IT is an amusing statistical fact that at the census of 1901 our "overcrowded" England had but 558 persons to the square mile, or one person to 1.15 acres, or one family to about 6 acres. If in 1901 the population of England and Wales had been distributed evenly over the area there would have been a distance of 240 feet between each person. In 1871 a similar distribution would have removed each person from his neighbour by 288 feet. Thus England is little more "crowded" to-day than it was a generation ago. It is useful to remind ourselves by these statistical exercises that the country is indeed nearly empty, and the towns very full. In the 75,000 acres of the administrative county of London were crowded, at the census of 1901, 4,536,541 people, a number as great as the entire population of Australia, almost as great as the entire population of the Dominion of Canada, and more than one-tenth of the entire population of the United Kingdom. In London and 75 other great towns in England and Wales are crowded about 15,000,000 persons or about one-half of the entire population of the country. As London and the great towns grow, the countryside is increasingly depopulated, and not the countryside alone. Many small towns are decreasing in size. Thus an increasing population is ever huddling closer together in a diminishing number of centres.
The greater number of our new births, then, are in crowded districts. The figures of Book I. tell us, also that the greater number are in urban houses of a rental under £20 per annum. The rental values of the houses of Great Britain in 1907-8 were as follows:
HOUSES OF GREAT BRITAIN, 1907-8
The figures do not include Ireland, but they include all residential shops, lodging-houses, hotels, farm-houses, etc., in Great Britain.
| Under £20 (Exempt from House Duty), | 6,875,000 |
| £20 and over (Charged to House Duty). | 1,912,000 |
| 8,787,000 |
Of the 8,787,000 houses fully 7,000,000 are obviously the homes of the very poor, as we should expect if the statements made in the earlier parts of this book are true. In various districts the accommodation which can be bought for £20 a year varies greatly, as has been already pointed out. £20 per annum may command a decent home in some parts of the provinces or Scotland, or a filthy tenement in East London or Manchester. Broadly speaking, the majority of the houses under £20 are fit for demolition. They rank in our estimate of capital (Chapter 5) for a great deal of money; they command an enormous amount of rent, but, I repeat, they are chiefly fit for destruction. In a minority of cases they are indecent or insanitary; in a majority of cases they are either old or ugly or uncomfortable. Rarely are they fit habitations for a self-respecting people. The same is true of many of the houses up to £40 and even £50 per annum in London and other crowded centres. Many £40 dwellings in London are crowded tenement houses, each of several reeking floors.
What overcrowding means to the lives of those who suffer it may be illustrated by the table prepared by Sir Shirley Murphy, which compares the sanitary areas of Hampstead and Southwark in respect of expectation of life. I have added the fourth column to give prominence to the accusing fact that the poor are robbed not of means alone but of life itself: