222 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



criminals, loafers and some others, who are in number at the rate of 1 

 per cent, in all London — that is 100 per 10,000, or nearly three times 

 as many as the v class: they therefore include the whole of v and 

 spread upwards into the u. His class B consists of very poor persons 

 who subsist on casual earnings, many of whom are inevitably poor from 

 shiftlessness, idleness or drink. The numbers in this and the A class 

 combined closely correspond with those in t and all below t. 



Class C are supported by intermittent earnings; they are a hard- 

 working people, but have a very bad character for improvidence and 

 shiftlessness. In Class D the earnings are regular, but at the low rate 

 of twenty-one shillings or less a week, so none of them rise above 

 poverty, though none are very poor. D and C together correspond to 

 the whole of s combined with the lower fifth of r. The next class, E, 

 is the largest of any, and comprises all those with regular standard 

 earnings of twenty-two to tliirty shillings a week. This class is the 

 recognized field for all forms of cooperation and combination ; in short 

 for trades unions. It corresponds to the upper four fifths of r and 

 the lower four-fifths of E. It is therefore essentially the mediocre 

 class, standing as far below the highest in civic worth as it stands 

 above the lowest class with its criminals and semi-criminals. Xext 

 above this large mass of mediocrity comes the honorable class F, 

 which consists of better paid artisans and foremen. These are able to 

 provide adequately for old age, and their sons become clerks and so 

 forth. G is the lower middle class of shop-keepers, small employers, 

 clerks and subordinate professional men, who as a rule are hard-work- 

 ing, energetic and sober. F and G combined correspond to the upper 

 fifth of E and the whole of S, and are, therefore, a counterpart to D 

 and C. All above G are put together by Mr. Booth into one class 

 H, which corresponds to our T, U, V and above, and is the counterpart 

 of his two lowermost classes, A and B. So far, then, as these figures 

 go, civic worth is distributed in fair approximation to the normal law 

 of frequency. We also see that the classes t, u, v and below are un- 

 desirables. 



Worth of CJiildren. 



The brains of the nation lie in the higher of our classes. If such 

 people as would be classed W or X could be distinguishable as children 

 and procurable by money in order to be reared as Englishmen, it would 

 be a cheap bargain for the nation to buy them at the rate of many hun- 

 dred or some thousands of pounds per head. Dr. Farr, the eminent 

 statistician, endeavored to estimate the money worth of an average 

 baby born to the wife of an Essex laborer and thenceforward living 

 during the usual time and in the ordinary way of his class. Dr. Farr, 

 Mdth accomplished actuarial skill, capitalized the value at the child's 

 birth of two classes of events, the one the cost of maintenance while a 



