1866. ] The Sanitary Condition of Manchester. 495 
one thing is certain—lectures on Sanitary Science are worse than 
meaningless, and denunciations of filth, overcrowding, and drunken- 
ness, rank hypocrisy, whilst the authorities themselves are the 
chief offenders against propriety, and, as in Manchester, consciously 
and obstinately so. 
Whilst the Sanitary Act, 1866, was passing through Committee, 
private individuals were prosecuting and pressing the authorities of 
Leeds and Liverpool very hard, and they knew that as soon as the 
Act was passed appeals to the Home Secretary might be made 
against them; but the Leeds Town Council allowed the Bill to 
take its course, whilst that of Liverpool, through one of the Hon. 
Members for the Borough, expressed its cordial approval of the 
measure. But what did the Manchester authorities do? 
One of the clauses of the Bill empowered private individuals to 
summon Nuisance Authorities before the magistrates if they failed in 
the performance of their duty; and, will our readers believe it ? 
the Manchester Council formed a powerful coalition with other 
neighbouring municipal bodies and with persons in the House of 
Commons, who they thought would, through the political necessities 
of the Conservative Government, prove useful allies, and they sent a 
deputation tothe Home Secretary to induce him, if possible, to 
withdraw this clause. They succeeded so far as to obtain a modifi- 
cation of it, the final appeal being now transferred to the Home 
Secretary! In a recent case, however, when an appeal was made 
to the Home Secretary to compel the authorities of Liverpool to 
discontinue a nuisance, he stated that recourse must first be had 
to the local magistrates, and his authority invoked only as a final 
appeal, so the Manchester gentlemen have succeeded in rendering 
the previously existing law more stringent and effective. 
We doubt very much whether the good old town knows of 
these things, for the proceeding was very quietly conducted ; if not, » 
it will now be aware of the character of the “guardians of its 
health.” 
Before passing away from the consideration of the sanitary 
management of particular towns to the more general question of 
the means to be applied for enforcing reform, we would say a few 
words concerning mortality tables. The question of mortality 
must not be regarded in a partial manner, and it cannot yet be 
comprehensively considered. Outbreaks of some particular disease 
in one town will often exhibit its mortality rate to disadvantage for 
a time, and when the atmosphere is relieved, it may for a while 
appear to greater advantage than its sanitary condition would jus- 
tify. For example, the death-rate of Bristol for the week ending 
March 17, 1866, was 40, that of Manchester 39. But Bristol 
was suffering from an attack of typhus, and for the whole year 
1865, the death-rate of Bristol was 23°52, whilst i Manchester 
