NUMBER OF WORKMEN AFFECTED. 37 



plies a coincidently increased number of deaths from most other 

 disorders. The statistical tables afford evidence in corrobora- 

 tion of this fact. The proofs already submitted have sufficiently, 

 I doubt not, impressed you with the extent of the evil to which 

 they are intended to direct your attention. It is a question, 

 to which attaches great interest, to know how many workmen 

 in the United Kingdom are, by means of their employments, 

 directly exposed to these effects. Have we any means of arriving 

 at the knowledge of this important fact 1 We are certainly with- 

 out any positive data to guide us, but I shall endeavour to arrive, 

 as nearly as possible, at a correct estimate of their numbers. 



Taking then, as the basis of our calculation, the recently pub- 

 lished census for the ten years previous to 1881, we find that the 

 whole industrial class has, during that period, increased by one 

 hundred and eighty-one thousand; and that in their aggregate 

 strength, they at present constitute a fourth part of the entire 

 population of the United Kingdom (24-97). That gives them, as 

 you will see, a numerical strength, say, of eight millions, five 

 hundred thousand : the entire population of the United King- 

 dom being thirty-four millions, six hundred and twenty-eight 

 thousand, three hundred and thirty-eight. 



Carefully scanning the various employments embraced by the 

 entire industrial class, I reckon that a proportion of one-tenth of 

 their number suffers that is to say, eight hundred and fifty 

 thousand are thus exposed to the injurious effects of their occupa- 

 tions. The first and immediate effect of this is, that every 

 member of this eight hundred and fifty thousand has his life 

 reduced to an average of forty-five years. 



Taking fifty-five years as a fair average standard to which each 

 ought in favourable surroundings to attain, it follows that every 

 one of these workmen loses ten years of his working life. Now 

 we may assume that a working man enters on active employment 

 at an age not later than fifteen, and from this it will appear that 

 the average lifetime after beginning work is about forty years. 

 But in the case of those whose 'average duration of life does not 

 extend beyond the average of forty-five, there will be only thirty 

 years of life after beginning work, or three-fourths of the normal 

 period. It therefore follows, as three times fifteen complete the 



