386 Original Articles. [July* 



than that formally condemned by the Royal Commission as insufficient for 

 a single soldier in barracks ! The amount of over-crowding in most 

 instances may be easily imagined by any one who will take the trouble 

 of measuring a space eight feet in each direction, and assigning it in 

 fancy as a habitation for six adults. It is hardly necessary for me to 

 say that I find in the facts above mentioned ample explanation of the 

 prevalence of typhus fever in the Rookery." This is the first part of 

 Dr. Gairdner's evidence, and no one will, we think, be disposed to 

 dissent from his conclusions. There will be no need for tendei*- 

 hearted readers hereafter to shudder over the accounts of the tragedy 

 in the Black-hole at Calcutta ; the report of Dr. Gairdner, and others, 

 to which reference has still to be made, will furnish records quite as 

 horrible, and even more repulsive in details. 



But it is not necessary to confine our inquiries to our own country, 

 for accumulated evidence of the truths advanced above is also to be 

 found in the reports of the Sanitary Commission of Paris. This body 

 of gentlemen, known as the " Commission des Logements Insalubres," 

 was constituted in 1850, and forms a permanent commission, with full 

 power to reform the character of the dwellings of the working classes 

 in Paris. A passing notice of the constitution of this board may be 

 useful to the English people, for it is not made up of amateur legis- 

 lators only, whose interests (as we have already seen) are not always 

 in unison with the public good, and upon whom an inconvenient pres- 

 sure may often be brought to bear by selfish and awkward constituents, 

 but it consists — 1st, of public officers appointed by the State, such as 

 the Inspector-General of " Ponts et Chaussees," the Water and Sewer 

 Engineer, the Superintendent (chef de division) of Public Works, and 

 four other gentlemen holding public appointments ; 2nd, of members 

 appointed by the Municipal Council, comprising the leading medical 

 men attached to the various hospitals, of chemists, engineers, archi- 

 tects, one of the judges of the Civil Tribunal of the Seine, and private 

 individuals ; and 3rd, of supplementary members, also appointed by 

 the municipality, as circumstances may direct. 



The results of having a committee thus constituted are unanimity of 

 action and the issue of just and feasible recommendations. Those 

 who have watched the efforts which have been made in England to 

 enforce sanitary reforms by bringing the offenders before the lay 

 magistrates must have noticed that differences constantly arise between 

 them and the guardians of the public health, and that private feelings 

 and prejudices are often an increment in the judicial decrees ; but in the 

 French Commission no such difficulty is to be apprehended, inasmuch 

 as different members of the commission are competent to decide in all 

 matters of law and detail with the same precision as if they consti- 

 tuted a final court of appeal. 



A further advantage in the operation of the French Commission 

 over some of our local boards, is the moral influence which its decisions 

 carry with them. In England an offender may often feel that his 

 security lies in the chance of the magistrate taking a lenient view of 

 his case, and differing from the sanitary officer, and so he may be 

 induced to turn a deaf ear to the voice of jiistice and morality until 



