Population  and  Difeafes  of  Chefter.  145 
like  moft  other  great  towns,  is  unfavourable  to  popula- 
tion. Thus  it  appears,  from  the  general  bill  for  ten 
years,  that,  on  an  average,  one  marriage  produces  lefs 
than  three  children.  One  caufe  of  this  frnall  proportion 
is  probably  the  want  of  manufactures,  which  might  ena- 
ble the  loweft  clafs  of  people  to  marry  in  earlier  youth : 
taking  the  whole  town,  the  number  of  perfons  in  each 
family  is  4 and  J>3d.  The  inhabitants  under  15  years 
old  are  4486,  that  is,  more  than  a third.  The  proportion 
of  deaths  this  year  to  the  number  of  inhabitants  is 
nearly  at  1 to  27  : this  difference  from  the  common  de- 
gree of  health  is  occafioned  by  the  unufual  fatality  of 
the  fmall-pox.  Table  in.  fhews  that  the  greater  mor- 
tality of  the  fummer  than  the  winter  quarter  of  1774 
was  occafioned  by  the  epidemic  fmall-pox,  which  began 
in  July:  yet  ftill  that  winter  and  autumn  taken  together 
were  more  fatal  than  the  fpring  and  fummer  in  the  pro- 
portion of  326  to  220,  that  is,  near  one-lixth  more  died 
‘ in  the  former  than  in  the  latter  portion  of  time. 
There  is  a general  prejudice  in  Chefter,  that  it  is  un- 
healthy to  inhabit  the  Rows;  a prejudice  moft  clearly  re- 
futed by  many  of  the  preceding  obfervations.  The  Rows 
run  along  the  central  ftreets,  which  include  incompara- 
bly the  moft  healthy  part  of  the  town. 
Vol.  LXVIII.  u 
That 
