Because the parish had no mortuary, and no room in which post-mortems could be performed.
The jurymen who went to view the body sickened at the frightful exhalations of this death-trap, and one who had thirty years' experience of London said never had he seen a fouler den.
I have turned to the newspapers for a report of the inquest and found it, and I think it will be better to present it word for word. It is an ordinary newspaper report of what has happened and been legally investigated, and may carry conviction where my own unsupported testimony would fail:
'A coroner's inquiry was held last night by Mr. Langham regarding the death of an infant aged two and a half months, the daughter of a butcher named Kent, who, with his wife and three children, occupy a single room on the third floor of premises used as a marine store in Wych Street. The inquiry was held in the Vestry-room of the parish. On the return of the jury from viewing the body—which lay in the room occupied by the family—one of the jurymen addressed the coroner. He had, he stated, during his thirty years' residence in the parish, seen many places which he regarded as unfit for dwelling-houses, but never had he seen one so bad as that which the jury had just visited. The staircase was dark and out of repair. The atmosphere inside was intolerable. Indeed, it was so bad that several of his fellow-jurymen had felt ill while they were there. They hoped that this expression of opinion would have some effect in inducing the proper authorities to provide a mortuary for the district, and that families who lived in one room might not be compelled to sleep and take their meals with a dead body within sight. Mr. Samuel Mills, surgeon, 3, Southampton Street, Strand, medical officer to the Bow Street Division of Police, deposed that he had made a post-mortem examination of the body on a propped-up table placed in front of the window of the room occupied by the family. The cause of death was consumption of the brain. From the state of the atmosphere in which the child was born, it was unhealthy. Another child had died from the same cause. He thought the local authority ought to provide a mortuary, and also a room in which post-mortem examinations could be conducted. A verdict in accordance with the medical evidence was returned by the jury, who further expressed their opinion that the want of a mortuary was calculated to be detrimental to the health of the persons living in the district; that there being no mortuary was a disgrace to the local authority; and that the circumstances surrounding the case they had investigated were a disgrace to this enlightened age.'
I will not add a word. I leave the newspaper report to arouse whatever thoughts it may in the minds of those who will peruse it. It is at least a revelation to many of 'How the Poor Live.'
Let me hark back again to the lighter side of my subject. I began the chapter with a story of the self-sacrifice of the poor. I will now end it with a little incident of which I was an eye-witness. Some poor children of the slums had 'a day in the country' given them by a friend, at which I had the privilege of being present.
At tea, to every little one there were given two large slices of cake; I noticed one little boy take his, break a little piece off, eat it, and quietly secrete the remainder in his jacket pocket. Curious, and half suspecting what his intention was, I followed the lad when tea was over to the fields.
'Eaten your cake yet?' I asked.
'No, sir,' he answered, colouring as though he had done something wrong.
'What are you going to do with it?'