The Sanitary and Moral Condition of New York City.
A glance at New York City, embracing the entire of Manhattan Island, will show that its geographical position, its advantages for sewerage and drainage, in fact for everything that would make it salubrious and healthy, cannot be surpassed by any city in this or any other country. And still, with its bountiful supply of nature's choicest gifts, many of our readers will be surprised to hear that our death-rate is higher than that of any city on this continent, or any of the larger cities of Europe. We append a table showing the relative per annum mortality in various cities:
| City | Death. Population. |
| New York | 1 in 35 |
| London | 1 in 45 |
| Paris | 1 in 40 |
| Copenhagen | 1 in 36 |
| Christiansund, (Norway.) | 1 in 40 |
| Liverpool | 1 in 44 |
| Philadelphia | 1 in 48 |
| Boston | 1 in 41 |
| Newark, N. J | 1 in 44 |
| Providence | 1 in 45 |
| Hartford | 1 in 54 |
| Rochester | 1 in 44 |
[Footnote 163]
[Footnote 163: Health in Country and Cities. W. F. Thorns, M. D.]
Let us first examine the conditions which favor and cause this excessively high death-rate, and then approximate as nearly as possible what our percentage of mortality should be, under good hygienic regulations.
The primary cause of the present condition is, evidently, in the packing system of the tenant-houses; and how the unfortunates exist in the fetid air and dirt of these dens, it is impossible to imagine. The name tenant-house is applied to all buildings containing three or more families. There are at present in our city 18,582 of these residences. In these live over a half-million of people, or more than half of our entire population. These houses vary in condition, from the apartments over stores on our prominent thoroughfares, which often contain all the comforts and conveniences of more aristocratic and imposing structures, through many gradations to the cellar, garrets, and model tenant-houses, occupied by the most miserable of our inhabitants. Such an economy of space was never known to be displayed in sheltering cattle as is here shown in the houses, if they can be so called, of the laboring classes. We give a description of one of these establishments, for the benefit of those who have never examined a "model tenant-house." On a lot 25 by 100 feet two buildings are erected, one in the front, the second in the rear. Between the houses is a yard or open space, in which are located rows of stalls to be used as water-closets. The buildings are frequently seven and eight stories high, including basement. Through the middle of each house runs a hall three to four feet wide. On each side of the hall are the apartments, as they are termed, more properly coops or dens. There are sometimes three or four sets of these coops to each half, making six or eight families to the floor; and so they are packed, from the cellar to the roof of the establishment. As the term "suites of apartments" is rather deceptive to the uninitiated, we will state this means simply two—one, the common room, where all the cooking, washing, and other family work is performed, and in some instances used additionally for manufacturing purposes, as shoe-making, tailoring, etc.; the other is the sleeping-room. The first is generally 8 feet by 10, and the second 7 by 8, with an average height of 7 feet. "Not unfrequently two families—yea, four families—live in one of these small sets of dens; and in this manner as many as 126 families, numbering over 800 souls, have been packed into one such building, and some of the families taking boarders and lodgers at that. And worse yet, all around such tenements, or in close proximity to them, stand slaughter-houses, stables, tanneries, soap factories, and bone-boiling establishments, emitting life-destroying exhalations." [Footnote 164]
[Footnote 164: Mr. Dyer's Report on the Condition of the Destitute and Outcast Children of this city.]