Density of population in cities becomes a matter of extreme importance connected with the visitations of pestilential diseases. A too crowded population may of itself engender a pestilence, and must inevitably aggravate one should it prevail from other causes. Hence the necessity which occasionally arises of thinning the inhabitants of certain districts—an exigency which, like that of war, often subverts civil authority, and demands the exercise of the most arbitrary power. We have recently seen our New York neighbours compelled to thin the population in some parts of their city, and we may yet be forced to have recourse to a similar measure. Upon this subject there are some interesting calculations furnished in Hazzard’s Register, (Vol. VIII. No. 5,) where may be found an interesting table, exhibiting the number of square feet in each ward of our city, together with the population at each census from 1790 to 1830, and the number of square feet to each inhabitant. From this table it appears that the increase in density of population throughout the city plot, has been in the following proportion during the forty years embraced in the estimate.
| In | 1790 | there was | 1 | person to | 1755 | square feet. |
| 1800 | ” | 1 | ” | 1216 | ||
| 1810 | ” | 1 | ” | 933 | ||
| 1820 | ” | 1 | ” | 986 | ||
| 1830 | ” | 1 | ” | 623 |
Viewing the wards separately, we find that, in 1830, there was one inhabitant to every 313 square feet of superficies in the eastern division, and one to 979 of the western.
| Eastern Wards. | |||
| New Market ward had | 1 | to | 236 |
| Lower Delaware | 1 | 243 | |
| Pine | 1 | 248 | |
| Upper Delaware | 1 | 318 | |
| Chesnut | 1 | 341 | |
| Walnut | 1 | 398 | |
| High | 1 | 402 | |
| Dock | 1 | 416 | |
| Average | 313 |
In the western wards, where there is a large proportion of unoccupied ground, the density varies from 840 to 1354 square feet to each inhabitant—the average being 979.
The propriety of legislative enactments limiting the maximum density of population, and the space allowed to be occupied by buildings, so as to ensure sufficient ventilation, &c. seems to us to be manifest. We shall take a future opportunity of offering some further remarks on this subject.
Injection of Saline Solutions into the Veins.
(Continued from page 55.)