, of
England and Wales. Some residents in Edinburgh also petitioned that
Scotland might be included; and accordingly, in August, 1839, Lord John
Russell addressed a letter to the Poor-Law Board, authorizing them by
royal command to extend to the whole of Great Britain the inquiry into
preventible disease, which had already been begun with regard to the
metropolis. The onerous task of setting on foot and superintending the
inquiry throughout,--of sifting the evidence, and classifying and
condensing it for the purposes of publication,--devolved upon Mr.
Chadwick.

The first Report on the Health of Towns was ready for publication in
1842. It _ought_ to have appeared as the Official Report of the Poor-Law
Board; but as the commissioners (some of whom were at variance with Mr.
Chadwick with respect to the New Poor-Law) refused to assume the
responsibility of a document that contained much that must necessarily
offend many influential public bodies, Mr. Chadwick took the
responsibility upon himself, and it was published as _his_
report,--which indeed it was,--and accepted from him as such by the
commissioners.

The amount of dry, hard work encountered by Mr. Chadwick in the
preparation of this and his other reports can scarcely be estimated,
except by those who know anything of the labour involved in extracting
from masses of evidence, written and printed, sent in from all parts of
the empire, only the most striking results bearing upon the question in
hand, and such as are deemed worthy of publication. The mountains of
paper which Mr. Chadwick has thus bored through in his lifetime must
have been immense; and could they now be presented before him in one
pile, they would appal even _his_ stout heart!

The sensation excited throughout the country by the publication of Mr.
Chadwick's Sanitary Report was immense. Such a revelation of the horrors
lying concealed beneath the fair surface of our modern civilization, had
never before been published. But Mr. Chadwick had no idea of merely
creating a sensation. He had an object in view, which he persistently
pursued. The report was nothing, unless its recommendations were
speedily carried into effect. A sanitary party was formed; and the
ministers for the time being, aided by members of both sides in
politics, became its influential leaders.

A Sanitary Commission was appointed in 1844, to consider the whole
question in its practical bearings. The Commission published two
repor