1819
The extent of the Population has of late years been most satisfactory ascertained; and, contrasted with the facts unfolded in former calculations, the result of the census of 1811 constitutes an extraordinary pecularity in the history of the capital of the British Empire. In spite of the fearful prognostication of some, and the elaborate alarms of others, the population of the metropolis has nearly kept pace with the yearly increasing dimensions of the town, without any apparent injury to the health of the inhabitants : the same is the fact with the country at large. The population of England, Wales, and Scotland, in 1801, was 10,942,646, and in 1811 it was 12,596,803, being an absolute increase of 1,654,157, or about fifteen in a hundred ! The population of the metropolis, including a twenty-fifth part for the 14,000 arrivals of shipping annually, in 1801 was 900,000, but in 1811 it amounted to 1,050,000 : in 1700 it was computed at 674,350. The last parliamentary Population Returns states, that the walls of the ancient city of London included a space, now in the middle of the metropolis, about 1 1/2 mile in lenght from E. to W., and rather more than half a mile in breath. The city's population has diminished three-fifths since the beginning of the last century; streets having been widened, warehouses, &c., erected, whereby the number of inhabitans has been lessened. The city of London, without the walls, is an extention of the same ancient city, and is under the same jurisdiction. The out-parishes, constitute part of the Population Returns. The appellation is taken from the London Bills of Mortality, which were first used in 1562, and, from 1603, have been kept in regular series : these bills were intended to afford timely notice of any alarming increase of the plague, from which London was then seldom free. The crowded part of the city was purified by the memorable conflagration of 1666; in the proceeding year 68,596 persons died of the plague : but since the great fire it has entirely disappeared. The proportion of the sexes remains much the same as in 1801, being nearly as ten males to elevan females, of the resident population, and about equal in the general total.
Source: Leigh's New Picture of London. Printed for Samuel Leigh, 18, Strand;
by W. Clowes, Northumberland Court. 1819