_Tending to prove that London hath more people and housing than the
cities of Paris and Rouen put together_, _and is also more considerable
in several other respects_.
1. THE medium of the burials at London in the three last years—viz.,
1683, 1684, and 1685, wherein there was no extraordinary sickness, and
wherein the christenings do correspond in their ordinary proportions with
the burials and christenings of each year one with another, was 22,337,
and the like medium of burials for the three last Paris bills we could
procure—viz., for the years 1682, 1683, and 1684 (whereof the last as
appears by the christenings to have been very sickly), is 19,887.
2. The city of Bristol in England appears to be by good estimate of its
trade and customs as great as Rouen in France, and the city of Dublin in
Ireland appears to have more chimneys than Bristol, and consequently more
people, and the burials in Dublin were, A.D. 1682 (being a sickly year)
but 2,263.
3. Now the burials of Paris (being 19,887) being added to the burials of
Dublin (supposed more than at Rouen) being 2,263, makes but 22,150,
whereas the burials of London were 187 more, or 22,337, or as about 6 to
7.
4. If those who die unnecessarily, and by miscarriage in L’Hôtel Dieu in
Paris (being above 3,000), as hath been elsewhere shown, or any part
thereof, should be subtracted out of the Paris burials aforementioned,
then our assertion will be stronger, and more proportionable to what
follows concerning the housing of those cities, viz.:
5. There were burnt at London, A.D. 1666, above 13,000 houses, which
being but a fifth part of the whole, the whole number of houses in the
said year were above 65,000; and whereas the ordinary burials of London
have increased between the years 1666 and 1686, above one-third the total
of the houses at London, A.D. 1686, must be about 87,000, which A.D.
1682, appeared by account to have been 84,000.
6. Monsieur Moreri, the great French author of the late geographical
dictionaries, who makes Paris the greatest city in the world, doth reckon
but 50,000 houses in the same, and other authors and knowing men much
less; nor are there full 7,000 houses in the city of Dublin, so as if the
50,000 houses of Paris, and the 7,000 houses in the city of Dublin were
added together, the total is but 57,000 houses, whereas those of London
are 87,000 as aforesaid, or as 6 to 9.
7. As for the shipping and foreign commerce of London, the common sense
of all men doth judge it to be far greater than that of Paris and Rouen
put together.
8. As to the wealth and gain accruing to the inhabitants of London and
Paris by law-suits (or _La chicane_) I only say that the courts of London
extend to all England and Wales, and affect seven millions of people,
whereas those of Paris do not extend near so far. Moreover, there is no
palpable conspicuous argument at Paris for the number and wealth of
lawyers like the buildings and chambers in the two Temples, Lincoln’s
Inn, Gray’s Inn, Doctors’ Commons, and the seven other inns in which are
chimneys, which are to be seen at London, besides many lodgings, halls,
and offices, relating to the same.