As for other comparisons of London with Paris, we farther repeat and
enlarge what hath been formerly said upon those matters, as followeth,
viz.:—
1. That forty per cent. die out of the hospitals at Paris where so many
die unnecessarily, and scarce one-twentieth of that proportion out of the
hospitals of London, which have been shown to be better than the best of
Paris.
2. That at Paris 81,280 kitchens are within less than 24,000
street-doors, which makes less cleanly and convenient way of living than
at London.
3. Where the number of christenings are near unto, or exceed the
burials, the people are poorer, having few servants and little equipage.
4. The river Thames is more pleasant and navigable than the Seine, and
its waters better and more wholesome; and the bridge of London is the
most considerable of all Europe.
5. The shipping and foreign trade of London is incomparably greater than
that at Paris and Rouen.
6. The lawyers’ chambers at London have 2,772 chimnies in them, and are
worth £140,000 sterling, or 3,000,000 of French livres, besides the
dwellings of their families elsewhere.
7. The air is more wholesome, for that at London scarce two of sixteen
die out of the worst hospitals, but at Paris above two of fifteen out of
the best. Moreover the burials of Paris are one-fifth part above and
below the medium, but at London not above one-twelfth, so as the
intemperies of the air at Paris is far greater than at London.
8. The fuel cheaper, and lies in less room, the coals being a wholesome
sulphurous bitumen.
9. All the most necessary sorts of victuals, and of fish, are cheaper,
and drinks of all sorts in greater variety and plenty.
10. The churches of London we leave to be judged by thinking that
nothing at Paris is so great as St. Paul’s was, and is like to be, nor so
beautiful as Henry the Seventh’s chapel.
11. On the other hand, it is probable, that there is more money in Paris
than London, if the public revenue (grossly speaking, quadruple to that
of England) be lodged there.
12. Paris hath not been for these last fifty years so much infested with
the plague as London; now that at London the plague (which between the
years 1591 and 1666 made five returns, viz., every fifteen years, at a
medium, and at each time carried away one-fifth of the people) hath not
been known for the 21 years last past, and there is a visible way by
God’s ordinary blessing to lessen the same by two-thirds when it next
appeareth.
13. As to the ground upon which Paris stands in respect of London, we
say, that if there be five stories or floors of housing at Paris, for
four at London, or in that proportion, then the 82,000 families of Paris
stand upon the equivalent of 65,000 London housteds, and if there be
115,000 families at London, and but 82,000 at Paris, then the proportion
of the London ground to that of Paris is as 115 to sixty-five, or as
twenty-three to thirteen.
14. Moreover Paris is said to be an oval of three English miles long and
two and a half broad, the area whereof contains but five and a half
square miles; but London is seven miles long, and one and a quarter broad
at a medium, which makes an area of near nine square miles, which
proportion of five and half to nine differs little from that of thirteen
to twenty-three.
15. Memorandum, that in Nero’s time, as Monsieur Chivreau reporteth,
there died 300,000 people of the plague in old Rome; now if there died
three of ten then and there, being a hotter country, as there dies two of
ten at London, the number of people at that time, was but a million,
whereas at London they are now about 700,000. Moreover the ground within
the walls of old Rome was a circle but of three miles diameter, whose
area is about seven square miles, and the suburbs scarce as much more, in
all about thirteen square miles, whereas the built ground at London is
about nine square miles as aforesaid; which two sorts of proportions
agree with each other, and consequently old Rome seems but to have been
half as big again as the present London, which we offer to antiquaries.