40
AACHEN.
come, and so far as foresight can avail the defects of the past have been prevented
for the future. No more manufactories are allowed within the residential
portions of the town, and special districts have been set apart for house property
suited to different classes of the population.
The undertakings carried on by the municipality include the waterworks,
electricity works, cattle market and abattoir, baths, library, reading rooms,
museum, theatre (now leased), an orchestra, a Kurhaus, a savings bank, and a
chemical laboratory. The tramways are in private hands, and the town is
supplied with gas by the Imperial Continental Gas Company, whose seat is in
London, in virtue of a contract which runs until 1912. From both these
undertakings, however, the town derives revenue. The Tramway Company
pays to the town 1 per cent, of the surplus of its receipts after deducting
working expenses up to an excess of £25,000, and 10 per cent, beyond that
amount, the present yield being £350, while the Gas Company pays a royalty
on all gas sold, and the revenue which accrued to the town from this source in
1905 was £8,500. The town supplies the tramways with electric power. By
its latest contract with the Tramway Company the municipality reserves the
right to purchase in 1915 or later.
In the interest of working - class and other small tenants the municipality
subsidises a free House Agency ; it assists a Labour Registry, and
provides it with offices rent free, and it also contributes to the support of a
People’s Inquiry Office and a writing-room for unemployed persons. For some
years the town has systematically carried on relief works (including woodcutting
and stone-breaking) during the winter months.
Aachen had in 1905 a birth-rate of 29*7 per thousand of the population,
the lowest recorded, and comparing with 35 0 per 1,000 in 1890. The illegitimate
births in 1905 were 5 5 per cent, of all births, which was the highest proportion
yet recorded, comparing with 4'0 per cent, in 1890. In 1905 the general
death-rate of the town was 18'9 per 1,000 ; the rate has decreased considerably
since 1893, when it was nearly 26 0 per 1,000, but the low rate of 1903, viz.,
17-2 per 1,000, is for the present unique. The deaths of children under one
year (still-born infants not counted) were in 1905 at the rate of 215 per
thousand born. In this respect there has been great and continuous improvement
during the past 15 years, for the rate has fallen in the interval from
380 per 1,000. Of late years philanthropic societies, working hand in hand
with the municipality and the medical profession, have energetically striven to
combat the excessive mortality amongst children of tender age by measures
directed to their better nursing and feeding. One of the most practical of their
efforts is the maintenance of a creche for the reception of infants whose mothers
work in the factories.
The following Table gives the rate of births and deaths for a period of
nine years :—
Year.
1897
1898
1899
1900
1901
1902
1903
1904
1905
Birth-rate per 1,000
of population.
342
35 2
33 9
33 9
343
321
305
312
29-7
Death-rate per 1,000
of population.
20-9
201
22 5
214
19- 9
20- 9
17 2
18-1
18-9
Infantile Mortality
per 1,000 births.
251
250
251
231
213
201
193
201
215
It will be observed that there has for some years been a gradual decrease
in the natural growth of the population. The excess of births over deaths in
1905 was 10-8 per 1,000 (comparing with 13*9 per 1,000 in the whole of
X russia, and 13*2 in the whole of Germany), against 13 3 per 1,000 in 1897.
A visitation of the homes of the working classes reveals the existence of a
large amount of poverty. The standard of housing is for that reason, amongst
others, an inferior one. The organisation of labour would not appear to have
made in Aachen the progress which one notices in industrial towns lying
