40 
AACHEN. 
come, and so far as foresight can avail the defects of the past have been pre 
vented 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 muni 
cipality 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 wood 
cutting 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 improve 
ment 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