Genre:

Poetry

Subjects:

Disease, Public Health, Sanitation, Pollution, Medical Treatment

    Detailed description of the dirty, odorous, and disease-ridden state of the author's street in Bloomsbury. Lamenting the dire condition of his 'triple-tenanted' rooms in Bloomsbury, observes that his 'walls shake with all they see of sickness, crime, and care: / While Vestrymen and Guardians, Health Boards, and Boards of Sewers, / Are wrangling round my wretchedness about their several cures'. Desperately seeks various sanitary measures to stop his 'helpless, hopeless inmates' succumbing to the 'red plague'.