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to compare the salubrity of one district with another, for as I
pointed out years ago, the mortality varies with the number of
infants, middle-aged and old people, with the social status of
the population as regards income, &c., also density of population,
and especially overcrowding. Thus iu Hackney we should
hardly have expected so low a death rate now as in 1851, when
the proportion of servants and other middle-aged people, not
likely to die in the district, was so much smaller then than now,
and yet it is a fact that the death rate was smaller here in 1872
than in 1851, or any year, except 1850, which was near it.
Diseases of the nervous system caused the death of 313
persons, or 12.5 per cent, which was above the average by 0.5
per cent. and affections of the circulatory organs produced 150
deaths, or 6 per cent. of the whole, which was also more than
the mean. Diseases of the respiratory organs, excluding
consumption, were fatal to no less thau 403 persons, which was
at the rate of 16.2 per cent, or above au average. Affections
of the digestive and urinary organs produced the death of 157
persons, or 6.3 per cent., which was a little above the mean,
whilst no less than 147 deaths were registered as having been
caused by premature birth and atrophy, or 5'9 per cent. against
5 5 per cent. in 16 years. The greatest difference from the
mean occurred in the deaths from old age, as only 119 or 4-8
per cent. were registered from this cause against an average of
6.9 per cent. A reference to the ages at death for the years
1850-72 shows that this reduction arose only in a small ratio
from the diminished number of deaths above 65, as in 1872
the rate was 9 4 per cent. against 10.1 per cent. for 1850-72,
but was partly caused by a more correct registration of the
causes of death.