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12
Table 6 shows the number of deaths from each of the seven
principal zymotic diseases for the 11 years since 1865; the per
centages for the 10 years 1865-1874; the per-centages of deaths
to total deaths, and to 10,000 population. The deaths of residents
from small pox varied between 2 in 1875 and 100 in 1871,
but, with the exception of 1871 and 1872, the largest mortality
in any other year was 31 viz., in 1866. The number of deaths
from measles has been much more uniform, as the greatest
number of deaths occurred in 1874, when they reached as many
as 68, and the lowest in 1867, when they were only 15. The
mortality from scarlet fever was intermediate as regards irregularity,
between measles and small pox, the smallest number
having been registered in 1873 and the highest in 1869, when
the mortality reached the very high number of 247, or about 2½
times the average of the ten years. Whooping cough caused its
greatest mortality last year, viz,, 113 deaths, and its smallest, 39,
in 1870. The deaths from fever have varied less than from any
of the other zymotic diseases, as the greatest number happened
in 1866, when it was 76, and the lowest in 1871, when it was
only 34. The deaths from diarrhoea have also varied largely,
having been as few as 76 in 1867, and as many as 161 in 1873.
Diarrhoea can scarcely be fairly classed with zymotic diseases, as
there is no evidence whatever to show that it is either contagious
or infectious, which all the other diseases undoubtedly are. Still,
as we are even now to a certain extent ignorant of the ultimate
causes of epidemic diarrhoea, we may reasonably continue its
grouping with the others. We know that its fatality corresponds
almost exactly with the mean weekly temperature of the summer
months, and that it prevails most severely in badly drained
places, especially in streets which have been built on thick
deposits of refuse. There was one death from cholera or choleraic
diarrhoea of a girl aged 16. She died in 18 hours, after having
been exposed to a very offensive smell from an open drain. The
rate of deaths from all these causes per 10,000 population was
40.2 during the years 1865-1874, and as low as 31.6 for last
year, which is below the average for all England. The deaths