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20
If we divide the last twelve years into three series
of four years each, we shall find that the average
death of the last four years is 707, of the preceding
four years 768, and of the four years preceding that
717.
The average death rate of the Parish for ten
years preceding 1856 was 775.
These facts will be
best represented by the following tables:—
Average death rate in 10 years,
from 1846 to 1856
775
Average death rate from 1857 to 1860
717
Average death rate from 1861 to 1864
768
Average death rate from 1864 to 1868
707
The remarkable diminution of the death rate after
1855 is probably partly attributed to the death of a
large number of persons of cholera in 1854 who,
had they not died of cholera, would probably have
increased the bills of mortality in the subsequent
years. The high death rates from 1800 to 1864 are
due as I have explained in my reports for those years,
to exceptional cold, over which, unfortnnately, sanitary
arrangements have little influence. The reduction
in the mortality of the year 1868, and of the
three preceding years may, I think, be fairly traceable
to the result of the persistent use of sanitary
means. Even during the second series of four years