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young adult lives, and of old and infirm ones, on
the death-rate of both town and country. "It is,"
he says, "rather disquieting to have one's attention
called to the unsoundness of the basis upon which
local death-rates, tables of mortality, and I know
not what else, have been calculated; "and, indeed,
he concludes from his investigations that "if we
wish to form an idea as to the comparative salubrity
or otherwise of two country districts, we must rely
on the death-rates at the ages of 0—10 and 45—75,
and abandon the thought of deducing any instructive
result from mortuary statistics at the
intervening ages. And the same remark," he adds,
"subject to some correction, will apply to town
districts." In point of fact it is fast becoming a
well-grounded conviction that the death-rate of a
place affords no indication of its salubrity without
reference to the various circumstances which affect
it, and that the weekly publications by the
Registrar General of the death-rates of 18 of the
chief towns of England are of no practical value.*
* See on this head the following :—
"Inconsistencies of the English Census, 1861." By William Lucas
Sargant. A paper read before the Statistical Society, January, 1865.
"Notes on the Principles of Population." By Andrew A. Watt, of
Montreal. 1869.
"On the Comparative Mortality of Large Towns." By Dr. E. J.
Syson. A paper read before the Manchester Statistical Society,
January, 1871.
"On the Effect of Migrations in disturbing Local Bates of Mortality."
By Thomas A. Welton. 1871.