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that which produces the nuisance complained of. All works in which sulphuric acid, muriatic acid, nitric acid, bleaching powder, and salt cake are produced are under the supervision of inspectors of alkali works; but if the medical officer can distinctly trace any offensive and dangerous effluvium to any such works, the owner is liable to be prosecuted under the Sanitary Act.

Bone Boiling and soap and candle making are processes which frequently produce emanations injurious to health. These processes should be conducted in close places and in such a way that any noxious effluvia produced may be passed through a furnace and from thence sent into the atmosphere through a high chimney. The mode of dealing with nuisances arising from ammonia works, &c., is explained in the chapter on Pollution of the Atmosphere. Gas Works sometimes produce a nuisance either at the place where the gas is manufactured or by leakages from the mains. Bad Odours in a dwelling or its yard, proceeding from a defective sewer, are nuisances of frequent occurrence.

Steam Whistles used in factories for the purpose of awakening the workpeople in the early morning are a nuisance, as they frequently disturb the sick and annoy the healthy. They are dealt with by 35 & 36 Vict., c. 61, s. 2.

In Section 19 of 29 and 30 Vict., c. 90, and sec. 8 of 18 and 19 Vict., c. 121, there are definitions of nuisances given

CHAPTER IV.

VITAL STATISTICS.

It seems an inexorable law of nature that at least 11 human beings out of every 1,000 living must die every year. As a matter of fact, from 15 to 40 per 1,000 perish, the variation in the numbers being chiefly, sometimes solely, produced by local causes. In the United Kingdom about 21 persons die annually out of every 1,000. Sanitary science has but two objects to accomplish-to reduce to the normal number mortality from disease, and to diminish the amount of sickness. That the number of persons perishing annually from disease so considerably exceeds the inevitable number above-mentioned is sufficient evidence that sanitarians have a vast work before them, as important, difficult, and onerous as any that concerns mankind in matters temporal. To enable sanitarians to estimate the amount or rather the result of their work, accurate statistical information relative to the number of deaths and births, and the amount and nature of present disease, is of the highest degree of importance. Unfortunately, there is no registration of disease in these countries; but we have records of the births and deaths

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which, though not absolutely accurate, are of the highest value to sanitarians.

Very few people die from old age, yet that is the natural termination of man's life. In the mortality returns a small proportion of the deaths is officially ascribed to "accident;" but a larger number really results from accidental causes. If a strong and healthy man be poisoned with sewer emanations, and die from typhoid fever, surely that circumstance would be an accident! Every death from a preventable disease is an accident, and not a natural and inevitable event. Nor are all the maladies termed "constitutional" necessarily inherent in man's nature: most of them are the results of privation, hardship, intemperance, gluttony, and immorality. Many of them are produced by breathing bad air and drinking foul water. They not only originate in our own faults and misfortunes, but we also inherit them from our ancestors; for the effects of the sins and mishaps of men afflict their children " even unto the third and fourth generation."

The mean period of the life of the people is the best test of the condition of the public health. In England the average duration of human life is 39.91 years in the case of males, and 41·85 in that of females. In Scotland the duration of human life is somewhat longer than in England. In Ireland the vital statistics collected are somewhat unreliable. In some districts the mortality is much greater than in others. During the ten years ended in 1867 the average death-rate in the districts of England containing the chief towns, and including a population of 11,000,000, was 23.89 per 1,000 persons living. During the same period in the smaller towns and country parishes, containing a population (in 1861) of 9,135,383, the rate of mortality was 20.08 in every 1,000 persons living.

In every 1,000 deaths in these islands, nearly one-fourth occur from zymotic diseases; more than one-third from local maladies— inflammations and functional diseases of the heart, lungs, and other organs; 180 from "constitutional diseases," such as phthisis, gout, and dropsy; and nearly all the rest-chiefly of children and aged persons are caused by developmental diseases, such as debility. About 30 deaths per 1,000 occur from violence-murders, suicides, and accidents. Half the number of deaths of young women between the ages of 20 and 30 years are caused by consumption. In some parts of England the death-rate is so low as 15 per 1,000 living; in others it rises to from 30 to more than

40.

According to Mr. Ratcliffe, rural labourers have on the average 45.32 years to live; carpenters, 45-28 years; domestic servants, 42.03 years; sawyers, 42.02 years; bakers, 41.92 years; shoemakers, 40.87 years; weavers, 41.92 years; tailors, 39-40 years; hatters, 38 91 years; stonemasons, 38-19 years; plumbers, 38.13 years; mill operatives, 38-09 years; blacksmiths, 37.96 years; bricklayers, 37.70 years; printers, 36-66 years; clerks, 34.99 years; population of England and Wales, 39.88 years. The rela

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tive mortality in these trades is not constant at all ages; for exple, a printer at 60 years of age has a mean expectancy of 12.04 years; whilst, at the same age, a bricklayer's expectancy of life is only 8.44 years. As a general rule, the average relative mortality amongst persons following different pursuits is very closely maintained at all periods of life.

It is a melancholy reflection that one-half of the human family perish before the age of puberty, and chiefly from causes brought into operation by man himself. In the healthiest of the larger cities of the United States, Philadelphia, no less than 42-72 of the deaths in 1873 were amongst children under 5 years.

In England 4,650 per cent., and in France 7.3487 per cent. of the children born die during the first month of their existence. In the former country 14.9493 per cent. of the children born perish before they enter upon a second year of life.

TABLE SHOWING EXPECTATION OF LIFE AT DIFFERENT AGES, IN A HEALTHY DISTRICT, ACCORDING TO DR. FARR.

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Mr. Neison states that persons of intemperate habits, aged 20 years, live on the average to be 35 years; and if they are 30 years, their mean expectation of life is 13.80 years. He calculates that the average duration of life after the commencement of intemperate habits is 21-7 years amongst the beer drinkers, and 16·7 years amongst the spirit drinkers.

M. Quetelet, the Belgian statistician, presented a report on the vital status of European countries to the Statistical Congress assembled at Florence in 1867. The table shows the birth and death rates per 10,000 inhabitants in various States, arranged from Quetelet's report:

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Influence of Occupation upon Longevity.

27

According to Levy and other authorities, marriages and births are less amongst Jews than Christians; but the longevity of the former is greater. Dr. Glötter states that the mean duration of life amongst Germans is 28.5 years; Hungarians, 23·11; Croats, 22·1; Jews, 30-2. Mayer' gives the mean duration of life amongst Jews at 37 years; amongst Christians, 26 years.

In England there are, on the average, five children to each marriage. The richer classes have fewer children than the poorer. Very youthful marriages are not conducive to longevity. In England the number of children annually born is about one to every twenty-nine persons living.

Mr. Radcliffe, in his observations on the rate of mortality existing among friendly societies (Manchester, 1850), gives the following table:

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Influence of Marriage on Health.-Levy, Motard, Londe, Tracy, Broussais and several other vital statisticians agree in attributing to matrimony a beneficial effect on life and health.

At a meeting of the French Academy of Medicine, held on the 14th of November, 1871, M. Bertillon discussed this subject in an elaborate paper on diseases. His statistics chiefly apply to France,

'Deutche Zeitschr. f. d. Statistik, t. xxi., p. 2. 1862.

28 Relation between Celibacy and Longevity.

Belgium, and Holland. From 25 to 30 years of age, the married men die at the rate of 6, the unmarried 10, and the widower 22 per 1,000 per annum. From 30 to 35 years, the deaths amongst these classes are respectively 7, 11, and 19 per 1,000, and from 35 to 40 years, 74, 13, and 17 per 1,000. At greater ages the same favourable difference exists in the case of the Benedicts versus the Celibates. It is curious that widowers are more likely to die than men of the same age who have never been married. The exceptions to the low mortality amongst Benedicts are only in the case of those who marry very early in life. It is rather startling to youthful worshippers at the shrine of Hymen to be informed that married men from 18 to 20 die as fast as men aged from 65 to 70. Amongst women marriage is not quite so favourable to longevity. No effect is observed until after the age of 25 years. Spinsters from 30 to 35 die at the annual rate of 11 per 1,000; wives in the ratio of 9 per 1,000. The mortality is greater in the case of wives under 25 years than of spinsters below that age. After 40 years the longevity of married women is much greater than that of unmarried females of corresponding ages. Middle-aged widows do not live so long as middle-aged spinsters or wives. M. Bertillon shows that, according to the doctrine of chances, or rather probabilities, a man who marries at 25 years is likely to live 40 years longer, whilst his chance of living so long, if he do not marry, is reduced by five years. On the other hand, a woman who marries at 25 years is likely to attain the age of 65, whilst if she remain single, she will only attain the age of 56 years.

According to Bertillon, crime is most rife amongst the unmarried, and least amongst the married. The widowers and widows are not nearly so bad as those who are unwedded, but they are not (of course, speaking only of averages) quite so virtuous as those who are actually in the state of wedlock. On the whole, M. Bertillon's statistics are most cheering to the intending Benedicts.

In the manufacturing districts of England the bad influence of early marriages is rendered painfully evident by the wretched stunted children who are to be met with in every direction; for there children are the mothers of children, and couples are to be met with whose united ages do not exceed thirty years.

In the report of the Board of Health for Philadelphia, 1873, the following conclusions are deduced from the vital statistics of one city:

The probabilities of marriage under twenty years are about forty-two times as great with females as with males; between twenty and twentyfive they are more nearly equal, though still in favour of females; but after the twenty-fifth year is passed the probabilities of marriage are always in favour of males, and the proportion increases throughout the remaining periods of life. Between twenty-five and thirty they are 1-21 times as great with males as with females; between thirty and forty, 1.83

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