Periods. 1801-'11,

We subjoin some additional facts respecting this disease in places without this Commonwealth :

Places.

Portsmouth, N.H., 19 yrs. 1818-25,

We might extend this statement, and show the prevalence of this disease in the milder climates of the West Indies, and on the sunny shores of Italy; and demonstrate how fruitless, generally, are the attempts to arrest its ravages. It is stated that, "of thirty-five consumptive patients who went to Madeira in 1821, two-thirds died at sea; three died in the first month after their arrival; five or six survived the winter, and about the same number survived the following spring; three or four lived to the second winter; but, of the whole number, there

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were but thirteen living in 1824. The grave-yards of Rome, Naples, Marseilles, Pisa, Nice, and Malta, bear ample testimony to the fatality of this disease among those who have been induced to seek a foreign clime in the vain hope of recovery." 1

5. The Diseases of the Circulative Organs are principally confined to those affecting the heart. These seem to have increased, both in the State and in Boston. In the latter, from .37 to 1.73,-more than 500 per cent.

6. The Diseases of the Digestive Organs embrace a very large class. Some may be zymotic or sporadic, as circumstances occur by which they are developed. The zymotic diseases, affecting these organs, are cholera, cholera infantum, diarrhoea, and dysentery; and the principal diseases of the sporadic class, as they appear in the tables, are enteritis, or inflammation of the bowels, teething, and the undefined diseases of these organs. The whole of both classes, in the table, may be stated as follows:

This statement shows that these diseases cause 12.61 per cent., or about one-eighth, of the deaths in this State, and 21.89, or about one-fifth, in Boston.

The influence of seasons and ages is greater in these diseases than in any other class, as will appear from the statement on the next page.

This table illustrates, in a remarkable manner, the modifying influences of the seasons and ages upon the diseases specified. When it is known how dangerous the months of July, August, September, and October, are to children, we should be especially taught to guard against all the causes which, at that time, excite these diseases.

1 British and Foreign Medical Review, Vol. XXIV, p. 107.

7. The Diseases of the Urinary Organs do not constitute a large class, and in neither period amount to one per cent. Gravel and diabetes are the most numerous of the class.

8. The Diseases of the Generative Organs are an important though not a large class. Cases of puerperal fever are classed under the diseases of child-birth; and they have been in nearly the same proportion in all periods of our history, in Boston and in the country.

9. The Diseases of the Locomotive Organs. Rheumatism, or rheumatic fever, has occasioned the greatest number of deaths. Spinal diseases are also increasing.

10. The Diseases of the Integumentive Organs have caused about the same uniform proportion. Ulcers are stated to have

produced more deaths than all other diseases of this class.

11. Old Age has fewer deaths, in proportion to the whole, to record among its victims now, than at the former periods of our history. In Boston, in 1810 to 1820, it destroyed 5.04 per cent.; in the last period, only 2.46; a decrease of more than one-half.

12. The Deaths by Violence are nearly as great in the country as in Boston, though the proportional numbers vary in both places. Accidents and drowning are the most numerous causes. Burns and scalds, intemperance and suicide, cause nearly the same proportions.

The following are some of the many important conclusions to which the facts thus far disclosed lead us:

1. It is proved that there is a great difference, in this State, in the longevity of people living in different places and under different circumstances. This fact is presented in a forcible manner in the subjoined illustration, taken from the Census of Boston, (p. 158.) The cut is drawn in ten divisions, each way; those from left to right representing the ages of life; those from top to bottom, the per centage of survivors :

10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100

Take one hundred persons from each of four different classes of people: 100 of those who enjoy an amount of life equal to the healthy classes in England; 100 of those who died at Newton, in 1810 to 1830; 100 of those who died in Boston, in 1840 to 1845; and 100 of the Catholics of Boston. If each of the hundred persons in all these classes had lived 100 years, each class would have enjoyed 10,000 years of life. But persons die at all ages, and in some classes very much earlier than in others. Accordingly four lines are drawn diagonally

across the cut, from the top on the left to the bottom on the right, to represent the amount of life that each class enjoyed. The white and shaded spaces below these lines represent life, and the dark and shaded spaces above the lines represent death. The upper line represents the survivors in England; the next below, those in Newton; the third, the general population of Boston; and the fourth, the Catholics. It will be perceived that 82 per cent., or 82 out of every 100, of the lives in England pass the line of 10 years, or survive that age; while only 34 per cent., or 34 out of every 100 Catholics, pass the same line! That 38.75 per cent., in Newton, survived 60 years, while only 9.95, in Boston, survived the same age! Other comparisons, equally striking, may be made.

2. It is proved that causes exist in Massachusetts, as in England, to produce premature and preventable deaths, and hence unnecessary and preventable sickness; and that these causes are active in all the agricultural towns, but press most heavily upon cities and populous villages.

3. It is proved that measures,-legislative, social and personal,-do not at present exist, or are not so fully applied, as they might be, by the people, for the prevention, mitigation, or removal, of the causes of disease and death.

4. It is proved that the people of this State are constantly liable to typhus, cholera, dysentery, scarlatina, small-pox, and the other great epidemics; and to consumption, and the other fatal diseases, which destroy so many of the human race in other parts of the world.

5. It is proved that the active causes of disease and death are increasing among us, and that the average duration of life is not as great now as it was forty or fifty years ago.

We are fully aware that the general opinion does not coincide with this fact, and that a directly opposite one has been expressed. It has been frequently said, that, owing to the different modes of living, the increased medical skill, and other causes, diseases have been ameliorated, and the average length of human life has been extended; and particularly within the last fifty years. We have long thought differently, especially in regard to the more recent periods of our history. Those who