758 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



ratio tliaii the unmarried. The average age of the married ex- 

 ceeded that of the unmarried by about fourteen months. This 

 coincides with the results obtained from other sources. So far 

 as I know, all statistics show a smaller mortality rate and a 

 greater longevity among the married than the unmarried. Mr. 

 Darwin urges matrimony as one of the greatest aids to long life, 

 and calls attention to a mass of statistics gathered in France, 

 showing that unmarried men die in far greater proportion than 

 married. Dr. Stark says that bachelorhood ought to be classed 

 with the most unwholesome trades, or with a residence in the 

 most unwholesome districts, so far as danger to life is concerned ; 

 and he presents statistics showing that in Scotland the death 

 rate of unmarried men of certain ages was 15 per 1,000 annually, 

 while that of the married men of the same ages was less than 

 half as great. Huf eland says that " all those people who became 

 very old were married more than once, and generally late in life. 

 There is not one instance of a bachelor having attained a great 

 age." Massachusetts statistics present no instance of what may 

 be termed remarkable age, the oldest being one hundred and 

 eighteen, and married ; nor do they show whether the individuals 

 mentioned had been married more than once, or late in life. But 

 it is undoubtedly true that the more regular habits and better 

 hygiene of the married, their less degree of exposure, more 

 abundant home comforts, better food in health and better care in 

 sickness and approaching age, together with the moderate and 

 restricted gratification of the sexual appetite in short, those ele- 

 ments which constitute the environment of the individual are 

 more favorable to longevity than are the corresponding elements 

 in the unmarried. 



Whether this is true in an equal degree of both sexes, however, 

 is more than questionable. Among the Massachusetts centenna- 

 rians one in eleven of the women had never been married, while 

 among the men the corresponding proportion was only one in 

 twenty-three. Further than this, while there were three times as 

 many women as men among the centennarians as a whole, there 

 were six times as many among the unmarried ones. It would 

 seem to be a fair inference that the effect of celibacy is less fatal 

 to longevity among women than men. Nor is this other than 

 might be expected, when we consider how helpless and dependent 

 is an old man, and how unable to care for himself in the little 

 niceties of life which contribute so largely to health and comfort, 

 and how much less so in all these respects is an old woman. 



But it would be a manifest error to conclude that, because the 

 average age of the married exceeds that of the unmarried, there- 

 fore this excess of longevity is due to the married state, unless it 

 can first be shown that the individuals composing the two classes 



