634 ^^^^' POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY, 



their insurance upon slight provocation, there are few indeed, of those 

 that think their health impaired, that will do so. The result is, that 

 an undue proportion of the sickly will remain, and exert a deteriorat- 

 ing influence upon the average mortality. 



Finally, it must not be forgotten that there is, after all, a consid- 

 erable difterence in the middle ages between the English life table and 

 the insurance tables, particularly the American Experience Table. This 

 latter, Mr. Romans states, has the effect of selection carefully elimi- 

 nated, and therefore indicates a higher rate of mortality than the 

 actual experience. As a matter of fact, all well-managed insurance 

 companies, doing a sufliciently large business to furnish the basis for 

 reliable averages, and having a constant accession of new lives^ experi- 

 ence more or less gain over the tables in use. 



Before dismissing this subject, one question of a general character 

 yet remains to be answered, viz., how do, or may, epidemics affect the 

 average rate of mortality ? 



As regards the possibilities of the future, it is strictly a problem 

 for medical and sanitary science ; but we may be allowed to draw 

 some inferences from the past records of a well-ordered state. 



In 1849 a cholera epidemic, of a very malignant type, prevailed in 

 England, considerably increasing the mortality for that year. 



The number of deaths for the Ave years from 1848 to 1852 were 

 as follows : 



1848 398,385 



1849 440,883 



1850 368,602 



1851 395,396 



1852 407,135 



2,010,401 



It will be noticed that in 1849 the increase over the previous year was 

 about 42,000, while in the following year, 1850, there was a falling off 

 to 30,000 below the number of deaths in 1848. For the period of five 

 years from 1848 to 1852 the annual average of 400,000 remained un- 

 disturbed. This would indicate that, when through a powerful influ- 

 ence an excessive death-rate prevails, a large proportion of the weak 

 and sickly is carried off, so that by way of compensation the surviv- 

 ing, healthier population will for a time show a mortality below the 

 average. It is also well known that such inflictions arc largely con- 

 fined to the dirtiest and most crowded quarters, and carry off princi- 

 pally the poor and im})rovident. As these classes do not insure their 

 lives, the mortality experience of insurance companies is no more likely 

 to be seriously affected by epidemics in the future than it has been in 

 the past. 



