176 THE DESCENT OF MAN. Part I. 



hold good, during the years 1863 and 1864, with the 

 entire population above the age of twenty in Scotland : 

 for instance, out of every 1000 unmarried men, between 

 the ages of twenty and thirty, 14*97 annually died, 

 whilst of the married only 7*24 died, that is less than 

 half. 23 Dr. Stark remarks on this, " Bachelorhood is 

 " more destructive to life than the most unwholesome 

 u trades, or than residence in an unwholesome house or 

 " district where there has never been the most distant 

 " attempt at sanitary improvement." He considers that 

 the lessened mortality is the direct result of " marriage, 

 " and the more regular domestic habits which attend that 

 " state." He admits, however, that the intemperate, 

 profligate, and criminal classes, whose duration of life 

 is low, do not commonly marry ; and it must like- 

 wise be admitted that men with a weak constitution, 

 ill health, or any great infirmity in body or mind, will 

 often not wish to marry, or will be rejected. Dr. Stark 

 seems to have come to the conclusion that marriage in 

 itself is a main cause of prolonged life, from finding 

 that ao'ed married men still have a considerable advan- 

 tage in this respect over the unmarried of the same 

 advanced age ; but every one must have known instances 

 of men, who with weak health during youth did not 

 marry, and yet have survived to old age, though 

 remaining weak and therefore always with a lessened 

 chance of life. There is another remarkable circum- 

 stance which seems to support Dr. Stark's conclusion, 

 namely, that widows and widowers in France suffer in 

 comparison with the married a very heavy rate of mor- 

 tality; but Dr. Fan* attributes this to the poverty and 



- z I have taken the mean of the quinquennial means, given in 'The 

 Tenth Annual Keport of Births, Deaths, &c, in Scotland,' 1867. The 

 quotation from Dr. Stark is copied from an article in the * Daily News,' 

 Oct. 17th, 1S68, which Dr. Farr considers very carefully written. 



