1 60 ALFRED FRYER ON SOME PECULIARITIES OF THE 



It is a serious thing to know that we, in towns, inhale with 

 each breath a poison which is sapping our health and strength, 

 and that though we may exercise the greatest care, we and 

 our families are inevitably defrauded of one-fifth of our lives 

 on the most favourable computation. When we further con- 

 sider that in the nineteen enumerated towns the average 

 duration of life is raised by several peculiarly healthy towns 

 being included, as well as outskirts of towns, which are gene- 

 rally more healthy ; and when we further remember that the 

 list containing the remainder of deaths does not consist entirely 

 of country districts, but includes Friends living in every un- 

 healthy spot in the country, not computed in the nineteen 

 enumerated towns, we cannot but conclude that the difference 

 between town and country life is much greater than here 

 shown. If we contrast the worst towns — Liverpool, with 

 its unenviable notoriety of being the most unhealthy 

 place in the kingdom, with 36 in the 1000 dying annually, 

 Manchester with 33 in the 1000, Leeds 30, Bristol 29, 

 Wigan 28, Bolton and Wolverhampton 27, &c, on the one 

 hand, and the rural districts on the other, we cannot doubt 

 that the difference would be at least 15 to 20 years, however 

 attentive the inhabitants of the former might be with regard 

 to their health. 



The mortality of the Society of Friends, as before stated, 

 contrasts very favourably with that of England generally. 

 In the diagram the two are contrasted, the lines relating to 

 the former being constructed on tables 10, 11, and 12, and 

 the latter from the deaths of the people of England registered 

 in the seven years 1838 to 1844, extracted from the Registrar- 

 General's 8 th Report. The most marked peculiarity consists 

 in the difference between the deaths of young children, the 

 number dying under one year, being of Friends 6.2, in Eng- 

 land generally 22, or 3J times more than in the Society of 

 Friends. Under five years the deaths of Friends are only 

 one-third of the average of England. The number of deaths 



