230 Transactions. 



The result of this calculation is to give 3,165 lunatics of specified ages of 

 twenty years and over, of which 1,590 would have been males and 1,575 

 females — that is, the two sexes would have been almost exactly equal in 

 numbers. The number of such actually returned at the census of 1906 was 

 3,026, of which 1,793 were males and 1,233 females. Instead, then, of the 

 number of the female lunatics being 0-61 of that of the males, it would have 

 been 0-99, a relative increase of 62 per cent. It must further be borne in 

 mind here, as elsewhere, that the dealing with quinquennial age-periods 

 does not make by any means a complete correction, which would undoubt- 

 edly give an actual excess of female lunatics. 



The result we have obtained does not. however, explain the whole of the 

 apparent difference between this country and England and Wales, for in the 

 latter there is returned a substantial excess of female lunatics, the numbers 

 recorded in the census of 1901 being — 



Lunatics. 



Imbecile and 

 Feeble-minded. 



Total. 



Males . . . . . . 37,583 24,480 62.063 



Females .. .. 46,189 24,402 70,591 



But the allowanceSjWe have made make the contrast very much less marked, 

 and bring it more within the uncertainties of such international statistics. 

 The difference remaining unaccounted-for affords a rather unsafe foundation 

 for argument and speculation. 



In conclusion, we may consider briefly how the female really stands with 

 respect to the male in New Zealand in the matter of liability to insanity. 

 At the census of 1906 there were returned, at specified ages of twenty years 

 and over, 1,793 male and 1,233 female lunatics. I shall not trouble the reader 

 with another table ; but if, in the manner of previous tables, we allow for the 

 difference in numbers and in age-distribution of the sexes by supposing 

 there had been a female population equal in numbers and similar in age- 

 distribution to the male population, but retaining the female lunacy-rate at 

 the various ages, we find that there would have been 1,567 instead of only 

 1,233 female lunatics. The comparison of this number 1,567 with 1,793, the 

 actual number of male lunatics, is the best way of comparing briefly the 

 liability of the two sexes to lunacy, since in it both the inequality in the 

 numbers of the sexes and the dissimilarity in their age-distributions are 

 allowed for. 



It is interestins further to notice the influence of alcoholism. In 1906 

 there were admitted to the mental hospitals of this country 401 males and 

 277 females. Amongst these cases seventy-three of the former but only 

 eleven of the latter were attributed to alcoholism. In 1907, again, the numbers 

 of admissions were 421 males and 279 females. Of these cases, seventy-one 

 of the former but only eleven of the latter were attributed to alcoholism. In 

 the two years the excess of male over female cases due to alcoholism is greater 

 than one-seventh of the total number of male cases. Unless the proportion 

 of recoveries is much greater for this class of patient than for those that owe 

 their insanity to other causes, these numbers would indicate that the differ- 

 ence remaining between the insanity of the males and females in New Zealand 

 that has not already been accounted for by the differences in numbers and 

 age-distribution is entirely explained by the greater excessive indulgence 

 of the male sex in alcohol, and the ravages this indulgence makes on the 

 sanity of the sex. 



