138 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Dec. 



In the above schedule is first given the general average for the 

 whole of Canada, from Gaspe to Essex, including the cities. 



Next come the figures ; 1. for the whole of Upper Canada; 2. 

 for the same, excluding the five principal cities, but including all 

 the others ; and 3. for the five cities, in the order of their popula- 

 tion. As compared with England, one cannot but be struck with 

 the extremely low rate of mortality throughout. English insurance 

 companies doing business in the province according to their home 

 tables, may expect to gain considerably on life policies. 



The third group presents the principal statistics for Lower Ca- 

 nada ; first for the whole province ; next for the same, leaving out 

 the two unhealthy cities, Montreal and Quebec ; next for the pro- 

 vince, leaving out also Three Rivers and Sherbrooke ; (these how- 

 ever, although as unhealthy as Toronto, do not affect the general 

 average;) next for Montreal, and for Quebec with its double entry 

 of "uncooked" figures; next for the county of Quebec, leaving 

 out the city ; and lastly for the two smaller towns, which, though 

 healthy in comparison with their populous neighbours, are much 

 more unhealthy than the larger cities of Upper Canada. 



The next group contains the figures for the eight counties round 

 Montreal, which were included in the registration district, and whose 

 returns are preserved at the Protonotary's Office. Some of these 

 display a high rate both of xymotic and of infantile mortality ; yet 

 when their total is added up, and the average taken and compared 

 with that of the city repeated below, the excess of deaths amounts 

 to one citizen taken yearly out of overt/ hundred, who would have 

 lived had he dwelt in the country, with the same climatal condi- 

 tions, and a preponderating Catholic element. 



The contrast is perhaps rendered more apparent by leaving out 

 Vercheres from the above total, and thus bringing the country 

 population to an almost exact equality with that of the city. Al- 

 though the abstraction of this healthy district somewhat raises the 

 death-rate for the rural population ; we find that in that year 904 

 persons were killed by city life; 12 per cent more of city than of 

 rural deaths were of children under five years ; less than half the 

 number reached the age of 70 ; and there were 17 additional deaths 

 to set against each hundred births. This was in spite of special 

 epidemics which appear to have visited at least half of the rural 

 districts, and which caused nearly 4 out of every hundred deaths 

 more than in the city. 



