140 ERRORS REGARDING THE DURATION OF LIFE. 



Salem had as great an increase of population as Holyoke, 

 you would have had as large a death rate under five as 

 Holyoke. The State Board of Health would have had a map 

 of your city and with the Mill Pond nuisance and the 

 North River, and you could not have made people believe 

 that your death rate under five was due to any other cause 

 than the two causes named. A great deal of mischief 

 results from not understanding the causes of the great 

 death rate in certain localities. A great amount of labor 

 has been expended to show that our cities have a much 

 larger death rate under five than the country towns. I 

 fail to see it. I see where our state officials make their 

 mistake. They have left out of their calculation the 

 number under five added to the state by immigration, 

 nearly all of which goes to the cities, and the cities that 

 draw the largest percentage are considered the most un- 

 healthy. Had this immigration gone to the country towns 

 instead of the cities, what would our registration officers 

 and Board of Health have said was the cause of the 

 deaths under five years being greater in the country 

 towns than in the cities, as they surely would have been 

 had immigration gone to the country towns instead of the 

 cities ? I imagine they would have said the cities have pure 

 water, their sanitary conditions are better regulated, they 

 are under better police regulations, and the cities draw 

 the most able physicians in the state. There is no reason 

 why the cities of the state should not be as healthy as the 

 rest of the state and they are. 



