CHAP. xx. THE DEMON OF GREED. 365 



simultaneously, we can hardly help seeing a relation of 

 cause and effect, since the accidental coincidence of so 

 many distinct phenomena is highly improbable, and the 

 first of them the increase of poverty, combined with 

 dangerous or unhealthy occupations is admitted to be 

 a true cause, if only a contributory one, of all the rest. 



But there is yet another inference to be drawn from 

 the facts and figures which have been set forth in this 

 chapter. If we turn to the table of death-rates in pub- 

 lic institutions, we find that they not only increase 

 steadily each quinquennium, but that they increase at a 

 more rapid rate in the later than the earlier years. Di- 

 viding the period equally, we find that during the first 

 half the death-rate increased by .21, or rather more than 

 a fifth, while in the second half it increased by .26, or 

 rather more than a fourth. And when we look at the 

 tables showing the amount of suicides, of premature 

 births, of congenital defects, and of deaths from alco- 

 holism, we find that all these also show a much more 

 rapid increase in the latter half, indicating still more 

 clearly the dependence of the latter upon the former. 



Now this portentous phenomenon, of the increasing 

 rate of deterioration of our population, is also seen in the 

 rate of increase of individual wealth. Taking the total 

 annual value assessed to Income Tax as the best available 

 indication of individual wealth at different periods, we 

 find the rate of its increase during three periods of fifteen 

 years each to be as follows: 



YEARS. INCREASE OF INCOME-TAX ASSESSMENT. 



1850-65 64.6 per cent, increase in 15 years. 



1865-80, .... 686 



1881-96, .... 82.4 



