1C8 PHYSIOLOGY AND HEALTH. 



less power to sustain themselves under the exposures of life, 

 and less strength to resist the causes or the attacks of 

 disease. 



390. Consumption is more frequent among females than 

 among males. The deaths from this disease in Massachu- 

 setts, during the registered years 1845 to 1863, were, of 

 males, 32,512; females, 44,091. And in England, in the 

 ten years ending with 1860, there were, of males, 239,305 ; 

 females, 269,318.* This shows that the mortality from this 

 cause was, in these years, in Massachusetts, 25'5 per cent., 

 and in England, 7'5 per cent., greater among the females 

 than among the males in proportion to the population of 

 each sex in these countries. Dr. Farr says, " The higher 

 mortality of English women by consumption may be as- 

 cribed partly to the in-door life which they lead, and partly 

 to the compression, preventing the expansion of the chest, 

 by costume. In both ways they are deprived of free 

 draughts of vital air, and the altered blood deposits tuber- 

 culous matter with a fatal, unnatural facility." f 



CHAPTER XVI. 



Lower Animals can bear Privation of Air longer than higher. 

 Some Men, by Practice, can bear this longer than others. All 

 Animals need Air. Air covers all the Earth. Animals con- 

 sume Oxygen, and give out Carbonic Acid Gas. Vegetables use 

 Carbonic Acid Gas, and give out Oxygen. 



391. IF a mouse or rabbit be placed in the exhausted 

 receiver of an air-pump, it will die in less than a minute ; 

 and a bird, which needs more air and that more frequently, 

 could not survive this privation more than half a minute. 

 But the lower animals, which have less energy of life, endure 

 this much longer. Reptiles, serpents, frogs, &/c., will live a 

 considerable time in a vacuum, or in such gases as cannot 



* Supplement to Registrar-General's 25th Report, p. 2. 

 t Registrar-Greneral's 2d Report, p. 73. 



