292 surgeons' ekports — new jeksey — fifth district. 



rolling l:iuil an<l niansli, so that extensive anil. judicious sewerage is required from tlie nature of its 

 foMuation, and to tbis the entire district is not an exception. 2Jot only its four chartered cities, 

 but much of the rural portion, could be improved and beautified by proper drainage. It is true that 

 much Las been done in this respect, but the exnenditnre has been more lavish in the work than 

 good judgment. 



The reports made to the State Jledical .Society of New Jersey by the reporters of the resi)ective 

 district societies of Hudson and Essex Counties for the year 1SC4, were to the efiect that in Hudson 

 County the prevailing diseases of the year were miasmatic fevers and other zymotic diseases. 

 That of Essex County showed that zymotic diseases had j)revailed to an unusual extent during 

 some portions of the year. These reports are compilations, the data being furnished by the regular 

 practitioners in the diflereut counties. 



The Ibllowing is a lirief summary of the last statistical report of the causes of death in the city 

 of Xewark, couii)iled by Dr. G. Grant, statistician of the Newark jNIedical Association, at the close 

 of the year 1860. Though lour years have elapsed since the completion of the report, I have no 

 doubt the results if exhibited for the succeeding years would have varied but little, except for 

 zymotic diseases. The deaths from .scarlet fever alone for the year number 233, a very unusual 

 epidemic. 



Zymotic diseases 572 



Diseases of uncertain and variable seat 202 



Diseases of brain and nervous system 442 



Diseases of respiratory organs 480 



Diseases of circulatory organs 50 



Diseases of digestive organs 214 



Diseases of urinary orgaus 6 



Diseases of generative organs, and child-birth 25 



Diseases of locomotive organs 2 



Diseases of skin I 



Diseases of old age 11 



External causes 170 



From the above, it appears that the whole number of deaths for the year 1860 were 2,175, out 

 of a population of 71,941, or one death to 33.06 of the population. The deaths under five years of 

 age were 1,582, leaving the number of deaths of adults 593. 



Although the above demonstrates that the mortality from climatic influences was not unusual 

 in the city of Newark, yet we must admit that thej" materially afiect the health of the inhabitants, 

 not only in the form of fevers spoken of by the reporter of Hudson County in specific localities, 

 but in the intermittent type assumed by other diseases in the entire district. 



The relative position of the district to the Atlantic, with no forest or mountain-range to shield 

 it from Its winds and vaijor, causes us to experience extreme and sudden changes in the humidity 

 and temperature of the atmosphere, to which is accreclited the prevalence of acute and chronic 

 rheuinatisni, as well as of diseases of the lungs. 



The ijopulation of the district, in 1800, was 134,058, of which number 52,059 were foreigu- 

 born. In the city of Newark, a fraction of over eleven thirteenths of the foreign-born element were 

 German and Irish, they being about equal in numbers; the remaining thirteenth and a fraction were 

 from the otlier lMiioi>ean natiouali ties and the British provinces, and I presume the nationalities of the 

 foreign-boru population of Hudson County bore about the same ratio to each other; to-day, jirob- 

 ably, the proportion of foreign element is still greater than in 1800. The German element alone is 

 estimated to have been trebled in the State during the past five years; how much of the increase 

 may be accredited to tbis district it is impossible to say, but it undoubtedly has its full share. 



With no means at hand to get at the actual facts, 1 approximate the visible means of support 

 of the inhabitants of tbis district to be : mechanical puisuits, 50 per cent. ; vocation of laborers, 

 25 per cent. ; mercantile, 10 per cent. ; agriculture, 5 per cent. ; operatives, 6 per cent. ; all others, 

 about 4 per cent. ; and in tbis I make no estimate of a luimerous transient or floating population, 



