* 
for the Town of Siem, igi 
“The inhabitants are not fübje&t to'any endemic’ diforders;' 
though, thirty or forty years ago, hyfteric and nervous com- 
plaints, are reputed to have been more than commonly rife 
here; at prefent, I believe we are as exempt from fuch’ mala- 
dies as the neighbouring towns. i. 
In the following bill the number of the dead, I believe, is 
pretty accurate ; the ages of the deceafed in general, and the 
month they died in, are tolerably afcertained ; but as to the lift 
of difeafes, I cannot be anfwerable for a confiderable part of it, 
as the beft account I could procure of the difeafe is fometimes 
taken from the fextons, the reports of nurfes or períons about 
the fick; and how uncertain 7227 muft be, I need not fay, when 
even phyficians themfelves are often at a lofs how-to clafs. the 
difeafes of their patients, with the precifion they would with ; 
and in feveral inftances I have not been able to procure any ac- 
count of the difeafe at all: I thought it better, however, to give, 
a bill of that fort, imperfe&as it is, than to fupprefs it entirely. 
As to the dirths, I believe the account is as compleat as can be 
expected, confidering from whom we are obliged to colle& the 
greateft part of it; and, I fuppofe, approaches much nearer to 
the number of perfons actually born, than accounts of chriften- 
ings ever can, in any country where there is a general religious 
toleration; indeed, in. a town where there are various religious 
fe&ts, fome of which never adminifter baptifm at all, and others 
who never adminifter it but to adults, which is our cafe, births 
can never be tolerably: guefled at from an account of chriften- 
ings. Thef however are not neglected, the gentlemen of the 
clergy having been fo obliging as to. furnifh me with a come 
pleat lift of their feveral baptifms ; from the 
fame hands too, 
and from the Juftices of the Peace, who by our laws are quali- 
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