154 _ THE AMERICAN MIDLAND NATURALIST. : ‘ 
that of the females. (DARWIN, 1871; PEARSON, 1897; NEWS- 
HOLME, 1899; WEBB, 1911; YULE, 1911; WHIPPLE, 1919, 
et al.) To illustrate: in England and Wales during the period 
1901-1905, the death-rate *‘ for males was 53.8 per M. as com- ~ 
pared with 44.9 per M. for the females. These rates were 
calculated for the total population under five years of age. In 
the urban districts the statistics showed death-rates for chil- 
dren under five years of 61.0 and 51.3 per M. for male and 
females, respectively. In the rural districts the correspond- 
ing death-rates were 40.1 and 32.2 per M. for males’ and 
females, respectively. In this body of data, only in the age- 
group of 5-15 years did the death-rate of females exceed that 
of males. (WEBB, 1911; cf. NEWSHOLME, 1899, p. 117.) 
Bills of mortality from city boards of health and registry- 
offices in all civilized countries show a considerably greater 
expectation of life for women. (See, e. g., Abridged Life 
Tables for States and Cities of the United States, 1920 (1922). 
The higher death-rate thus implied for adult males has gen- 
erally been attributed to the “greater hardships and dangers” 
of a man’s work. However, in such an attempted explana- 
tion the fact is lost sight of that this marked vital discrepancy 
between the adult sexes finds its counterpart in the diverse 
rates of infant mortality. TATHAM (1897) in his English Life 
Table shows that of 1,000,000 infants of each sex born, 161,- 
036 males and 131,126 femalés die in the first year (a death- | 
rate for the males of 161.0 per M. as compared with 131.1 
per M. for the females.) It will thus be seen that the males 
had a death-rate 122.8% of the female death-rate. For Ger- 
many, the Statistisches Jahrbuch fiir das deutsche Reich, 1914, 
(Bd. 35, pp. 30-31) in a general mortality table for the decade 
1901-1910, gives data showing the same relation. The mor- 
tality per M. (exclusive of still-births) for infants under one 
year was 202.3 for males and 170.4 for females—a male death- 
rate 118.0% of that of the females. *. 
NEWSHOLME (1899, p. 125) has called attention to the fact — 
that in infants under one year of age the rates of deaths cue 
to debility, atrophy, and inanition show a differential death- 
rate of the sexes. (Males, 25.1 per M.; females, 20.3 per M. 
Such a differential death-rate in infaney cannot be explained 
