Foreiff7i Literature and Science. 



187 



2. As far as I have been able to determine the tempera- 

 ture of compressed water, and I have done so to the extent 

 of forty eight atmospheres, I have found no heat disengaged 

 by compression. 



3. The compression of mercury is but Httle more than a 

 milhonth of its volume for one atmosphere. 



4. The compressibihty of sulphuric aether is about triple 

 that of alcohol, double that of sulphuret of carbon, but equal 

 only to a third of that of water. 



5. The compressibility of water, holding salts, alkalies and 

 acids in solution, is less than that of pure water. 



6. The compressibility of glass is excessively small, and 

 far below that of mercury. — Ibid. 



38. Prohahility of Life. Comparative results deduced 

 from Registers kept at Geneva, and calculations made by 

 Dr. Odier. — It appears from these registers that the proba- 

 bility of life, as well as its average period, has been continu- 

 ally increasing from the sixteenth century to the year 1826, 

 particularly in its earliest stages ; and that there is a slight 

 dimmution in the subsequent periods, but which is far from 

 balancing the former gain. It is thus very manifest that the 

 cares bestowed upon infancy have ameliorated its existence, 

 and that children are now preserved in a very remarkable 

 proportion. These successive improvements will be obvious 

 from the following table. 



The probability of the life of women, has always been su- 

 perior to that of men, and agreeably to a table prepared by 

 Dr. Odier, from the mortuary register of 1801 to 1813, mar- 

 ried women and widows have a superiority over others, with 

 respect to the average of life in the ratio of 112^^ to 100, 

 notwithstanding the risques of child birth. He estimates the 

 number of women, who perish from this cause, to be one 

 hundred and twenty five in ten thousand, or one to eighty. 



