ORIGIN OF LIFE INSURANCE. 297 



As he spoke the dry thermometer stood at 70^ and the wet one at ten de- 

 grees lower. The engine was running at its lowest possible rate, and the fan was 

 making about 300 revolutions a minute. He placed the hygrometer in the mouth 

 of the tube, where it received the full benefit of the cold air. The dry ther- 

 mometer quickly fell to 65^°. It was then 6 o'clock, and the moisture was only 

 two and one-half grains to the cubic foot. The room had grown so cold that 

 summer clothing was uncomfortable, and the temperature was steadily maintained. 

 KX 6:25 a thermometer placed outside the building indicated 90° in the shade, and 

 one in the center of the room 68°. 



The apparatus furnishes 80,000 cubic feet per hour, and makes no percepti- 

 ble noise in running. It is so arranged that ventilation can go on without passing 

 the air over the ice, whenever the natural temperature is found sufficiendy cool ; 

 or so that a part of the air can be cooled on its way in, and mixed with the nat- 

 ural atmosphere, whereby exactly the degree of temperature desired may be main- 

 tained without stopping the machine. It is controlled by the simple pulling of a 

 cord by an attendant in the room. 



A compact portable apparatus containing its own power has been devised by 

 Prof. Lowe, which can be attached at a few hours' notice to any building, and 

 used in cooling and ventilating either the entire building or any single room. — 

 Norristown Herald. 



ORIGIN OF LIFE INSURANCE. 



Among the nations of antiquity, the Romans were the first to make an effort 

 to arrive at a law of mortality. To this they were led indirectly by their highly 

 developed system of jurisprudence. It became necessary at times to fix the 

 value of life estates, i. e., property owned during lifetime only, without the right 

 of alienation or bequest, and to do so the probability of life had to be estimated. 

 It appears that the method in common use was about equivalent to assuming that 

 all persons who attain the age of thirty wotild certainly live to the age of sixty,, 

 and then certainly die. This purely arbitrary assumption was probably accepted 

 by jurists as the simple solution of a difficult problem. 



A great improvement was introduced by the Prsetorian Prefect Ulpianus, 

 one of the most eminent of Roman jurists. He published a table of mortality, in 

 which a distinction was made between the different ages, and the probable num- 

 ber of years of Hfe for each given. The rate of mortality assumed for the middle 

 ages approximates to that probably prevalent previous to the seventeenth century. 

 Whether this table was based upon actual observation or was purely speculative 

 is not settled ; but, if its estimates were correct, the chances of life above sixty 

 years were very poor indeed among the Romans. However, these early efforts 

 do not seem to have exercised any influence toward a proper investigation of the 

 subject, and, having been forgotten they only possess a passing interest for us. 



