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investigation, must be very obvious to physicians. The proneness of 

 boys to fall victims to diseases of a highly inflammatory character, 

 must surely call for the adoption of prompt and vigorous means of 

 reducing the exalted actions of the system, which sustain local in- 

 flammations, and lead them to terminate in disorganization. In the 

 treatment of girls, on the contrary, more than ordinary caution should 

 be observed not to push antiphlogistic measures too far, to guard 

 against the effects of enfeebling agencies, and provide timely support 

 to the exhausted energies of the system. 



Effects of Hot Weather upon Infantile Mortality. 



In the Southern and Middle States of the Union, the direct and in- 

 direct agencies of high temperature swell the lists of infantile mor- 

 tality often to a melancholy extent. In some tables published in the 

 American Journal of the Medical Sciences (Nov. 1831), I showed the 

 deaths in Philadel[)hia under the 20th year, at the different seasons, 

 for a period of five years. Taking the months of June, July, and 

 August, or three warmest months, the proportion of deaths occurring 

 under the 2d year of childhood, was about four times greater than 

 that which occurred during the same months for the whole 18 years 

 of life succeeding. On the other hand, the sum of the mortality 

 under the 2d year, for November, December, and January, little ex- 

 ceeded that of the same months for the succeeding 18 years. These 

 estimates show, in a striking manner, the direful influences exerted 

 by hot weather upon infantile life, and the comparatively small injury 

 sustained from cold. Perhaps the most interesting fact developed by 

 statistical researches upon this particular subject, is, that the delete- 

 rious operations of heat are almost entirely confined to the first months 

 of life, as, after the first year, the influence of the seasons in increasing 

 infantile mortality is scarcely perceptible. 



These investigations vvere published by me in 1831, since which the 

 results of other inquiries upon the effects of temperature on life, made 

 in Europe, have come to hand. These, generally, show an increased 

 infantile mortality during the winter months, but still they sustain the 

 law — for such I think it may be considered — that the influence of at- 

 mospheric temperature upon the infant seems almost lost, after it has 

 weathered the first months of existence. Among others who have 

 devoted attention to this topic with confirmatory results, I may refer 

 to M. Quetelet, in his account of the influence of the seasons upon 

 mortality at different ages, published in Brussels in 1838." 



VOL. IV. — 2 E 



