Newman.—Is New Zealand a Healthy Country ? 501 
England. The smallness of our general death-rate is, therefore, utterly 
inconclusive as a test of our real vitality, and it becomes necessary to 
ascertain the death-rate, not merely en bloc, but at all the separate ages of 
life. This has been done in the accompanying tables. 
** So far as the present writer is aware, only one such comparison has ever 
been made before for this colony. It is contained in anarticle * On the Addi- 
tional Premium required for Residence in Foreign Climates,’ by Mr. James 
Meikle, the eminent Scotch actuary, published in the nineteenth volume of 
‘ The Journal of the Institute of Actuaries.’ It may, therefore, be well to quote 
the words in which Mr. Meikle summarized the results he arrived at. ‘From 
the Census Enumeration,’ he says,* ‘ which gives the number of lives in exist- 
ence in March, 1874, and from the number of deaths in the year 1873, I am 
enabled to show the rate of mortality during each quinquennium of life, 
and thus to eliminate the effect of immigration, and the consequent irregular 
distribution of the lives according to age, as compared with the population 
of this country. The result compares favourably with any other table. It is 
very much lighter than either the H™{ or the CarlisleS. I have not made 
any adjustment of the figures ift respect of the progressive increase of the 
eee or for the deaths being those for the year anterior to the census 
e results show an exceedingly light rate of mortality.t When 
measured by the annual premium for a life assurance, I should imagine that 
the New Zealand rate would require about 7} or 10 per cent. less premium 
than the H™ rate. Before, however, placing much confidence in the 
results, they would require to be verified at the next census.’ The verifica- 
tion which Mr. Meikle here speaks of, we have now accomplished,—and 
more. It will be seen that we have included in our tables the results of 
the three last census years, namely,—1874, 1878, and 1881; and it is satis- 
factory to be able to point out that the larger data we have thus collected, 
fully confirm his conclusion as to the low rate of mortality which prevails 
in this colony.” 
* * Journal of Institute of Actuaries,’ vol. xix., p. 291. 
1 The italics are our own 
1 A table founded on the experience of twenty British insurance offices, and accepted 
as the best exponent of the mortality of assured life. 
§ A well-known table, accepted as a fairly good exponent of average mortality. 
