Ch. viii. in England. 413 



o 



In the Observations on the Results of the Popula- 

 tion Act it is remarked that the average duration 

 of life in England appears to have increased in 

 the proportion of 117 to 100,* since the year 

 1780. So great a change, in so short a time, if 

 true, would be a most striking phenomenon. But 

 I am inclined to suspect that the whole of this 

 proportional diminution of burials does not arise 

 from increased healthiness, but is occasioned, in 

 part, by the greater number of deaths which must 

 necessarily have taken place abroad, owing to the 

 very rapid increase of our foreign commerce since 

 this period ; and to the great number of persons 

 absent on naval and military employments, and 

 the constant supply of fresh recruits necessary to 

 maintain undiminished so great a force. A per- 

 petual drain of this kind would certainly have a 

 tendency to produce the effect observed in the 

 returns, and might keep the burials stationary, 

 while the births and marriages were increasing 

 with some rapidity. At the same time, as the 

 increase of population since 1780 is incontrover- 

 tible, and the present mortality extraordinarily 

 small, I should still be disposed to believe, that 

 much the greater part of the effect is to be attri- 

 buted to increased healthiness. 



A mortality of 1 in 36 is perhaps too small a 

 proportion of deaths for the average of the whole 

 century ; but a proportion of births to deaths as 

 12 to 10, calculated on a mortality of 1 in 36, 



*r.c 



