312 MR. J. BAXENDELL ON CHANGES IN THE SEASONS 



racter of the weather is rarely, if ever, the same over the 

 whole of England and Wales as that which may happen to 

 prevail in the Manchester Water- works district, but will 

 often be widely different in some localities, it is evident 

 that the whole of the differences between these numbers 

 cannot fairly be attributed to meteorological causes alone, 

 and therefore that during this period of ii years the 

 general rate of mortality was slowly increasing both in 

 town and country districts, but in a much higher ratio in 

 the former than in the latter ; and yet it is in the large 

 towns that what are supposed to be sanitary improvements 

 have been carried out to the greatest extent, and where, 

 therefore, had the schemes adopted been based on sound 

 principles, their effect in checking the increase in the rate 

 of mortality would have been most apparent. 



It will, no doubt, excite surprise in the public mind to 

 find that, after so many years' trial, and the expenditure 

 of so much public money, the schemes carried out by our 

 sanitary authorities have produced absolutely no improve- 

 ment whatever in the general sanitary condition of the 

 people, nor even prevented an increase taking place in the 

 average rate of mortality ; but, as I have indicated above, 

 our sanitary authorities seem never to have made any seri- 

 ous and systematic attempt to discover the true causes of 

 the fluctuations which take place in the rate of mortality, 

 and trace out the modes of operation by which their effects 

 are produced. Almost all that has been done in this 

 direction has been accomplished by private individuals ; 

 and I may refer, as a noteworthy instance, to a valuable 

 paper in Vol. I. Series III. of the Society's Memoirs, by 

 Dr. A. Ransome, and Mr. G. V. Vernon, F.R.A.S., "On 

 the Influence of Atmospheric Changes upon Disease.'' 

 Sanitary officials, however, seem, for the most part, to act 

 as if they were strangely ignorant of the value and im- 



