ARTIFICIAL PROLONGATION OF LIFE 341 



whooping-cough, and, above all, tuberculosis, to mention only 

 these, will claim as victims those who are weak and degenerate 

 of constitution, whose power of resistance is least developed ; 

 and such diseases, in eliminating the unfit and thereby per- 

 mitting the greater multiphcation of the fit, must be regarded, in 

 this light, as beneficial factors of race progress. Our economic 

 conditions have disturbed the working of this law of selection ; 

 for, as Professor Lexis remarks, " the percentage of the death- 

 rate during the first year of life is certainly very difEerent in the 

 different classes of the population, and is far less among the 

 wealthy classes than among the masses. But even in the best 

 of hygienic and economic conditions this percentage remains 

 remarkably high, and it must be remembered that, owing to 

 better nursing and better food, a mere prolongation of life is 

 attained, so that death is postponed for a few years ; whereas 

 among the less favoured masses of the people rigorous selection 

 operates rapidly and unchecked." ^ It is to be feared that 

 the " rigorous selection " of which Professor Lexis speaks is 

 unfortunately less rigorous than we might hope — even among 

 the masses, in which natural selection must, nevertheless, 

 necessarily play a more important role than among the upper 

 classes. 



The artificial prolongation of life which Professor Lexis men- 

 tions may be inferred from the statistics compiled by the Eegis- 

 trar-General for England and Wales concerning the death-rates 

 at difEerent groups of ages. In the Sixty-third Annual Report 

 of the Registrar - General (Tables 13 and 14, p. Ixii) for 1900, 

 we find valuable comparative statistics as to these death-rates. 

 The following is the net result of the variations from 1870- 

 1900, omitting the intervening years, with the exception of 

 1880 and 1890 : 



1 W. Lexis, Ahhandlungen zur Theorie der Bevolkerungs und Moral- 

 staiistik, p. 87. Jena, 1903. 



