THE PRESENT EVOLUTION OP MAN — MENTAL 321 



difference 2'047 weeks. It then falls till, after age 

 seventy, the comparison ceases, as the numbers at risk 

 do not warrant it. Taking the whole of life, the total 

 difference is largely in favour of the abstainers, being 

 14 11 9 weeks less sickness. 



" 85. I quote these figures as they represent a singular 

 exception to the general rule. I am aware that some 

 time ago statistics were published of all the Friendly 

 societies and sick clubs in East Grinstead, in which 

 there were 57 abstainers and 1042 non-abstainers, the 

 former having in one year 21 members ill, and the 

 latter 188, and the results arrived at were stated by the 

 compiler to be that drinkers had less sickness, but more 

 severe and of greater duration when they did become 

 ill, and more liable to a fatal result. This would be 

 very satisfactory to the abstainers if it could be relied 

 on, but the small number of abstainers and the short 

 period of observation (one year only) render the results 

 unreliable. 



" 86. It is more satisfactory when abstainers and 

 drinkers in the same society can be compared for a 

 number of years. Thus, the experience of the Foresters' 

 Court at Streatham, London, for seven years was as 

 follows — 



This gives an average of 4s. S^d per abstainer, and 

 l7s. \Qd: per non-abstainer. 



" 87. In the Loyal Prince Alfred Lodge of Oddfellows, 

 Kelvedon, Essex, from 1876 to 1880 the results were as 

 follows — 



Y 



