Proceedings oj the British Association. 457 



tain there are 42,632 employed and 5,830 unemployed, (many of the 

 latter, however, being under repair), making a total of 48,482 frames 

 available for the machinery of the trade. The earnings of the frame- 

 work knitters are subject to heavy deductions, for the rent of frames and 

 other incidents, which frequently reduce the net earnings to a most 

 miserable sum. The earnings, clear of shop deductions and expenses, 

 range generally from 4s. Qd. to 7s. per week, and in some places, where 

 cotton-hose is chiefly made, wages are even lower than the above mini- 

 mum. Many cases of hardship from excessive frame-rent were re- 

 corded ; and it deserves to be remarked, that frames are not perishable 

 articles, many of those now in use having been manufactured in the 

 reign of Queen Anne. The general condition of the frame-work knitters 

 is described as very deplorable; they work generally from fourteen to 

 fifteen hours per day, and their net earnings are generally inadequate 

 to procure subsistence for themselves and their families. The ultimate 

 results of the hosiery trade are to turn imported raw materials and 

 those of home growth of the collective value of 705,900/. into the 

 selling value of 2,562,713/. There are manufactured annually 84,000 

 dozen of silk stockings and socks, 2,164,000 of cotton, and 1,770,000 of 

 worsted. Including gloves and other hosiery products, the annual pro- 

 duction is 5,705,600 dozen, which would not give more than one pair of 

 stockings and one pair of gloves for each inhabitant of Britain. 



Dr. Thurnam read a paper on the statistics of Insanity, designed to 

 refute Esquirol's theory that women were more predisposed to insanity 

 than men in the proportion of 38 to 37. The discussion of this poinc 

 turned chiefly on the corrections necessary to be made in statistical 

 tables of insanity, by taking into account the rates of mortality, the 

 proportions of male and female population, and the probability of re- 

 covery in the two sexes. Dr. Thurnam came to the conclusion that 

 Esquirol's proportions ought to be reversed; but the question ulti- 

 mately resolves itself into whether more confidence is due to the statis- 

 tical returns of insanity in France or England. 



In the discussion that ensued, Mr. Tuke entered at length into an ex- 

 amination of alleged disproportion of insane among the Society of 

 Friends, tending to prove that the predisposition to mental alienation 

 in that Society is less than in the general community. 



In the absence of Col. Sykes, Mr. Heywood read his paper on the 

 Lunatic Asylums of Bengal. They are chiefly remarkable for the ra- 

 pidity with which they have improved since their first establishment, 

 and the very trifling cost at which they are supported. 



