12 
ALASSIO AND ITS FLORA 
The intelligent and practical reader 
after having read and considered the above 
tables will without doubt be convinced of 
the salubrity of our climate, as we have not 
only a lower average deathrate than the 
other Italian cities, but even than the prin- 
,cipal English ones, where few things are 
left untried which may benefit the public 
health; for it is well known that nothing in- 
creases mortality so much as neglect of hy- 
gienic measures. And yet in this period that. 
I have had under examination, there were 
various causes at work, which had a bad in- 
fluence on the public health. (In the winter 
of 1884-85 we had cases of Typhoid fever and 
of Pneumonia, which brought alarm into 
not a few of our families; the misfortune 
of the earthquake of 1887, and some other 
causes unnecessary to enumerate). 
If the hygienic measures proposed to our 
Corporation to improve the sanitary con- 
dition of our town, and so give it immu- 
nity from epidemics, were adopted, such as 
providing it with drinkable water instead 
of that which, defiled by the subsoil is drawn 
from the existing wells; a most necessary 
