176 
THE DESCENT OF MAN. 
Part I. 
hold good, during the years 1863 and 1864, with the 
entire population above the age of twenty in Scotland : 
for instance, out of every 1000 unmarried men, between 
the ages of twenty and thirty, 14*97 annually died, 
whilst of the married only 7*24 died, that is less than 
half. 23 Dr. Stark remarks on this, “Bachelorhood is 
“more destructive to life than the most unwholesome 
“ trades, or than residence in an unwliolesome house or 
“ district where there has never been the most distant 
“ attempt at sanitary improvement.” He considers that 
the lessened mortality is the direct result of “ marriage, 
“ and the more regular domestic habits which attend that 
“ state.” He admits, however, that the intemperate, 
profligate, and criminal classes, whose duration of life 
is low, do not commonly marry; and it must like- 
wise be admitted that men with a weak constitution, 
ill health, or any great infirmity in body or mind, will 
often not wish to marry, or will be rejected. Dr. Stark 
seems to have come to the conclusion that marriage in 
itself is a main cause of prolonged life, from finding 
that aged married men still have a considerable advan- 
tage in this respect over the unmarried of the same 
advanced age ; but every one must have known instances 
of men, who with weak health during youth did not 
marry, and yet have survived to old age, though 
remaining weak and therefore always with a lessened 
chance of life. There is another remarkable circum- 
stance which seems to support Dr. Stark’s conclusion, 
namely, that widows and widowers in France suffer in 
comparison with the married a very heavy rate of mor- 
tality ; but Dr. Farr attributes this to the poverty and 
23 I have taken the mean of the quinquennial means, given in ‘ The 
Tenth Annual Report of Births, Deaths, &c., in Scotland/ 1867. The 
quotation from Dr. Stark is copied from an article in the ‘ Daily News/ 
Oct. 17th, 1868, which Dr. Farr considers very carefully written. 
