meeting of Congress, making it known at least six months before the time. Lastly, on the motion of Lord Ebrington, a vote of thanks was passed by acclamation to the president, and after the delivery of a short address by the president, the Congress closed on Thursday the 2nd of September. Thus terminated these most important proceedings. The Congress sat four days, the sections sitting between 9 and 12, and the Congress from 2 to 4 o'clock each day. The Central Statistical Commission, the Minister of the Interior, M. Quetelet, and M. Ducpetiaux, were sumptuous in their liberalities and hospitalities, towards those who attended the Congress. The king, the Duke de Brabant, and the Comte de Flandres, with several officers, honoured the Congress with their presence, and invited a great number of the members to a banquet at the palace. The clubs and other public institutions were opened to the members, and a statistical dinner, attended by all the members of the Congress, and by the Ministers of the Interior, Finances and Justice, contributed to render the whole a most social and brilliant entertainment. Thus the interests of statistical science were extensively promoted, whilst the representatives of twenty-six states, and a large number of scientific individuals from all countries, were united for the common object of establishing the basis upon which the true economy of nations may be founded.

XVII. The Statistical Society of London.-The important proceedings of such a congress upon such numerous and comprehensive subjects cannot fail to awaken the deep interest of the Statistical Society of London. Zealous for the promotion of statistical science, it will hail with delight the progress secured by so successful an event. But its results impose on all governments and statistical societies, responsible duties. To give effect to the wise suggestions of the Congress, in so far at least as it is practicable, or indeed desirable, in this country, is what is now most essential. According to the different forms of government, the instrumentalities employed must vary. In this country where voluntary associations assume a large share of public functions, much is generally required of them. It is, therefore, from the Statistical Society of London, that the Belgian Commission may receive invaluable co-operation. Placed in the centre of the metropolis of the commerce of the world, it should be the depositary of the statistical information from all countries, and as the accounts published by the departments of our public administration are wanting in unity and system, the society might form the centre wherein they may be collected and digested, and from which they may be transmitted to other countries. The society may therefore enter into a new era of usefulness. Let it exercise its accustomed energy, its acknowledged eminence, and its abundant

resources.

Brussels had the honour of being the first to hold a congress of an important and practical character. It is reserved for the London Statistical Society to invite the succeeding congress to be holden within this vast metropolis, and under its own auspices.

On the Duration of Life among Medical Men. By WILLIAM A. GUY M.B., Cantab.; Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians; Professor of Forensic Medicine, King's College; Physician to King's College Hospital; Honorary Secretary to the Statistical Society; &c. [Read before the Statistical Society of London, 19th December, 1853.] THE present communication is the second of a series of papers on the Duration of Life among the Members of the several Professions. The first paper of the series, "On the Duration of Life among the Clergy," was read at the November Meeting of this Society, in the year 1851, and was published in the December number of the Journal of the Society for the same year. An essay "On the Duration of Life in the Members of the several Professions," founded mainly upon facts gleaned from the "Annual Register," had been previously submitted to the Statistical Section of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, in September, 1846, and was published in the December number of the Society's Journal for the same year. This Essay embodied a table showing the average age at death in 260 members of the medical profession, which table was compared with the results obtained by Professor Casper, of Berlin. I shall presently have occasion to revert to these results. I may also, in this place, remind the Society of the valuable contribution which was made by my able colleague, Mr. Neison, to the department of medical statistics of which this paper treats, in his essay "On the Rate of Mortality in the Medical Profession," read before this Society on the 15th of March, 1852, and published in the September number of the Journal of the Society.

The facts which have been employed in obtaining the average results contained in this communication are:

1. The ages at death of such English medical men, chiefly phy. sicians and surgeons, as had by their writings and high professional reputation secured for themselves a place in the pages of "Chalmers' Biographical Dictionary."

2. The ages at death of such English medical men, (also chiefly physicians and surgeons,) as have found a place in the less select obituaries of the " Annual Register," from 1758 to 1843; and

3. The ages at death of English medical men, (chiefly physicians and surgeons,) recorded in the pages of the "Biographical Dictionary" up to the year 1815, added to the ages at death recorded in the obituaries of the "Annual Register" from that date up to the year 1852, inclusive. The object of combining the facts derived from these two sources was to bring the data down to the latest period, as well as to increase the number of individual facts from which the average results were to be deduced.

It is necessary to premise, in reference to all these orders of facts, that in this, as in former and in future essays, all deaths by violence, accident, or suicide, are excluded. It should also be borne in mind that the average results are deduced from the ages at death alone, the element of the ages of the living communities among whom the deaths took place being wanting.

The preceding table will be found to embody, arranged under the three distinct heads just indicated, the individual facts from which the averages of the subsequent tables are derived.

The differences which exist between these three columns of figures are such as might have been expected. The first column, which comprises the ages at death extracted from "Chalmers' Biographical Dictionary," exhibits very few deaths at very early or at very advanced ages, in comparison with the deaths at the corresponding ages contained in the second and third columns. The small number of deaths at the early ages to be found in the pages of the "Biographical Dictionary," was to be expected when we bear in mind how rarely literary or scientific eminence is achieved before the middle period of life; while, on the other hand, the greater number of deaths occurring at the more advanced periods in the column headed "Annual Register," and in the mixed column containing facts from the "Biographical Dictionary," with facts from the later volumes of the "Annual Register," is readily explained by an observation contained in the essay "On the Duration of Life among the Clergy," namely, that the short biographical notices contained in the obituaries of the "Annual Register" will naturally comprise "instances of great longevity, introduced as items of interesting intelligence."

The figures contained in Table I. have supplied the materials for Tables II. and III., which exhibit, for periods of five and ten years respectively, the number and per-centage proportion of deaths under each of the heads already specified; that is to say, the "Biographical Dictionary," the "Annual Register," and the two works combined.

The following table shows the average age attained by such medical men belonging to the three classes as had reached the several specified ages. A similar table is given in the Essay "On the Duration of Life among the Clergy," as well as in former essays.

Having now presented the facts which I have collected in illustration of the Duration of Life among Medical Men, in tabular forms, admitting of comparison with similar tables employed in illustrating the Duration of Life among the Clergy, I proceed to compare the results obtained, first with other facts bearing on the duration of life of members of the same profession, and secondly, with the duration of life among the clergy.

I have already referred, in the essay "On the Duration of Life in the Members of the several Professions," to the results obtained by Professor Casper, of Berlin. The ages at death on which those results are founded are the ages of medical men described as "Médecins." The results do not admit of exact comparison with those contained in the foregoing tables, because the status of the class described by him as Médecins differs from that of pure physicians and surgeons whose histories are to be found in the pages of the "Biographical Dictionary," or shorter notices of whose lives are contained in the obituaries of the "Annual Register." It is true that the exclusion from Casper's tables of anatomists, veterinary surgeons, naturalists, and medical men engaged solely in literary pursuits, leaves