Dr. Price points out that in this, as in the preceding T. from Dr. Haygarth's regis., there are several irregularities in the decrease of the prob. of the duration of life, which would not have taken place had the obs. been made on a larger body of people or for a longer period of years; "but they do not much affect the correctness of the expectations and values of lives [annuities] deducible from these T., except at the extremity of life, after the age of 80 or 85." He continues:

According to the Chester Regis. the whole number of males that died at every age for 10 years between 80 and 85 was 44; 22 died between 85 and 90; and 14 above 90. This Regis. also makes 102 of the number of females that died between 80 and 85; and 34 and 27 the numbers that died between 85 and 90, and above 90. The preceding T., from the age of 80 to 97, is formed just as it would have been formed had the Regis. given only this information without particularizing the numbers dying in every single year of life after 80. It will be easily seen that this was necessary. The deaths at the extreme ages beyond 96 or 97 bear so small a proportion to the rest that there is no occasion to include them in a Table of obs. ; nor is it possible to do it properly.

Dr. Price also says, "It should be further considered, that the remark at the end of the T. for Warrington is applicable to this T." This is inconveniently indefinite; for there are several remarks at the end of that T., of which perhaps the following are more specially referred to:

It appears from this T. and the Regis. on which it is grounded that, though the prob. of living among females are higher than among males, and a smaller number is born, yet more die. The reason must be that more males emigrate, and that many of them die in the army, the navy, and the militia. To this also it is owing that more wives die at Warrington than husbands.

It is proper to add that in consequence of this greater emigration, the preceding T. give the proportion of the expectations of life among males to those among females lower than it really is. But at the same time it should be remembered that it does this only for the ages before which and during which the emigration happens. After these ages (that is, prob. after the age of 40 or 50) the correctness of the T. cannot be affected by this cause.

Dr. Price, in the general intro. to his T., when he speaks of those for Chester, says, "Concerning these T. it is necessary I should make the following obs.":

The T. for females must be considered as particularly correct, because the numbers of females born and buried in Chester are very nearly equal. On the contrary, the number of males born being about an eighth greater than the number buried, it follows that, in the T. of Decrements for Males, the numbers of the living, and consequently the prob. of living at every age, for at least 10 or 15 of the first years of life, must be given too low.

The expectation of a female at birth is, according to these T., nearly 33 years; and of a male 281. The number of females therefore at Chester is to the number of males as 33 to 28, or in the proportion of 8000 to 6771, which is the proportion discovered by the survey in 1774, when the females in this city were found to be 8016 and the males 6697.

He proceeds to say that these T. are further confirmed by the proportion which they give of the numbers of males and females living under 15 to the whole number. This proportion was by the T. nearly that of 4486 to 14,888; and the actual numbers found by the enumeration in 1774 were 4486 and 14,713. In like manner the number of the living above 70 was, by the same survey, found to be 625; and the T. gave this number nearly the same. He proceeds:

The expectation at birth, taking males and females together, is at Chester by the T. near 31; and therefore I in 31 ought to die annually. But the quotient arising from dividing the number of inhabitants (14,713) by 409 (the medium of ann. burials from 1772 and 1781), will show that in reality no more than 1 in 36 die ann. The reason of this difference is, first, that the births exceed the burials, and that consequently a T. which takes the burials for its radix, must give the expectations of life too low. A second reason is the emigration of males from Chester, in consequence of which, though more males than females are born, and though males are also more short-lived, yet fewer die at Chester; many dying in the army, navy, militia, etc. The effect of the first of these causes will be particularly exemplified hereafter, in the case of the Kingdom of Sweden.

Dr. Price, when commending this Table to the notice of the members of the Equitable in 1779, said:

Chester is an old and very healthy town of moderate size, which has continued much the same as to populousness for a long course of years. These are circumstances which render it a situation particularly fitted for showing the true law that governs the waste of human life in all its stages. The regis. which has been estab. there is more minute and correct than any other; and it is the only one I am acquainted with that gives the difference between the chances of living among males and females, and from which it is possible to compute, with any degree of precision, the values of lives before 5 and after 70 years of age. [FEMALE LIFE.]

Mr. Wm. Morgan made the following remarkable statement concerning this Table, before the Parl. Committee on F. Societies in 1827:

Chester is the best town for making observations, for it is a town where the inhabitants at the time Dr. Price formed his T. neither decreased nor increased much. . . . And that being the case when we computed the T. in our office [the Equitable], both Dr. Price and myself had a doubt whether the CHESTER or the NORTHAMPTON should be adopted. Dr. Price was for the Chester as being stationary with regard to the number of its inhabitants, and therefore as affording the best data. I beg leave to observe that the Chester T. gives the values of lives a little higher than the Northampton T.

Thus how near we were of altogether escaping the great controversies to which the Northampton Table has given rise! [NORTHAMPTON T.] CHETWYND'S [LORD] INS. FOR SHIPS AND BOTTOMRY.-A project under this title was set on foot in 1719, for carrying on Marine Ins. Application was made to Parl. for powers, and refused. The scheme was at one time called Ram's Ins. It afterwards merged into the London Assu. Corp. [MARINE INS., HIST. OF.]

CHETWYND, MR., Assistant Sec. of the General Post Office, Lond. He was joint editor and proprietor of the Insurance Gazette, first founded 1856. In 1866 he became sole proprietor of that paper, on the retirement of his co-proprietor, Mr. H. R. Sharman.

Mr. Chetwynd is believed to be the chief moving spirit in connexion with the Government scheme of Life Assu. and Annu. ; and he will find great scope for his exertions in making that scheme popular.

CHEVANTIA [from the French, Chevance].—A loan or advance of money upon credit; also goods, stock, etc.

CHEVISANCE [or CHIEVANCE].—Usury. An indirect gain in point of usury. Also an unlawful bargain or contract.

CHICAGO. A mercantile city situate at the south-western extremity of Lake Michigan, U.S. Some 50 years ago it consisted prob. of several log huts. On the 7th Oct., 1871, it claimed to be fourth in point of pop. and wealth in the U.S.; its inhabitants being estimated at 350,000. [At the census of 1870 its pop. was returned at 298,000, which placed it fifth in the order of cities.] On that day a fire of serious magnitude occurred; to be followed by one on the following day, which will ever be spoken of as the Chicago conflagration. By the 9th Oct., 1871, all the principal bus. portion of the city was in ruins. The fire destroyed about 12,000 buildings, covering nearly 5 square miles; the pecuniary loss being about £33,000,000! Hence this may be regarded as the largest fire the world has yet seen.

We draw the following add. details from the report of the Ins. Auditor of the State of Illinois, pub. 1872:

Total amount at risk [insured] in burnt district...
Amount adjusted and in course of adjustment
Total amount resisted

Total amount of losses claimed...

...

£20,045,000

£19,274,702
36,041

£19,310,743

The

Of this amount there had been paid £7,599,797; the salvage and discount amounted to £1,034,752; leaving then unpaid £10,676,195; a good deal of which the offices would be unable to pay in full. The average paid on the amount claimed was 39.36 p.c., and it was believed there would be 12:54 p.c. further paid, making a total of 51 90 p.c. There were 170 American cos. upon which claims were made, and but 6 Brit. cos. American offices sustaining the greatest loss were the following: Chicago Firemen's, £1,321,437 (not expected to pay more than 5 p.c. of that amount); Merchants, of Chicago, £1,000,000 (expected to pay from 8 to 12 p.c.); Etna, of Hartford, 820,000; Germania, of Chicago, £660,000 (will pay from 3 to 8 p.c.); Home, £614,278 (has paid in full); Hartford, £440,000; Equitable, of Chicago, £400,000 (will pay about 2 p.c.); Anaes, £206,445. Most of the smaller U.S. offices interested in this fire have passed into liq. The following is the position of the Brit. offices:

Salvage and
Discount.

£45,634
28,723

2082

221

These amounts will be varied in relation to the offices themselves by re-insurance; and from that cause also other British cos., of which the State Auditor has no cognizance, suffered more or less severely by the conflagration. [AMERICA, BRIT. OFFICES TRADING IN.] The promptness with which the Brit. offices discharged their losses in this case has placed them in high estimation in the U.S. Several other Brit. offices have since commenced bus. there, viz. the Guardian, Lancashire, Lond. Assu. Corp., and the Universal. The larger offices have revised their risks to a considerable extent. The city is again [9th Oct., 1872], rebuilt more grandly than before. [On the day just named a fire broke out at Boston, U.S., of a most extensive and alarming character-second only in importance to this of Chicago. Most of the above-named offices and others lose heavily.] CHICHESTER.-It is recorded by William of Malmsbury, that this city lost 34,000 inhabitants from an epidemical disease which broke out A.D. 772.

CHICKEN-POX (Class, ZYMOTIC; Order, Miasmatic).—Every year a certain number of deaths arise from this disease. In 1867 there were 46, viz. 22 males, 24 females. Nearly all the deaths occur within five years of birth: the greater number within one year. CHIENE, GEORGE TODD, Man. of National Guarantee and Suretyship since 1871. Was previously in practice as a Chartered Accountant. CHILD, SIR JOSIAH, Banker and Political Economist, published in 1668 a Discourse concerning Trade. The tract was written in 1665: and when pub. in 1668 did not bear the author's name, but only his initials "J. C." He advocated a reduction of the legal rate of int. to 4 or even 3 p.c. instead of 6, as it then stood. He also advanced arguments for erecting a Court of Merchants for determining controversies relating to maritime affairs. About the same date he appears to have issued another tract, Trade and Interest of Money considered. These were probably blended into one in the later eds. of his Discourse about

Trade, pub. 1670, 1690, and 1693. In an ed. we have, dated 1690, are the words on the
title-page, "never before printed;" and it contains, by way of appendix, A Small Treatise
against Usury, written by Sir Thomas Culpepper the elder, but not so stated there.
His (Child's) works were long held in high esteem, and even now retain a great reputa-
tion.-Hodge, 1860. [MARINE INS.] [USURY.]
CHILDBEARING.-It is generally conceded that in the climate of Gt. Brit. no female under
the age of 13, nor above that of 50, can conceive-provided in the latter case that she
have been previously barren. This, however, is only regarded as a general rule, subject
to exceptions. The question at what age pregnancy is possible, and when it ceases to be
possible, has been much canvassed. As to premature pregnancy in European countries,
the most astonishing instance is given by Meyer, of a Swiss girl becoming a mother at 9
years of age. The English law admits of no presumption as to the time when a woman
ceases to bear children, though this enters into most other codes.-Wharton, Beck, etc.
CHILDBED FEVER.-Puerperal fever, originating in the peritoneum, and often called
peritoneal fever. [PUERPERAL FEVER.]

CHILDBIRTH, DEATHS FROM (Class, DEVELOPMENTAL; Order, Developmental Diseases
of Adults).-The following T. shows the deaths in England of women in Childbirth-
including Metria-during the 21 years 1847-67. It also shows the numbers resulting
from metria, as also those resulting from the accidents of Childbirth. The fluctuations
are somewhat considerable, but on the whole there is a tendency to diminution.
DEATHS IN ENGLAND OF WOMEN IN CHILDBIRTH IN EACH OF THE YEARS 1847-67:

See also CHILDBIRTH, RISKS OF.
CHILDBIRTH INSURANCE.-In 1711,

[PUERPERAL FEVER.]

after Parl. had endeavoured to suppress the Birth and Marriage Ins. schemes which then prevailed in vast numbers, the projectors hit upon the method of ins. against the dangers of Childbirth-prob. because it appeared to evade the provisions of the Act. Upon what data, if any, the calculation or estimate of risk was based does not appear: nor is it at all clear what the precise nature of the risk undertaken, and the benefits resulting, were. Obscurity was one of the features of the ins. projects of that speculative period. We present such data as we find.

The Profitable and Most Equitable office, at the Golden Candlestick, in Newgate St., which had been founded in 1710 at another address, for the ins. of marriages, births, etc., announced on the 5th April, 1711, that books were "open'd and subs. taken on single lives, and safety of women in childbed, where several persons have received great advantages at an inconsiderable charge." The term "single lives" referred to NONMARRIAGE INS., of which we shall have to speak under that head.

On the 5th April, 1711, notice was issued from an ins. office next door to Pool's Coffee House, Without Bishopsgate, of "a new and advantageous method settled upon lives and safety of women in childbed, to the great benefit of their families..., where proposals may be seen, and the money returned at the month's end if satisfaction is not given."

The next announcement was on 10th April, as follows: "The Beneficial Adventure upon the Lives of Childbed Women, at Pratt's Coffee House, in Cateaton St., between St. Lawrence Church and the corner of Aldermanbury, this day, being the 10th April (1711), will be opened four books of ins. upon the lives of childbed women; wherein any person may become a subs. for the expense of 25. The women are to live 40 days before, and 20 days after delivery." This last feature sadly requires elucidation.

Nearly all L. ins. offices have undertaken the risk of childbirth in connexion with L. ins., charging mostly an extra prem. at least for the first child. We do not find that the Amicable made any add. charge for female lives; the Equitable, at starting, did so, but appears to have abandoned the practice. The subject will be fully considered in our art. on FEMALE LIVES; and we shall in the present art., therefore, only now speak of offices which have made a special feature of ins. against the risks of childbirth.

The Asylum L., founded 1824, made a special exception in favour of pregnant females, which we have already noted in our hist. of that co.

The British Nation, founded 1854, had a scheme of "Pregnancy or Childbirth Ins.” which it presented to the world in the following elaborate phraseology:

It is also proposed by the estab. of this asso. to originate a new source of bus., by affording to females an opportunity of assu. themselves through the dangers of that crisis that nature has destined them to endure, and which creates in them so much solicitude. During that interesting epoch of female life-Pregnancy-which gives rise to so many fears and anxieties, they will be readily admitted, without medical examination, to the resources and comfort of L. assu.; and thus one cause of alarm will be assuaged by the reflection that should the mother be removed, the child or children she leaves behind will be provided for. In the event of the mother dying in childbirth, or within nine days after (or upon the 9th day), this Asso. will grant to the child, if surviving, an annu. until the age of 21, in proportion to the amount which may be assured; or according to any arrangement that may previously be entered into.

The special rates of prem. were not stated; but the advantage was extended to all ladies ins. in the office for the whole term of life without extra prem. CHILDBIRTH, RISK OF.-The question of the risk to mothers of Childbearing has, very naturally, occupied from time to time considerable attention. Some writers have been of opinion that child-bearing women are not only liable to all diseases incident to other women, and this plus the peculiar dangers of childbearing. But the majority are of opinion not simply that the pregnant state renders the constitution less susceptible of receiving or developing various diseases; but that, speaking generally, pregnancy more frequently befalls healthy than unhealthy women; and that it may therefore be regarded prima facia as a proof of health. That pregnant women appear to have the power of warding off the ravages of disease has frequently been the subject of remark in relation to Consumption; but we do not propose to follow the medical so much as the statistical aspect of the case.

Graunt remarked upon this subject in 1661, in his Obs. on the Bills of Mort.:

In regular times, when accounts were well kept, we find that not above 3 in 200 died in childbed, and that the number of abortives was about treble to that of the women dying in childbed; from whence we may probably collect that not one woman of an hundred (I may say of 200) dies in her labour; forasmuch as there be other causes of a woman's dying within the month, than the hardness of her labour. If this be true in these countries, where women hinder the facility of their childbearing by affected straitenings of their bodies; then certainly in America, where the same is not practised, nature is little more to be taxed as to women, than in brutes; among which not one in some thousands do die of their deliveries. What I have heard of the Irish women confirms me herein.

The early statistics gathered from the British Lying-in Hospital furnish the following results. Between the years 1750 and 1762 the deaths of mothers were 1 in 38; between the years 1788 and 1800, 1 in 318. These figures show a reduction of mort. in an inst. which must have commanded the best medical skill, and best nursing, of the whole period under review, of more than five-fold for children, and more that eightfold for their mothers. "In this reduction, sanitary improvements in space, ventilation, and cleanliness must have borne a very considerable part."-Dr. Guy.

Some wider obs. were taken early in the present century. Thus in the whole kingdom of Prussia, in 1817, the deaths in childbirth were I in 112. In the Dublin Hospital, in 1822, there were 12 deaths among 2675 women delivered, or 1 in 223. In the Edinburgh Hospital, about the same period, the deaths were found to be I in 100. At the City of Lond. Lying-in Hospital, in 1826, the deaths were I in 70; at Strasburg, about the same date, the deaths were I in 109. The deaths in childbirth shown by the Lond. bills during the 10 years 1818 to 1827 gave the proportion of deaths as 1 in 117-making the extra prem. for ins. about 17s. p.c.

In 1829 Mr. Geo. Farren pub. Obs. on the Laws of Mort. and Disease; and therein he remarked on the comparative danger of the first and subsequent childbirths, as follows: The mort. in first labours, selected from the general mort. by childbirth, will appear to be in the proportion of 14 to 100, and there is no reason to doubt that first labour is attended with greater danger than the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th among young women; but that after several labours the immediate consequences of childbirth are still more dangerous to life than the act of a first labour; and that every subsequent birth is attended with increased risk.

Where a first pregnancy takes place in the middle of life, the same consequences which frequently follow the birth of a ninth or tenth child by a young woman, may be expected at a fourth or fifth labour of a woman of more advanced age.

These remarks are intended to apply strictly to the dangers of childbirth, and its immediate con

sequences, distinguished from the state of pregnancy, with respect to which a very slight prognosis may be formed.

The following Table furnishes the statistics of childbearing in Sweden during the 5 years 1831-5:

The figures in the 4th col. are derived by multiplying the number of childbearings in the 5 years 1831-5 (col. 3) by 100, and then dividing by 21⁄2 times the women living at the two enumerations 1830 and 1835 (col. 2).

Dr. Southwood Smith, in his famous work, The Philosophy of Health, published 1836–7, said (respecting some of the statistics already given by us):

The change that has taken place in the condition of lying-in women during the last century in all nations of Europe cannot be contemplated without astonishment. The mort. of lying-in women in France, at the Hotel Dieu of Paris in 1780, is stated to have been one in 15. In 1817 for the whole kingdom of Prussia, including all ranks, it was 1 in 112. In England in the year 1750, at the British Lying-in Hospital of Lond., it was 1 in 42; in 1780 it diminished to 1 in 60; in the years between 1789 and 1798 it further decreased to 1 in 288; in 1822, at the Lying-in Hospital in Dublin, it was no more than 1 in 223; while during the last 15 years at Lewes, a healthy provincial town, out of 2410 cases there have been only two deaths, that is, one in 1205. There is no reason to suppose that the mort. in the state of parturition is less at Lewes than in other equally healthy country town in England.

The learned writer's view in this last respect was too sanguine.

It was only when the Gen. Registration Act of 1836 had got into proper working that we began to have trustworthy national statistics on this and many other equally important subjects. In the year 1838 the deaths from childbirth in England and Wales numbered 2811; in 1839, 2915; in 1840, 2989; in 1841, 3007-being in this last year an average death of 8 mothers for every day in the year. In the 4 years the deaths were 11,722; and the mort. was I death to 171 births regis. Dr. Farr, reviewing these statistics in an able paper in the 5th R. of Reg.-Gen., pub. 1843, admitted that they were even then "less specific than could be desired." He says:

Midwifery is as well understood in England, and the medical practice is certainly as sound, as little encumbered with obsolete prejudices, as well adapted to aid and correct the efforts of nature, as the other parts of surgery; but errors in practice are sometimes committed; and though excellent nurses -considering their education-are sometimes met with, medical precepts are too often set at naught by the nurses and old women in attendance, who have peculiar views of their own, which they lose no opportunity of announcing and carrying into effect, with the best intentions in the world, but the worst consequences. A large proportion of the 500,000 English women who lie-in every year, and have any attendance at all, are attended by midwives, who, from one cause or another, prob. delicacy of the national manners in points of this kind, receive no regular preliminary instruction in anatomy and other matters, some knowledge of which a glance at the causes of death in childbirth will show is indispensable in many emergencies. It is true that a medical man can be called in where danger is imminent; but to discover danger a knowledge of its sources is required; and those who have come in contact with midwives or monthly nurses are well aware that ignorance does not diminish their self-confidence.

He proceeds to note that in France the "sages-femmes" go through a regular course of instruction, theoretical and practical. Madame Boivin and others had greatly distinguished themselves there by their writings, and contributed not a little to the progress of their art. Mr. Hoffman stated that the Prussian Gov. supported, in each of the eight provinces, schools of midwifery, which in 1837 had furnished the country with 11,155 midwives, examined and passed by the Medical Boards. Among the Hebrews and the Egyptians we believe midwifery was practised by women only.

Dr. Farr proceeds:

It would be folly-with the undoubted differences in our manners and institutions-to argue that the French or Prussian systems should be introduced into this country; practically they are perhaps not more efficient than our own; but it is very well worth while, in the first place, to inquire whether our English system does not admit of essential improvements, and in the second, what steps should be taken for carrying these improvements into effect.

No one who has reflected upon the subject, and certainly no one who has a practical acquaintance with it, will contend that the ann. deaths of 3000 women in childbirth, and of 13,350 boys, and 9740 girls in the first month after delivery, or the sufferings and deformity of many who escape with life, are natural and inevitable. Admit that the lives of 1000-of 500-or of 100 of these mothers might be saved-and that many more might be rescued from injuries and pains which disable, or never leave them, and assuredly no apathy, no false sentiments of delicacy, will prevent those who have the public health at heart from giving the subject the most attentive consideration.

VOL. I.

33