multiple thereof not exceeding £104, to be due in the contingency of sickness from the day of the date of the assu. until the day when the assurer shall be 70 years of age. Rule IX. provides:

Sickness on account of which provision shall be due, shall be such, whether mental or bodily, as to incapacitate a clergyman from officiating in the public services of the Church; and whenever reference is made to sickness in any of the rules and regulations of the So., sickness as above defined is to be understood.

Rule X. says provision in sickness shall begin to be due when sickness shall have continued during a preliminary term of six successive weeks; and the 7th week of sickness shall be the first week on account of which provision shall be due, and it shall then be due weekly during the continuance of sickness. But there are the following additional regulations:

1. If during the preliminary term of sickness, provided it be after the 2nd week thereof, sickness shall discontinue for any one or two weeks, but not more, and then be renewed, the succession of weeks shall not be interrupted thereby, only the week or weeks when sickness shall have discontinued shall not be reckoned in the number of six weeks to be completed before allowance shall be due. 2. No claim for provision shall be allowed which may occur within 18 months of the day of the date of the assu., unless the amount of one year's prem. shall have been paid at the time of making the assu., in add. to the first prem.

Rule XXXII. provides:

It shall be lawful for the Board to reduce the preliminary term of sickness to four weeks instead of six weeks, if such alteration be approved by the actuary or consulting act. of the So., and to lessen the amount of the add. prem. fee, or the term during which provision is to be withheld in case of nonpayment thereof, as in Rule X.

Rule XIV. provides that provision in sickness shall not be due to an assurer [the insured] whilst residing out of the limits of the U. K., or when refusing any request of the directors to be seen by a physician or surgeon, and to answer him such reasonable questions concerning his sickness as it may be thought proper to ask him, or upon occasions stated in the pol. of ins., to which intending insurers are referred. "But should any member be advised to leave the kingdom on account of sickness, it shall be lawful for the board of directors to dispense with the restrictions of this rule in his case, so that the provision, or any part thereof, otherwise due to him during sickness, may be paid upon full and sufficient testimony being given of his continued incapacity by reason of sickness." And Rule XV. contains the following:

If at any time it shall be certified by the actuary or consulting act. of the So., that in his opinion the Fund AA alone, and unaided by any other fund of the So., is insufficient, or likely to prove insufficient, to pay the whole amount of provision in sickness which may from time to time become payable under assurances AA, the board of directors, at a special meeting, shall have power to reduce the orig. amount of provision in sickness payable upon assurances AA, in all cases then existing and afterwards to arise, where the whole amount orig. ins. shall have been paid for 78 weeks of sickness, whether such weeks of sickness shall have been in succession, or at intervals of any extent, and whether before or after, or partly before and partly after the power of making such reduction shall have been exercised; and if any reduction so made shall afterwards be certified by the act, or consulting act. of the So. to be in his opinion insufficient, then the board, at a special meeting, shall have power from time to time to make any further reduction or reductions: provided always, that no such reduction or reductions as aforesaid shall be so made as that the amount orig. assured shall be reduced more than one-half.

The same rule gives power for further adjustments as to the sick allowance.

Rule LI. provides that if any assurer [insured] shall be sick, and his sickness be found to have been occasioned by any act of gross immorality, or if any such assurer shall defraud, or attempt to defraud the So., by any false representation in relation to his incapacity to officiate in the services of the Church, or shall notoriously offend against the sacred character of his profession, his sickness assu. shall in any of such cases become null and void, and the provision assured thereby forfeited.

None can be admitted into the sickness branch but clergymen of the United Church of England and Ireland. The rates have had to be increased on two occasions, viz. on 28th Feb., 1850, and on 13th Feb., 1872. The scale now in force is the following:

ANN. PREMS. FOR £104 P. A. DURING SICKNESS, UP TO AGE 70.

If it should occur to any one that the conditions and regulations with which this branch of the bus. is surrounded be too severe, a very short experience would convince him to the contrary. [HEALTH INS.] [SICKNESS INS.] Indeed, we observe in the report by the actuary, on the last quinquennial investigation, issued Jan., 1872, the following:

This branch of the So.'s bus., owing to the lengthened sickness of some of the members, has not proved remunerative, and I am now, at the request of the directors, preparing a new T. of prems., from obs. based, as far as circumstances will admit, upon the actual sickness which has prevailed among the members assured under this class from the commencement of the So. [This is the T. just given.] The bal. to the credit of the Sickness Fund has been steadily decreasing, but by Rule XXXI. the directors have power to place to the sickness account the profits of the endowment branch; hence, from the last bonus fund (1871) had to be deducted the sum of £6261 35. Id.-"the difference between the liability under 162 Sickness assu. pol., estimated at £7389 15s. 10d., and the amount of the fund, viz. £1578 12s. 9d." The profits of the endowment branch have, however, been greater than any demand made by the sickness branch at present; and so the life pol.-holders have been adequately indemnified.

The progress of this So. in its earlier stages was anything but rapid. Indeed, having no proprietary cap. to fall back upon, extreme caution was almost a necessity of the situation. Yet, upon the small foundation so laid, results little short of marvellous have been realized. These will be shown in a T. at the close of this art. The first investigation of surplus took place in 1836.

As and from 15th Aug., 1850, some modification was made regarding the issue of "nominee pol."; but we shall have to notice this subject more particularly hereafter. The So. completed the 22nd year of its operations on 31st May, 1851. Its report then stated:

The prosperous working of the So. has been greatly facilitated by new provisions introduced into the rules of the So. in Dec. last, under sanction of 13 & 14 Vict. c. 116. Many members have been accommodated with loans on the security of the value of their pol. The privilege of effecting assu. upon life in the So., hitherto confined to clergymen, and the wives, widows, and relatives of clergymen, has been extended to the relatives of wives of clergymen.

In the report upon the investigation of that year it was stated:

A large surplus cap. was found existing in the life branch, to be dealt with as bonus under Rule XXXI.; and under the direction, and with the certified sanction of Mr. Ansell, such surplus cap. was appropriated to the reduction of the ann, prems., payable upon the then existing life assu.

.

The amount of bonus then appropriated was £79,485. The amount of ann. prem. extinguished by such bonus was £6290. The total amount of ann. prem. payable after such extinction by bonus on 1st June, 1851, was £44,468. In 18 cases of life assu., where there was no ann. prem. remaining to be paid upon pol., add. were made to the cap. sums ins. by such pol.; the total amount of such add. was £1398. The number of deaths of members holding life assu. in the interval of five years between the bonus of 1846 and the bonus of 1851 was 49; and the amount paid to claimants upon the assu. held by such 49 members was £54,949 9s. 9d.

These claims were remarkably low, not amounting top.c. p.a., upon the sum ins. This low mort. has been the main source of the bonus power of the So.

In 1854 a somewhat important constitutional change came over this So. We have seen that it was orig. regis. under the Friendly Sos. Acts. These Acts presented many advantages, such as exemption from stamp duties; special facilities for settlement of disputes; but more particularly gave the power of issuing what were known as "nomination pol.' [NOMINATION POLICIES.] Hence several L. offices had been induced to regis. under them. But against these advantages, various disadvantages arose, among which were more particularly, (1) restrictions as to investment of funds; (2) constant changes in the F. Sos. Acts; and (3) the jealousy of other offices, who, not being able to avail themselves of these Acts, took every opportunity of endeavouring to curtail the advantages they at one time offered. At length the five L. offices mainly interested, of which the Clergy Mut. was one, took steps to obtain a legislative measure which should place them out of reach of F. Sos. legislation, and estab. them upon the basis of their existing rules; giving them also power to extend these as circumstances might require. The measure was adopted by the House, and took form as the 17 & 18 Vict. c. 56, known as "The Friendly Sos. Discharge Act, 1854." Any so. issuing L. pol. for sums exceeding £1000 payable at death was to cease to be a friendly so., and was not to be affected by any Act thereafter passed relating to F. sos. The particular provisions of this measure will be given more at large under FRIENDLY SOS.

Since 31st July, 1854, all L. pol. issued by the So. have been made payable to executors, administrators, or assigns, in the usual manner. As to endowment and annuity pol., it is still provided by Rule XXI. :

Any person being a clergyman, or the wife, widow, or child of a clergyman, may make any assu. for a provision, as above, upon his or her own account; and any person may make an assu. for a provision, as above, for the benefit of a nominee, being a clergyman, or the wife, widow, or child of a clergyman, upon whose life the assu. is to depend, and by whose age the prem. is to be taken, and to whom, or to whose proper guardians on his or her account, if under age, the provision when due upon any such assu. shall be paid.

At the bonus division of 1856, the progressive rate of former divisions was not maintained. The cause for this was explained to the pol.-holders as follows:

Here then the directors have to signify to the assured members, that the reduced rate of the bonus

on the present occasion is solely attributable to a measure which has been deemed necessary with reference to the prob. affecting the money market. Hitherto, viz. in 1836, 1841, 1846, and 1851, the calculations according to which the greater or lesser amount of bonus is regulated, were based upon the supposition that the rate of int. procurable upon the cap. [funds] of the So. would, through all time of its contracts existing, be not less than 32 p.c. p.a., a supposition warranted by the rate then obtainable with Gov. security. On the present occasion the actuary appointed by the So. has strongly recommended the directors to adopt at once the precautionary measure of calculating the bonus of 1856 upon the supposition that int, of money will not uniformly exceed 3 p.c. p.a.

The adoption of this advice of the So.'s actuary is the cause, and the only cause, for the reduction apparent in the present bonus. It is the effect of a general rectification which prudence dictates. Had the calculations been made on the present occasion upon the estimate of int. being 34p.c. p.a., as on previous occasions, the bonus of 1856 would, as respects policies which participated in former surpluses, have been an increasing one as heretofore. And, if all things remain as at present, the bonus of 1861, and every successive one, will effect a larger and larger reduction of ann. prems.

It has been a characteristic feature in the management of this So. that the members have always had clear and explicit information upon all points affecting their interests.

The favourable mort. experienced by the So. was shown in a remarkable degree in the year ending 1868. The mort. indicated by the Carlisle T. was 105 lives; and by Hodgson's T. 90; whereas the actual mort. was limited to 63 deaths.

Mr. Hodgson died in 1870, full of years and honours. Mr. Stewart Helder is his able successor. Mr. Matthew Hodgson [grandson of the founder] is Sec.

From the statement of accounts and schedules made up in conformity with the Life Assu. Cos. Act, 1870, to 31st May, 1871, we gather some particulars of interest. For instance, in add. to the life pol. then in force as shown by the T. hereafter given, there were also in force 172 endowment pol., ins. £43,900, and yielding in prems. £2063. There were also in force 124 annuity pol., the ann. prems. on which were £754; and the ann. payments in respect of which amounted to £4976. "The extra prems. consist of .. together £452 5s. for residence or travel beyond the limits permitted by the So., and are for the most part of short duration; and of £350 165. 3d. for assu. upon lives which are considered not to be fully up to the average standard. Both sums are entirely excluded from the valuation of prems. receivable. Regarding the "valuation of pol." and "distribution of profits," the following details are given :

The principles to be adopted in the valuation and in the distribution of profits are, by the 31st rule of the So., fixed by the board of directors acting under the advice of the act. or con. act., and approved by the council of reference. Each pol. is valued separately. Pol. for the whole of life are valued by a prepared T. at the ages of entry for the number of years and months they have been in force. Reductions made in the premis., and additions made to the sums assured by previous bonuses, are valued at the ages attained by the members at the date of the valuation.

The profits are distributed amongst the members entitled to participate in the following proportion: (a.) As regards policies which were in force at the date of the last valuation. The difference between the ann. prems. which would be charged by the So. at the ages attained at the date of the last valuation, accumulated for five years at 3 p. c. compound int., and the sums that would be reserved at the same rate of int. and for the same period as the liabilities of such assu. (b.) As regards policies which were effected since the date of the last valuation. The difference between the number of ann. prems. paid accumulated at 3 p.c. compound int., and the sums reserved at the same rate of int. as the liabilities of such assu. The amounts so apportioned are either paid in cash, or appropriated to the reduction of the ann. prem., or to the increase of the sum assured, according to the option exercised by the pol.-holder at the time of making the assu.

The tables of mort. used in the valuation are:-(a.) For assu. for the whole term of life, a special T. derived from the ann. prems, charged by the So., such prems. being based upon the Carlisle T. of mort, with a per-centage added for expenses of management. (b.) For the other classes in which the contingency of life is involved, the Carlisle T. of mort.

The rate of int. assumed in the calculations is 3 p.c.

Provision is made for future expenses and profits in the amount set aside as the reserved value of the pol.; the reserve being such a sum as, with the value of the ann. prems. payable by the members, is equal to the single prems. which the So. would charge to assu. the lives of the members at their respective ages at the date of the valuation.

The So. effects no re-insurances and allows no commission.

The rate of int. realized on the L. assu. fund during the 5 years ending 1871 was as follows:-1867, £4 4s. 3d. p.c.; 1868, £4 4s. 10d.; 1869, £4 5s.; 1870, £4 4s. 10d.; 1871, £4 5s. 3d.

The Act., Mr. Stewart Helder, says, in his special report, dated Jan. 1872:

The So. continues to prosper. Since its institution it has returned to the members in bonus £839,325; it has paid for claims by death £867,786; it has on foot over 6000 pol.; the total sums assu. with bonuses are approaching £5,000,000; the ann. income, exclusive of the reductions made in the prems., is nearly £230,000; and the funds accumulating for the purpose of meeting future claims amount to £1,890,000.

In conclusion, I would remind the clergy and their families that by joining the So. they gain a profit which can be obtained in very few other offices, viz. the profit arising from the non-payment of any commission to agents; they gain a profit which can be obtained in no other office, from the low rate of mort, which prevails amongst the clergy, and which may safely be stated to be 20 p.c. less than that of the general community.

The following T. shows the growth of the So., and also all the necessary details of its financial position at each quinquennial investigation, so far as the L. department is concerned. The sickness funds are not included. It will be remembered that the ann. income of the So. is periodically very much reduced by the large application of bonuses to reduction of prem. :

To those who understand the finance of L. ins. it is quite unnecessary to state, after perusing this T., that the So. stands second to none in Gt. Brit.

CLERGY MUTUAL ASSU. So., MORT. EXPERIENCE OF.-In a preceding art.-CLERGY, LONGEVITY OF THE-we have made reference to the mort. experience of this So. It does not appear that the entire experience has ever been reduced into the form of a mort. T. The following details relate exclusively to the clergy ins. in the So.; and present some points of considerable interest as regards surrendered and lapsed pol.:

TABLE SHOWING EXPERIENCE OF THE Clergy MUT. ASSU. SO. FROM THE DATE OF ITS ESTAB. IN 1829, TO IST JUNE, 1869.

The following is a re-arrangement of the data of the preceding T. into a form suitable for exhibiting comparative results :

2

Entrance into

30-34

1239

6,703'9

The annexed table shows the ann. percentage of mort. experienced by this So., as contrasted with that of the Carlisle T., and that of Experience T. No. 2: we number the cols. consecutive to those of the preceding T., for the purposes of the explanations which follow:

The Rep. of the directors for 1869 contained the following remarks concerning the results of the preceding tables:

Had deaths occurred in the Clergy Mut. Assu. So., since the date of its estab. in 1829, according to the rate of mort. experienced by the 20 assu. cos., the number of deaths would have been 1183 instead of 734; showing a difference of no less than 449 in favour of the Clergy Mut.; and consequently, by reason of a longer duration of life amongst the members of this clergy class so., a saving of £395,120 in excess of what would have been saved in the 20 L. assu. offices had the number of lives under obs. been the same as those stated in column 3 of the Table, the amount of each pol. being taken at an