Table 85 shows the number of deaths from suicide by counties and for the whole State for the ten years 1895-1904, and shows the ratio of suicide to the total mortality by counties and the State for the same period.

The ratio of death by suicide to the total mortality for the year 1904 was 7.2, while the ratio for the ten-year period was 6.8.

TABLE 86. — Recapitulation, Ten Years, 1895-1904.

HOMICIDE.

SUICIDE.

ACCIDENT OR
NEGLIGENCE.

NATURAL AND
UNKNOWN CAUSES,

INCLUDING

ALCOHOLISM.

Totals, 696 2.65 3,282 12-50 10,888 41 46 11,396 43 39 26,262

2 cases of electrocution.

Accident or Negligence. — From accident or negligence there were reported in 1904 1,210, or 41.18 per cent. of all the cases investigated, as compared with 1,187, or 39-43 per cent., in 1903; 1,151, or 41.18 per cent., in 1902; 1,073, or 38.57 per cent., in 1901; 1,050, or 39.89 per cent., in 1900; and 10,888, or 41-46 per cent., for the ten-year period.

Of the deaths from accident, the principal causes were as follows:

There were 3 deaths from lightning during the year.

Totals.

Intemperance. The returns as to death caused by alcoholism in 1904 reflect, as in other years, largely the temperament, ideas and individuality of the respective medical examiners. It is a matter of great difficulty to arrive at an exact idea as to the number of persons who die because of over-indulgence in spirituous or malt liquors. The primary cause undoubtedly in a very large number of cases is overindulgence; but when it comes to a definite diagnosis, it is perhaps too frequently the case that, in the absence of acute symptoms the practice is to sign the certificate "alcoholism.”

It is very easy to say, Rum did it;" but when one considers the suffering to the living because of the stigma, and of still greater moment to individuals of a certain creed who hold a large preponderance in numbers in the cities, ― persons to whom it is of great moment that the burial should take place under conditions consonant with their feelings, it is well worth while for the examiner to make himself absolutely sure, by autopsy if necessary, that the death really was due to acute alcoholism at the termination of a protracted spree, or whether it was due to organic changes in the viscera induced by long over-indulgence, and a weakening of the organs to an extent that a moderate indulgence should emphasize a condition which might well have insured fatal results without the last straw.

The examiner, it seems to the editor, should, both for the accuracy of vital statistics and with a due consideration of the possible feelings of the living relatives, be exceedingly careful in giving a certificate of death from alcoholism. And not only is it a question of mental suffering on the part of friends, but in many instances a question of the receipt of money from pension or insurance, which might be endangered by a certificate of alcoholism, money in many instances of vital importance to those left behind.

The editor has seen so many cases where the results of view and personal enquiry might have led to a diagnosis of alcoholism, where the autopsy showed quite a different cause, irrespective of former habits, that he questions the absolute accuracy of the returns in the matter of intemperance.

The number of persons who are said to have died of the intemperate use of alcoholic stimulants in 1904, as stated in

the tables constructed from the returns of the medical examiners, is 112, or 42 less than the number reported in 1903, and is 3-81 per cent. of the whole number of cases reported, as compared with 5-12 per cent. in 1903, a gratifying decrease, if it be anything more than a different method of sizing up the situation in the various cases.

38,

Until the public be

The number of accidental deaths from illuminating gas in 1904 is practically the same as in the previous year, instead of 36 in 1903, and 39 in 1902. come aware of the danger attending the use of the so-called water gas for heating and cooking, there is likely to be a formidable roll of deaths from this agent.

There seems to have been a diminution in the popularity of this agent as a means of self-destruction, as there were but 23 suicides from gas in 1904, while there were 35 in the previous year, a falling off of nearly one-third. This seems to the initiated strange. Why a person desirous of "shuffling off this mortal coil" should choose the painful method of carbolic and other acids, the knife and pistol, when the anæsthesia of carbonic oxide is so readily at hand, is one of those things not easily to be understood.