Diphtheria. Since 1864, this disease appears to have been steadily diminishing in its fatality, and the number of deaths the present year is less than in any of the previous ten years. The alarming increase of mortality reported during the five years, 1860-64, has not been approached at any season since, and diphtheria is no longer included, as at that time, among the most fatal diseases. This immunity is to be accounted for partly by greater correctness in diagnosis of the disease at the present time, but chiefly by the absolute remission of epidemics of diphtheria, an affection which is avowedly very fatal.

Dysentery also appears to have been subject to a gradual decrease in its fatality, the number of deaths having diminished from 1,186 in 1864 to 471 in 1870. The low rates of ten years ago are again reached, and if we may draw any inferences from the experiences of previous years, in the periodic rise and fall of mortality from dysentery, approaching something like regularity, we may, with tolerable certainty, predict an increased death-rate from this cause before many summers shall have passed. The relative distribution of the mortality in the various counties is evidence of the sporadic nature of the disease, during 1870. As usual, the mortality is greatest during August and, September (182 of the 471 deaths having occurred in these months); and more than one-half the deaths (273) were of children under five years of age.

Typhus. The number of deaths was greater by 128 than that reported for 1869. The fatality was greatest in the ages between twenty and thirty, and was nearly equally divided between the two sexes. The whole number of deaths reported (including 134 under five years of age, classed as usual, with doubtful propriety, as infantile fever), was 1,333. The autumnal months, and especially September and October, exhibit the greatest mortality.

Measles.-Two hundred and sixty-nine deaths were reported in 1870; of these, two hundred and eighteen were children under 5 years of age. The mortality was distributed through all the counties except Dukes, Nantucket and Plymouth. The first six months of the year show a considerably larger proportion of deaths than the last six months.

Scarlatina.-There were 683 deaths, a diminution of more than one-half as compared with the report of 1869. Of the deaths recorded, 460 were under the age of five years, and 612 were under ten years of age. The mortality was distributed quite equally through all the months of the year. None of the counties were exempt, but (as compared with deaths from other causes) the disease was especially fatal in Suffolk, Worcester, Middlesex, Hampshire, Hampden and Bristol.

Cholera Infantum caused the death of 1,914 young children in 1870, 490 more than were reported in 1869. The deaths from this cause comprised 7.1 per cent. of the whole number of deaths, and this ratio is showing an alarming increase from year to year. The average percentage for the past twenty-nine years, as compared with the deaths from all causes, is 3.70, and for the past five years (1865-69) it is 4.95. In the order of relative mortality, cholera infantum takes its place as the second in the list, standing next to consumption, a position it has never before occupied. This striking promotion of a disease so deadly in its inroads on infant life, should need no other argument to enforce the lessons which it so plainly teaches, namely, that more emphatic attention should be paid to the well-known and preventable causes and that the need for the purification of crowded centres of population is more imperative than ever.

The percentage of deaths from cholera infantum to deaths from all specified causes in the various counties was as follows: Barnstable, 2.9; Berkshire, 4·4; Bristol, 4·7; Dukes and Nantucket, 0.8; Essex, 6.6; Franklin, 4·4; Hampden, 6·5; Hampshire, 6·7; Middlesex, 9.1; Norfolk, 5.9; Plymouth, 3.9; Suffolk, 7·8; Worcester, 8.

Consumption.-There were 5,003 deaths in 1870, with an excess of 449 females. The following tabular statement shows that the changes of the seasons exercise but little influence on the fatality of New England's scourge:—

If comparison is made according to the divisions of the seasons strictly, the numbers are as follows:

DEATHS from Consumption at certain ages.-Three Years.

Twenty-seven per cent. of all who died from consumption in 1870 were between twenty and thirty years of age.

DEATHS from Consumption in the Counties, 1870.-Percentages.

The following table presents a view of the relative mortality of the counties in 1870, as regards consumption compared with all other diseases.

ORDER of Mortality by Counties.-1870.

The slight increase in the actual and the relative mortality from consumption reported in 1870, does not seriously affect the positive tendency toward amelioration as regards the fatality of this disease, a fact made evident in the following table :

MORTALITY from Consumption in Massachusetts.-Eighteen Years.

Pneumonia proved fatal in 1870 to 1,718, a number 18 less than that reported the previous year. The sexes were almost equally divided.