SOME OBSERVATIONS
ON THE PECULIARITIES OF
DISEASES IN INFANTS AND CHILDREN.
BY J. K. WALKER, M. D. HUDDERSFIELD.
IN a recent paper on the late population returns, I
took occasion to submit some account of the relative
decrease of mortality in different parts of the empire,
and, at the same time, I endeavoured to trace the
operation of those causes, which appeared to me
most influential in producing this happy change.
In prosecuting this enquiry, I was induced to compare
the last returns with those of the ten years
preceding, and it was a gratifying result of such
comparison to find that, in by far a majority of
towns, a very considerable decrement had taken
place in the rate of infant mortality. But, though
this was strikingly the case in many, yet, in other
parts, this declension is less obvious. In some of
the manufacturing districts, the number of children
who have been buried, under one year old, was one fourth
of the whole number of burials in the last ten
years. In one report, I observe the number of
children who have been buried, under the age of
six, is more than half of the whole number. But,
as the highest rate of infant mortality has usually
been in large towns, so has the diminution of deaths
