of Westphalia do even 300 Jews reside together; thus, it is very difficult for them to possess any well-ordered public Institution of importance. In the province of the Rhine also, the Jews are distributed into such insignificant masses, that the largest community, which is at Cologne, does not contain more than 585 members. In the Rhenish towns of Knefeld, Düsseldorf, Bonn, and Kreuznach, alone, are to be found Jewish communities consisting of more than 300 persons: in all other towns in this province, how rich soever they may be in people and traffic, the Jewish communities are still smaller, and of the 26,000 Jews in the Rhenish province, more than 16,000 are scattered about in country towns and villages. The largest Jewish community in the province of Saxony is to be found at Magdeburg, and yet it contains but 559 members; in Halberstadt there are 342 Jews, but in no other towns in this province do the Jews amount to 300. At the same time by far the largest proportion of Jews live in the towns, the country making a return of only one-seventh part of the whole Jewish population. In the province of Brandenburgh, Berlin contains the most opulent Jewish community in the Prussian States, which, according to the latest census, contains 6458 members, a number exceeded only by the Jews in the town of Posen. In Frankfort on the Oder there were 648, in Penzlau 371, and in Landsberg on the Weser 349. In no other district of this province did the Jews amount to 300. The four towns above-named contained four-sevenths of all the living Jews in the province; by far the greater part of the remaining three-sevenths was found in small groups in the towns. The number of Jews residing in the country was very trifling, and amounted scarcely to one-fourteenth part of the whole body of Jews in the province. In the province of Pomerania, Stettin, and Stolpen were the only towns containing more than 300 Jews, and only one-sixteenth of all the Jews in the province were found in the country districts. An examination throughout all the Prussian States makes it apparent, that by far the greatest number of Jews are to be found where the Polish language and the Roman Catholic religion prevail. In the southern parts of Eastern Prussia, however, where the language is almost universally Polish, and the inhabitants are Protestants, there are very few Jews.

As early as the 11th March, 1812, we find that many Jewish families became domiciled in the Prussian States with consent of the authorities, and were admitted to the rights of citizenship, on condition "that they assumed permanent family names, and that in their commercial transactions, as also in their written contracts and legal testamentary documents, they use German, or some other living language, and subscribe their names in none other but German or Latin characters."

With the fulfilment of these conditions they were, as far as concerned all civil or political rights and duties, placed on an equality with all Christian inhabitants, and were only subject to restrictions with regard to their capability of holding public offices. On this point the Edict states, "That they may exercise all school and academic functions and professorships, for which they have duly qualified. How far the Jews may be permitted to hold public and state offices is a question which we reserve to ourselves for legal determination in course of time."

These resolutions, however, have not as yet been followed up, nor has the German Confederation come to any agreement concerning the amelioration of the state of the Jews according to the intention of the Act of Confederacy. On the contrary, opinions against the extension of privileges among the Jews having become prevalent in modern days, the progress of legislation in their favour has been checked, and even in some instances given place to restricted measures. In the Prussian States especially, the laws embodied in the Edict of the 11th March, 1812, were confined to that portion of country then belonging to Prussia, while other portions which have been recovered or acquired, maintain the original restrictions which were in force against the A Cabinet Order of the 8th August,, 1830, expressly establishes the universal application of this law, because in some districts doubts had arisen on the subject. Meanwhile the necessity of regulating the condition of the Jews by a general law embracing the entire State was recognized, and its publication will be looked for with eager expectation, as the laws promulgated since 1812 indicate views essentially different from those which gave rise to the Edict of the 11th March in that year. The preliminary Ordinance of the 1st June, 1833, respecting the condition of the Jews in the Grand Duchy of Posen, gives to the numerous Jews inhabiting that country a constitution, according to which they are to form local committees for the management of their own affairs. It is insisted that each Jewish child shall, between the ages of 7 and 14, receive such school instruction as shall fit him for a particular calling, and that he shall afterwards follow such calling, the business of pedlar, factor, huckster, and pawnbroker, being excluded. Only such Jews as have by compliance with this Ordinance merited more distinguished marks of confidence, shall by patents of naturalization be recognized as citizens of the State. Here, then, we have those rights, which the Edict of 1812 bestowed at once upon the Jews domiciled in the Prussian States, conferred by a gradual process. The relations of the Jews in that district, once consisting of the Bishoprics of Paderborn and Korvei, are, with reference to the possession of landed property, and in regard to money transactions with the Christian inhabitants, subjected to special limitations by Orders of the Cabinet, dated 20th September, 1836, and 5th January, 1839, because they had there established a system of traffic most destructive to the small landowners, and similar to that which induced the French Empire to place restrictions on the money transactions of the Jews residing on the shores of the Rhine, especially those which they had with the proprietors of small vineyards.

Besides these Ordinances which have reference only to the Jews of those districts who in 1812 did not belong to Prussia, there are others which affect all the Jews throughout the kingdom, including those on whom the Edict of 1812 had conferred the right of citizenship. For instance, the resolution of that Edict, by which Jews recognized as citizens were admitted to professorships, and all scholastic and academic offices, was by a Ministerial Proclamation of the 4th December, 1822, rescinded, because of certain incongruities, which did not appear until the law came into operation. In like manner the revised Ordinance of the 17th March, 1831, so far limits the Jewish capability for holding municipal offices, that professors of the Christian religion

alone are considered eligible for the offices of chief mayor and mayor of towns. Besides, a Jew possessed of a knightly estate is not permitted to exercise the prerogatives attached to his landed possessions, and communion with a Christian Church is expressly required to render a man eligible as deputy for any commune in the States.

PROCEEDINGS OF THE STATISTICAL SOCIETY OF

LONDON.

Second Ordinary Meeting, 1845-6. Monday, 22nd December, 1845. The following gentlemen were elected Fellows:

William Ogilby, Esq., M.A.
J. J. Sylvester, Esq.

Richard Dugard Grainger, Esq.

J. S. Goodfellow, M.D.

Major Henry Berkley Henderson.
Charles Grenville Mansell, Esq.

Henry Wyldbore Rumsey, Esq.

The following paper was read :

Statistics of Crime in England and Wales, from 1839 to 1843. By Rev. Whitworth Russell.

Third Ordinary Meeting, 1845-6. Monday, 19th January, 1846. Richard Clewin Griffith, Esq., and F. G. P. Neison, Esq., were ap pointed the Auditors of the Society's Accounts for 1845, in conjunction with Dr. Bowring, M.P., appointed by the Council.

The following gentlemen were proposed for admission into the Society:

On the Duration of Life among the English Gentry, with additional observations on the Duration of Life among the Aristocracy. By W. A. Guy, M.D., Hon. Sec.

MISCELLANEOUS.

STATE OF THE PUBLIC HEALTH IN THE PAST QUARTER. "THE Quarterly Returns are obtained from 115 Districts, sub-divided into 576 Sub-Districts. Thirty-four Districts are placed under the Metropolis, and the remaining 81 Districts comprise, with some agricultural Districts, the principal towns and cities of England. The population was 6,579,693 in 1841."

The mortality in the last quarter of 1845 was much lower than is usual, for only 39,178 deaths were registered, which is less by 14,740 than the number (43,918) registered in the corresponding quarter of 1844; and 2357 less than the average of the corresponding quarter of seven previous years, notwithstanding the increase of the population at the rate of about 1.74 per cent. annually.

The fluctuations in the mortality, above and below the average, are exhibited in the following series of numbers. The lower line is deduced from the Return in the December quarter of 1838, and shows what the deaths would have been if they had increased in the same ratio as the population.

1838 1839 1840 1841 1842 1843 1844 1845

Deaths Registered in the De-40,030 41,598 44,044 39,165 39,544 42,449 43,918 39,178

cember quarters of 8 years.. Deaths which would have been registered if the numbers had increased from 1838 at the rate of 1.74 per cent. annually Difference above the calculated number Difference below the calculated number

The mildness of the season was one cause of the diminished mortality. This is illustrated by the annexed Table of the deaths, exclusive of those by violence, registered in the Metropolis, and the mean temperature at Greenwich of the last six weeks of 1844 and 1845. The deaths and the temperature were the same at first: on the fifth week the deaths were 1,343 in 1844, and only 933 in 1845; the temperature in the previous week (the fourth) had fallen to 28° 2 in 1844, and only to 39° 2 in 1845.

A fall of the mean temperature of the air, from 45° to 4° or 5° below the freezing point (32°) of water, destroys from 300 to 500 lives in the Metropolis. It produces the same results on a larger scale all over the country. Nor is it to be wondered at that a great change of the heat of the air which we breathe and live in, should have such an effect.

The deaths returned by the Registrars for each year are as follows:

In the first three years there were 497,166 deaths; in the last three years 496,698. The population increased in the districts, from which returns have been procured, about 1.74 (nearly 1) per cent. annually, in the intervals of the last censuses,and the excess of births over deaths has continued,- —so that it may be safely assumed. that the numbers living have gone on increasing at the same rate-about 9 per cent, in the five years, from the middle of 1839-40 to the middle of 1843-5. Now, the deaths, instead of increasing with the population 9 per cent., and consequently amounting to 541,960 in the three last years were 496,698-less by 45,262 than if the rate of mortality, which prevailed in the three years 1838-40, had been sustained. The improvement may perhaps be partly accounted for by other circumstances; but as far as can be seen at present, it is fairly ascribable to the partial removal of nuisances from large towns, to some increase of employment, and, we may hope, a consequent amelioration in the condition of the great body of the people in the dense town districts of the kingdom. But an epidemic, generated in this or any neighbouring population, may speedily reverse the results of the tables, and carry off the thousands of lives that appear to have been spared and saved.

* The Deaths of Wandsworth, now in the Metropolis, have been added to those of all the previous years.

* In reading the twentieth column it will be borne in mind that is read "HIGHER," and➡ LOWER," than the average,