The New Zealand Graphic AND LADIES' JOURNAL. SATURDAY, JANUARY 7, 1892.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume X, Issue 1, 7 January 1893, Page 14

The New Zealand Graphic AND LADIES' JOURNAL. SATURDAY, JANUARY 7, 1892.

SUICIDE, horrors, sadden deaths, and calamities, are, according to rule, the gruesome and unsavoury story of the holiday weeks and what is known as the * fes. live season.’ Christmas after Christmas, New Year after New Year, the columns of the daily papers, after suspending operations for a few brief hours, reappear replete with tales of human vice and misery, glutted with horrors, and plethoric with stories of suffering from all parts of the globe, so that the legend ‘ Peace upon earth, goodwill to men,’ appears neither more nor less than a convenient butt for the sneering witticism of the cynical unbeliever and dart of the agnostic. Death, hand in hand with Santa Claus, would form a fitting cartoon for the week, and the breath of the ‘ valley of the shadow ’ is on our faces at the threshold of the new year. The boating calamities are large after any public holiday, but it is during the Cnristmas vacation that fatalities of other descriptions seem so specially prevalent.

The suicide of Mr Stubbing, a music master and wellknown society man in Auckland, on Christmas morning, has caused almost greater surprise than sensation, for there seem- at first sight to have been but the most flimsy and unsubstantial motive for an act which religion and law have designated as a crime. After such an event people invariably remember numbers of small circumstances and characteristics which seem to have pointed clearly and inexorably to the accomplished result. These reminiscences must not be too seriously regarded, since it is only hnman nature to unconsciously exaggerate and embroider such things, and in such connection to merge fancy into fact. So far as the facts brought out at the inquest are concerned, the unfortunate man sought voluntary death for the simple reason he himself has given—that he was tired of life. There is no reason to suppose that he was gravely embarrassed financially, or that he was suffering from fear of detection and exposure—the most frequent causes of suicide. He suffered, so ’tis said, from tits of depression, but this may be said of an enormous percentage of the human race who never dream of suicide. There is no solid ground for supposing for one instant that this life was taken for any other reason than that its owner was weary of it, and saw no reason why be should longer endure what hid become distasteful to him.

This case is not moreover a singular one. On the contrary it is a type of suicide becoming year by year morecommon, advancing.assuici leas a wholeadvances, in direct ratio with the progressof civilizationand thespread of education. Tbestitemeut is sufficiently startling, but most thinking men have long since recognised it as a truism. Statistics prove beyond the possibility of question that the frequency of suicide in civilised communities shows a growing and uniform increase, so that generally voluntary death since the beginning of t re century has increased, and goes on increasing more rapidly than the geometrical augmentation of the population and of the general mortality. From 1851 to 1860 the yeirlv suicides in England were 65 per million of the population ; from 1871 to 1877, 67 per million ; and in the two years from 1885 to 1887, 80 in the million. In Austiia for the same periods, the rising scale is still more terribly rap d, the jump being from 45 to 122, and then to 159.

Morselli, in liis standard work on suicide in ths International Science Series. say« : ‘ It is those countries which possess a higher standard of general culture which furnish the largest contingent of voluntary deaths. Although sometimes great differences may be observed in degree of instruction, but equal intensity in the suicides, yet the geographical distribution of these violent deaths goes, in a general way, pari /muuh with instruction. The < lermanic people are the most cultivate 1 of all European nations, and the rate in Fiankfort is 344 in the million; in Bio Janeiro in Sonth

America it is but 60. Against this comes a carious exception (about the only one) which shows the percentage in London to be low and decreasing compared with the population. In '5l to '6O it was 100 in the million, now it is less than 80. This is, however, contrary to the result in all other cities. ‘ What better, what more conclusive proof of the direct relation between suicide and general culture can we have than that drawn from the contemporary increase of the fonnerin civilized countries step by step with the latter? The increase of madness advances.’ Morselli relentlessly goes on, * with that of education, and it is not surprising that the same occurs with regard to suicide. Brond asserted many years ago that it was possible to deduce the average of self sought deaths in a given country from the number of pupils in the public schools. He was confirmed in this opinion by Balbi, who published lengthy statistic®, of which we quote two instances. In 1863 64 the scholars being per hundred 5 44, the suicides per million were 29 2; in 1877 the scholars had increased to 7'45, and the suicides to 40 6. Nor is this all ; the periodical press is, so it is claimed, the surest expression of general culture and education, and it can be clearly proved that here, too, the tendency to suicide increases in direct ratio with the number of periodicals published in a country.'

The explanation of this is, of course, that the cause of suicide in civilized communities is invariably mental strain, and that mental strain will naturally increase with education, which breeds new desires, new ambitions and consequently new worries and anxieties. Those who care to go farther into the question to verify our figures and study this particular branch of the question cannot do bettei than consult Morselli’s work.

The whole statistics of suicide are, in fact, most curious and of great interest and importance. Most people have a very natural impression that the predilection towards suicide would be more severe in winter than at any other season, the gloomy weather, dull days and depressing atmosphere all seeming more likely to tend that way than the bright spring and summer weather. The exact opposite is the case. Suicide is more common in the summer in all countries of the world except Norway and Holland, where the spring season is the most fatal. The changes of temperature in summer are far more sudden, and this has, according to Morselli, a vast amount to do with it. In connection with this, by theway.it is impossible not to reflect how much the frequent and sudden changes in the weather, which have during the last few weeks aroused universal comment in Auckland, had to do with the death of the young mnsic master on Christmas morning.

The regularity of the suicide seasons and the monthly distributionofsuicideistoo great for it to be attributed tochance or human will. As the number of violent deaths can be pre dieted from year to year with extreme probability so can the average suicide of the seasons be foreseen, and these seasons are so constant from one period to another as to have almost a specific character from a given statistical series. Mulhall in his splendid dictionary of statistics gives the following figures :—ln the United Kingdom -. Spring, 336 : Summer, 372 ; Autumn, 264 ; Winter, 288 Very few who seek their own lives do so from midnight to morn. The greatest number ch-rose the hours from 6 a.rn. to noon in the morning, after that from six in the evening to midnight is the favourite time, the afternoon and night being eschewed.

If we glance fora moment at those most predisposed to voluntary death, it is a somewhat painful fact to realise that suicide is far more frequent in the army than amongst civilians. Dr. Ogle's paper on the sul-ject shows that for the twenty-six years ending 1883, there were 42,630 suicides, and that per million between the ages of twenty-five and sixty-tivetherewere l,249soldiers, the general averagefor other trades and professions being 222. miners being lowest with 74. Lawyers were 408, and doctors 472 ; brokers, 376; while two curious instances are milkmen with the high average of 353, and hairdressers, 364. The lalrouring man is low in the list, 177; gardeners, 157 ; and policemen, 201. Had we space it would be of considerable interest to discuss these figures, and to quote further those of other trades and professions, tine can understand hairdressers being liable to suicide—the razor constantly at hand in moments of temptation, but it does seem strange that the milkman should he more prone to self destruction than a schoolmaster or a printer, a baker or a clerk. Weie the subject less grim one might suggest poisoning themselves with their own milk.

In all cases, suicide mortality is greater by almost half from the ages of 45 to 65 than from 25 to 45, and this leads us to inquire into the physical and moral causes of the crime. For inquest and merciful purposes, it has been held in England for many years, that to commit suicide a man must be mad, but this, of coarse, is not a ground that can be tolerated in an enquiry into the actual causes of suicide. Undoubtedly there are many suicidescommitted under mental aberration, but there are others, planned and carried out with such calmness and determination as utterly preclude

all supposition of insanity. The determination is firmed and the act committed with a coolness only to be inspired by most perfect logic. Let us again consult Morselli’s careful statistics. We shall find that out of 9.450 cases in Prussia, madness was responsible for 295 suicides. Like poor Mr Stubbing, 119 were ‘ weary of life.’ Passion engulfed 21, vices 99. Money troubles drove 34 to do themselves to death : remorse, fear of condemnation or shame, 125; domestic affliction 125, and so on. These were all men. As might be expected, the woman table is different. After 434 for mental disease, shame follows with 131, while finan cial disorders only troubled eight to death, and domestic troubles drove 50 out of the world.

One class of people which gives fewsuicidesconsists of those da voted to religion. Especially is this the ease among women, nuns, convent maids, and lay sisters, and it is seen 03 enquiry that religious sentiment has less to do with this than retirement and removal from the disappointments and passions of the laity. Catholics are far less prone to self - destruction than Protestants, and Jews than Catholics—the number per million of inhabitants being Catholics, 58 ; Protestants, 190.

A very interesting point is whether suicide and crime advance concurrently. The different and irregular information which we possess of criminal statistics affords scant help towards making exact deductions. Nevertheless it seems briefly possible to investigate whether the general progress of crime corresponds to that of suicide, and whether there is any relation between the two kinds of social phenomena. While suicide increases every year throughout France, Belgium, Austria, Bavaria, Germany, etc., crime also increases : but in England crime has decreased, and is decreasing yearly, but suicide, except in London, is advancing. In France the advance in suicide is moreover altogether out of proportion to that of crime. The increase in crime has been normal, that of suicide frightful. Mulhall points out that the number of yearly suicides has doubled itself in thirtyfive years. In 1850 there were 103 deaths from selfdestruction, and in ’B5, 205 killed themselves. It may therefore be held that suicide does not always increase in the same ratio as crime, but that where the annual average of voluntary deaths offers a very perceptible increase, a synchronous increase of crime is generally seen.

Hanging is the most common mode by which men commit suicide, drowning and shooting with almost equal frequency the next, cutting or stabbing the next, and taking poison the next. Females most frequently take their lives by drowning or by taking poison, next by stabbing or hanging, but only four times in 131 cases which have occurred during the last nine years by shooting. It may be mentioned that suicide by shooting is much more common now than formerly, the number of cases in the ten years ended with 1890 being three times as numerous as in the previous ten years.

It has been pointed out that suicide is a more terrible destroyer of human life than war, for whilst during the first fifty years of the Queen’s reign war occasioned 52,000 deaths of subjects of the United Kingdom, and 316,000 deaths of subjects of France, Germany and Austria, suicide claimed 77,000 victims in the first-named country, and 610,000 victims in the other three countries named.

A glance at ourselves in the matter and we have done with a somewhat morbid subject. In ten countries of the world, the proportion of suicides is greater than in New Zealand, but we, like the other Australian colonies, rank high on the black list. We are 88, in 100,000 persons living, and in the United Kingdom they are only 6 9, and in Russia 29. On the other hand, in Saxony the proportion is 30 Ito 100,000. We are below most of the other Australian colonies, Queensland having 13 7; Victoria, 11-8; Western Australia, 113 ; New South Wales, 95; South Australia ’.he same as oarselves, viz., B’B, while Tasmania is one of the lowest in the woild with 53. May the year we have just entered on be phemonenal in the low average of suicide ca®es all over the world, but specially with us. W. G. R.