The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1871-01-06
gP1R1x OF THn RRuss.
Editorial Opinions Of the Leading Journals
upon Current Topics Compiled Every
Day for the Evening Telegraph
THE YEARS SUICIDES.

THE YEARS SUICIDES.
P,oYa the n. Y. Tribune.
There is a Spanish proverb which says
there is a remedy for everything but death;
and in spite of all the teachings of philoso-
ply and religion, the universal feeling of the
European civilization accepts dissolution as
the one irremediable misfortune. We speak
of our own civilization; because the love of
life and the dread of death are greater among
the races to which the Christian religion has
given a weighty sense of personal RESPONSE
bility, than among those whose traditions and
fanaticisms have made all the incidents of
living and dying matter of comparative un-
concern. The Japanese gentleman resents
an affront by ripping up his own bowels, and
his discomteous adversary must follow the
chivalrous example or be held boor and
craven. In some provinces of China a man
condemned to death can buy substitute for
a few hundred dollars. The vicarious con-
vict makes his wife and children
comfortable for life, and then proceeds to
make himself comfortable for death by
indulging in protracted orgie of rum aud
opium, at the end of which the executioners
sword cures the logical headache, and the
troubles of life and housekeeping are ended.
But this indicates a triumphant exercise of
what the Germans call pure reason, above
the reach of the Caucasian intellect. mans
life may be very worthless, but he will not
sell it for money. He still says, in excuse for
any meanness, "a man must live, and DR..
johnson, M. de Talleyrand, Didaskalos Tis,
and all the wits and sages since jest-books
were written, may reply in vain, 81 do not
see the necessity" The gloomy wisdom Of
Solons warning to the Lydian King--to
count no man happy until his DEATHS
usually reversed in the sanguine instincts of
average human hearts, which persistently re-
fuse to despair this side of the undiscovered
country.
The report of the Coroner gives some hint,
therefore, of the utter wretchedness which
exists unknown at our very elbows, when it
informs us that in this, the most practical
and prosperous of all the worlds great cities,
during the year just finished, 112 persons
found the miseries of life more dreadful than
death, and laid violent hands on their own
existence. OF these, only % were natives of
the United States-the element of hope is
stronger in the Yankee than any other crea-
ture. Beer, metaphysics, and home sickness
give to the Teutonic immigrant predsposi-
ton to self-slaughter, increased by indiscreet
reading of Werther and the Robbers. The
German suicides reach the disproportionate
number of 53. The Irish are relatively
much less numerous. Many of them
would seem to have little to live for,
and yet only 10 have thought best to
die. OF the French, who at home have such
passion for charcoal and the Seine only
three chose to run the ordeal of an alien
Morgue. AS might naturally be expected,
the very young people have not been eager to
leave world where there was kissing and
dancing. Under twenty years of age there
was but one solitary unfortunate; under thirty
there were 26 under forty there were 81 that
grew tired of the hard fight; under fifty, 27
there were 16 under sixty and 10 under
seventy, and one who had finished the allotted
limit of men grew impatient and courted his
dallying death. The suicides were pretty
evenly distributed through the year. Janu-
ary was the month most affected by the self
slaughterers, and in March there were fewest
This is natural enough, as midwinter is desti-
tute of cheer to the wretched and hope
wakes in every heart where it slept at the
first vivifying touch of spring.
Either because they suffer less, or endure
suffering better than men, comparatively few
women commit suicide. Last year the pro-
portion was 23 to 49, There is curious and
which the two sexes make way with their
lives. The largest number of men shoot or
hang themselves; but only five women used
the ungraceful rope, and not one had the
courage to load and fire a pistol. Most of
them took poison, which allows one to die in
a picturesque and heart-broken attitude.
-Four, who had possibly read Hood and seen
Hamlet, SOuSnU WaIery grave, WHICH Iney
would not have done if they had ever seen a
drowned person. A blonde Bavarian girl
came before the Coroner a few days ago aud
said:-''Mylover and agreed to dienow while
we were young and loving. He brought two
pistols and shot himself, and was afraid.
If this Romeo of the Bowery had brought 9
phial of prussic acid, his Juliet would have
gone unfinchingly with him into the Silent
Land.
The predominance of foreigners in all suct
lists shows that nostalgia is the most fruitfu
cause of that utter despair which makes life
hateful A condition of misery among stran
gers is worse than financial ruin, or disgrace
or despised love. In the early days of thu
coolie emigration, the contractors on tn,
Isthmus of Panama frequently found thei
working gangs seriously reduced by suicide
The unhappy bondmen would go through
some religious ceremonial, and then, droninl
melancholy hymn, they would clasp hand
and lie down in platoons on their faces in TIA
warm and shallow brooks and never NOV
again. This they imagined was the easies
way to get home.
ARE THE REPUBLICANS SHUT UP TT