Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1882-02-08
FOOD AND MORTALITY.
The Effect of the Price of Food
ON the Moral aud Social.
Condition of the People.

New York Post.l
1t has been amply demonstrated that
there is an intimate connection be-
tween scarcity aud pestilence, be-
tween bad seasons and epizooty; and
there is a tendency among a popula-
ton stinted in their food supply to
contract the so-called zymotic disease,
as typhus and malarial fevers and dys-
EMERY. Again, it has been shown
that in England and France those
years in which corn was sold at the
highest price have been those in which
mortality was greatest, and disease
most prevalent; and that those,
on the contrary. in which corn has
been cheapest, have been the health
lest and least mortal. DR.. Farr,
of England, in his statistical alb
stracts, shows that the death rate of
the population falls three per cent for
each decrease of two shillings in the
price of wheat. The influence of the
cost of living upon the number of
marriages is too we'll recognized to
need any extended notice. In Europe
this influence is exerted upon emigra
ton, and the statistics show that a
year of high prices is accompanied
with an Increased emigration. Though
this influence is indirect rather than
direct; for under the gold fevers oc
casioned by the discoveries of gold in
Australia and California, or the polit-
ical reaction that followed 1848, emf
grafton was increased, although the
price of corn was very low. Still. an
English economist, Dawson, laid down
as a general rule that the variations
Of the stream of emigration will be
found to coincide nearly with the fuc-
tuations in the prosperity Of small cap
italists and the ruder class of laborers
in the countries from which the emf.
grafton proceeds, and in estimating
this prosperity the cost of food is an
important factor.
But the effects OF high priced wheat
are not confined to the social and
physical condition of man. They
affect also his mental condition
though this is difficult matter to
prove on account of the length oil
time that must necessarily elapse be
tween the cause and the effect. There
can be no doubt that poverty and un
derfeeding are powerful agencies il
the production of some kinds of in
sanity. Imperfect nutrition is one O
the most frequent causes of insanity
and imbecility among the poor, and i
is the lower classes-those classes tina
are dependent upon their wages anC
lead hand to mouth existence-tha
the larger number Of insane are found
Morselli, in his recent work on sui
eide, clearly proves the intimate rela
ton that exists between the number
of suicides and the social condition
of the people, The number of crimi
pals increase with the price of food
as has been proved by Pint in Eng
land and Weisz in Germany. Oct
tingen and Mayr have botl
determined from a different Sc
of statistics that with every rist
in the price Of wheat the number O
crimes against property increases anC
that OF crimes against persons de
cre9ses, and an opposite result follows
a fail in the price of wheat, and May
has shown that an increase of on,
| larceny to every 100000 inhabitants G
Bavaria accompanies every rise of
farthings in the price of wheat, and
on the other hand, an equal diminutiol
in offenses against property follows ar
equal fall in the price of wheat. AM
yet there are some who would favo
dear wheat, and Others who advise
{ short production, on the ground tina
"a great harvest frequently tends t.
T render the labor of the whole yea
almost proftless whenever foreigl
countries are blessed with compara
lively an equal abundance. Blu
Bentham was nearer correct when b
stated that provisions, the produce {
agriculture, constantly and necessaril
produce market for themselves. 'rh
more provisions a man raises over an
above what is necessary for his ow
consumption, the more he has to Civ
to others to induce them to proVid
him with whatever besides provision
he chooses to have"