Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1888-09-12
THE SUPERIOR SEX.
WOMAN . EXPECTATION or LIFE
GREATER THAN THAT OF MEN.

Interesting Report from n Recognized
Authority-A Formidable Array of Fig |
ures-Why Women Are Longer Lived
Than Men-The Future.
Professor Stanford Z. Chaille M. D., dean |
of the medical faculty of Tulane university, |
a recognized authority in matters of sani- |
tary philosophy and hygiene, has recently |
published an interesting report on the life |
and death rates of New Orleans as compared |
with those of other cities. Attention here is |
directed to some deductions which the pro-
fessor derives from his Statistics and if We
may trust in this case to the somewhat ques-
tionable statement that Figures never lie,"
we are brought face to face with some re-
markable and strikingly suggestive facts.
Our professors statistics, which are, of
course, perfectly square and honorable as
far as he is concerned, are derived partly
from the records of the Louisiana board OF
health, which is charged with the duty of
recording all births and deaths in this city,
and partly from the mortuary tables of the
tenth United States census, and they are
doubtless as reliable as such collated figures
that in most parts of the United States
women have a better expectation of life
than men; they live longer and survive
with more tenacity and success the vicissi
tudes that tend to shorten existence. But
it is in New Or cans where these advantages
are enjoyed to the highest degree over any
other place.
THE SOFTER SEX SUPERIOR
Here learned psychologist presents for
midable array of figures to show that in the
struggle for life the softer sex starts out with
decided advantages of immunity from the
assaults of death as compared with the males;
| that the women have better chances for de-
velopment in all that makes up sane, sound
| and vigorous life In word, the men are
| on the down grade of health and morals
| while the women possess all that conduce to
| their physical and moral superiority. Let
us quote the words of our scientist:
| "The expectation of life for females is, in
every locality, better than of males, but the
| difference in favor of females varies greatly,
| and to an extent inexpllcable by me. The
| superiority of white females over males is
| greatest, and very great, in New Orleans and
| Charleston; it is little in Boston, Brooklyn
and New York and it is very slight and least
| IN New Jersey and Massachusetts, The four
teen localities take, In reference to this
| perioriuy of females over males, the follow
ing order: New Orleans, Charleston, Cincin-
! natl San Francisco, St Louis, Chicago,
| Philadelphia, District of Columbia, Balti-
more, New York. Brooklyn, Boston, Massa-
chusetts, New Jersey
THE like superiority and difference exists
| i'm tn fam los nd m lac
The localities reported, only four, take the
following order: New Orleans, again first
and the difference is very great, though not
as great as between white females and males
next Baltimore, then the District of Column
bia, and last Charleston. And it is very sin
gular that in Charleston, where the superb
ority of the white female is very great, the
superiority of the colored female over the
colored male is very little.
Another singular fact is that, while there
is slight superiority in Massachusetts of the
females over the males, yet the males have
the superiority from two to ten years of age,
and that this male superiority is found in no
other locality. A third singular fact, and
one encouraging specially to New Orleans, is
that the expectation of life of its white
females is superior to that of the white
females of Charleston, Brooklyn, New York
and Boston; but the expectation OF life of the
white males of New Orleans is less than in
said places"
THE SEVERAL REASONS WHY.
| Why is all this possibIei Our author re-
plies:
Females are, in less number, guilty Of
vicious and hurtful excuses; they are mort
confined in the house and engaged in les
hazardous occupations, and thereby they are
less exposed to communicable diseases, K
inclemencies of weather and to dangerou.
! accidents But these obvious causes, whit
explaining in part, fail to do so in whole
For at no time is the superiority of female.
as great as under 5 years of age, and sucf
females are no more exposed than males t,
the above causes For such reasons vita
statisticians have claimed that nature en-
dowed the female with a stronger vitality
with greater vital endurance, and if Their
be better explanation do not know it"
We are to believe, then, that while womel
| are in obedience to subtle forces of evolu
ton, growing physically more perfect, an,
| this would seem also to include advancement
toward moral perfection, the men are de
Ginning in all vital characteristics TIL
>
full and more numerous, while the men are il
a corresponding ratio to retire from tn
world they have for so many ages dom
mated and controlled. By these mysteriou
and potential agencies the men are dying
fading out of existence, and their last d.
spairing gaze is to be fixed ON a race of GOO
desses, "divinely tall and most divinel
fair crowding upon the stage where til
tremendous tragedy of Man and Woman
has been so long enacted, but now to
superseded by the inexpressibly peculiar an
unknowable drama, woman"
1t is to this ending that all the must
figures and dry bones of science presente
above inevitably tend. 1t is the consumm
ton of an implacable law which is destin,
declaring the survival of the fittest. 1t pc
u tends a grand future for woman, but it
much to be doubted if Eve can be happy
paradise without Adam.-New Orleans Pic
yune