Before the enactment Vaccination provided Vaccination of any Vaccination gratuitously, but not obligatory. Laws. obligatory. Year. No. of Year. No. of Year. No. of Deaths. Deaths. Deaths. 1838 16,268 1841 6,368 1854 2,808 1839 9,131 1842 2,715 1855 2,525 1810 10,431 1847 4,226 1856 2,277 1848 6,903 1857 3,936 1840 4,645 1858 6,460 1850 4,666 1859 3,848 1851 6,997 1860 2,749 1852 7,320 1861 1,320 1853 3,151 Average 11,944 — 5,221 — 3,240 Annual Deaths. The table was compiled for the purpose of showing that legislative measures to provide and enforce vaccination, have been effective in diminishing the mortality from small-pox. The year 1838 was the most fatal year, from small-pox, in the present century. The table is commenced with that year, _while former years are omitted in which the death-rate from small-pox was low_, (for it had not prevailed severely since 1825). Hence the average mortality is swelled to 11,944. So much for the first division. The third division is supposed to prove that the decrease of the mortality from small-pox is due to compulsory vaccination. It must be remembered however, that in the second division there are three epidemic visitations included, while in the third division there is only one. Moreover, if the years 1862–3–4–5, be added, the average annual deaths for the period 1862–65 amount to 5,421, thus— Year. No. of Deaths. 1862 1,628 1863 5,964 1864 7,684 1865 6,411 — 5,421 Dr. Seaton attributes the diminished mortality from small pox to compulsory vaccination, closing his account with 1861, which is the year of lowest mortality in the table. How will he account for the subsequent increase of mortality from small-pox under a more vigilant enforcement of the Act of Parliament? In 1863 it amounted to 5,964; and it rose to 7,684 in 1864; _which was the most fatal year in regard to small-pox for twenty-four years_. If vaccination be really “protective,” and if the gradual diminution of the mortality from small-pox down to the year 1861 was consequent on vaccination having been made compulsory, how, and why was the mortality of 1864 from that disease no less than 6,364 _in excess_ of the mortality of 1861? Dr. Routh has quoted Dr. Seaton with a view of illustrating the contrast between the last century and the present in respect to the mortality from small-pox.