The great difficulty, just referred to, in comparing the results deduced from equally complete statistics of different countries, lies in the variety of the arbitrary rules under which the computations in making them up are effected. As an example in point, take the railroad returns of Great Britain and those of Massachusetts. They are in each case prepared with a great deal of care, and the results deduced from them may fairly be accepted as approximately correct. As respects accidents, the number of cases of death and of personal injury are annually reported, and with tolerable completeness, though in the latter respect there is probably in both cases room for improvement. The whole comparison turns, however, on the way in which the entire number of passengers annually carried is computed. In Great Britain, for instance, in 1878, these were returned, using round numbers only, at 565,000,000, and in Massachusetts at 34,000,000. By dividing these totals by the number of cases of death and injury reported as occurring to passengers from causes beyond their control, we shall arrive apparently at a fair comparative showing as to the relative safety of railroad traveling in the two communities. The result for that particular year would have been that while in Great Britain one passenger in each 23,500,000 was killed, and one in each 481,600 injured from causes beyond their control, in Massachusetts none were killed and only one in each 14,000,000 was in any way injured. Unfortunately, however, a closer examination reveals a very great error in the computation, affecting every comparative result drawn from it. In the English returns no allowance whatever is made for the very large number of journeys made by season-ticket or commutation passengers, while in Massachusetts, on the contrary, each person of this class enters into the grand total as making two trips each day, 156 trips on each quarterly ticket, and 626 trips on each annual. Now in 1878 more than 418,000 holders of season tickets were returned by the railway companies of Great Britain. How many of these were quarterly and how many were annual travelers, does not appear. If they were all annual travelers, no less than 261,000,000 journeys should be added to the 565,000,000 in the returns, in order to arrive at an equal basis for a comparison between the foreign and the American roads: this method, however, would be manifestly inaccurate, so it only remains, in the absence of all reliable data, and for the purpose of comparison solely, to strike out from the Massachusetts returns the 8,320,727 season-ticket passages, which at once reduces by over 3,000,000 the number of journeys to each case of injury. As season-ticket passengers do travel and are exposed to danger in the same degree as trip-ticket passengers, no result is approximately accurate which leaves them out of the computation. At present, however, the question relates not to the positive danger or