“Of one hundred persons,” says Esquirol, “who attempt suicide only forty succeed.” Brierre de Boismont says, “for one suicide there are two attempts.” Legoyt has ascertained that in Dublin, 1874-76, for three years the proportions (known to the police) were 41 successes and 123 attempts. He also calculates that in the countries of Europe, excluding Turkey, there are annually 28,000 persons who attempt to kill themselves, and 22,000 succeed. The Statistical Society published in Vol. I. of their Journal the following figures; in one year, 75 completed to 47 attempts; in another, 117 completed to 58 attempted; these were London cases, and the numbers were, I believe, procured from the police registers. During a period of nine years, 4,595 suicides were registered in Paris, and 1,864 suicidal failures. In Baden, during two years, 417 suicides were discovered, whilst the official records show only 22 cases of attempted suicide. The attempt to commit suicide is much less liable to interruption than attempted murder. There is no resistance from the opponent to be allowed for, and it is easy to evade the officers of the law by attempting the act when alone. As a matter of fact, it is a rare event for anyone to commit suicide when in company with others. The majority of suicides are not discovered until after death. Comte considers it a folly of lawmakers to think that enactments can check the act. Heber, “Journey through India,” calls attention to the very small amount of success, during many years, which English officials achieved in preventing suicidal drowning at Benares and elsewhere in British India, by means of legal enactments. THE LAW OF SUICIDAL ATTEMPTS. Suicide, as before described, is a felony; the attempt to commit a felony is in the eye of the English law a misdemeanour; consult R. _v._ Higgins, 2 East., 8; and R. _v._ Martin, 9 C. and P. 213-215. An attempt at Felo-de-se is a misdemeanour over which the quarter sessions have jurisdiction; but it is not an attempt to commit murder within the meaning of the Act 24 & 25 Vict, c. 100, _see_ R. _v._ Burgess, 1. L. and C. 258, 32 L. J., M. C. 56. When the police hear of an attempt at suicide, the culprit is taken in charge by them; if seriously injured the patient is watched in hospital by a police officer. It is customary to charge the offender before the magistrates as soon as practicable; in such a case it is more usual to bind over the prisoner to “keep the peace,” than it is to send the case for trial; if there be any evidence of insanity, the prisoner is examined by the police surgeon and another medical man; and if found to be insane is certified as such, and confined in an asylum.