Diseases as specified in the Bills are a disgrace to the medical science and civilisation in which as a nation we are acknowledged pre-eminent; nor can any effective reform take place while the sources of information are so ignorant and venal as at present. The information as to the disease of which any person dies is collected and verified in the following way.--The Churchwardens of each parish within the Bills of Mortality appoint two old women to the office of Searchers. These women as soon as they hear the knell for the dead, repair to the sexton of the parish to learn the residence of the deceased. They demand admittance into the house to examine the body in order that they may see that there is nothing suspicious about it, and _judge_ of what disease the person died; and _they_ report to the parish clerk. The regular charge for the performance of this office is 4d. to each Searcher; but if an extra gratuity be tendered, they seldom pass the threshold or hall of the house, and are content with whatever account is given; or should they actually view the corpse, it is easy to imagine what credit is due to the judgment they pronounce.[76] In presence of defects so grave as to the number of the dead, and of diagnosis so grotesque as to the causes of death, it would be unwise to argue with any confidence from the data of these Bills; yet, such as they are, we have nothing else to appeal to. The variations of mortality from year to year were of wide irregularity; and whatever influence smallpox might have had, it does not appear to have had much in magnifying the annual totals. Let us take a dozen years when smallpox was heaviest from the last seventy years of the century, and observe its relation to the entire mortality, and to that from fevers-- Burials from From From Year. all Diseases. Smallpox. Fevers. 1736 27,581 3014 3361 1740 30,811 2725 4003 1746 28,157 3236 4187 1749 25,516 2625 4458 1752 20,485 3538 2070 1757 21,313 3296 2564 1762 26,326 2743 3742 1763 26,143 3582 3414 1768 23,639 3028 3596 1772 26,053 3992 3207 1781 20,709 3500 2249 1796 19,288 3548 1547 ------- ------ ------ 296,021 38,827 38,398 Again, let us take twelve years when the death-rate from smallpox was at its lowest. Here they are--