16

as to secure "a pare atmosphere and other conditions favor-
able to the growth of a healthy and vigorous population."

In the table of the "Rates of Mortality," showing the per-
centage of deaths in the population of these different natural
divisions, being seven in number, they are less in this Alle-
gany region than in any other of the regions, except the fifth,
which comprises the Pacific coast, and the seventh, which
comprises the States of Wisconsin, Iowa and Minnesota."
The difference is, however, very slight, the average for the
years 1850 and 1860 in the third division being 1.02 per cent.,
for the fifth division being 0.93 per cent., and for the
seventh 0.99, not qnite on,e per cent. When we re-
member the different kinds of population of the two other
divisions, compared with that forming a large part of our State,
the 5th and 7th being inhabited by settlers who mostly go
there in the prime of life, hale; hearty and strong emigrants;
and the population of Maryland in its Alleghany region
being old settlers, composed of the usual proportion of old
men, women and children, amongst whom deaths are much
more frequent than in those of middle life, and a large emi-
gration of the strongest and healthiest part of its popula-
tion, it must be acknowledged in all candor that the advantage
is decidedly with us. Even the figures as givens how but a small
advantage in favor of these regions where fewest people die,
not where the causes that promote health and long life are
most abundant. It is not fair to compare the deaths amongst
a youthful, strong and vigorous population with that eom-
posed of the extremes of infancy and old age. And this is
the comparison in the census table between the "Alleghany
region, No. III., and the Pacific coast, No. V., and the
Northwestern States, No. VII."

But this is not all the correction to be made in that table
in favor of our State; more than one-third of her whole popu-
lation is comprised in the city of Baltimore; in no other state
does the same relation exist between the rural and urbal
population, but we all know that the relative degree of health
in the country far exceeds that in large cities, and it is to the
health of the country part of Maryland, that I am inviting
attention. But this is not all yet to be said in our favor; in
1860, per 8th Census, the population of Maryland was about
one-eight free negroes, and the greater mortality amongst
this class than any other, will give a much larger per centage
to Maryland mortality. The fact well known to us, is stated
in the Preliminary Report on the 8th Census, page 6, that
"of an excessive mortality amongst the free colored, which
is particularly evident in the large cities." In the Prelimi-
nary Report on the eighth census, the table on page 22, shows
Maryland in an equally favorble light, and when taken in con-
nection with, the facts mentioned above, as to the large pro-
portion of urbal population in Maryland, compared with the
rural, and the existence of a large class in our State, amongst