On tables of mortality and the mean duration of life, marriages and associations in general

Abstract

There is a very simple way of constructing mortality tables [1].^aFrom the civil registers a large number of individuals whose births and deaths are shown, are taken. Then one determines how many of these individuals have died in the first year of life, how many in the second year, and so on. From this one may deduce how many individuals were alive at the beginning of each year, and one writes this number in the table next to that which indicates the year. Thus one writes the number of births next to 0, the number of children who reached one year next to the year 1, the number of children who reached two years next to year 2, and so on.^a But as mortality is very high in the first two years of life, it is necessary, for greater accuracy, to indicate in these early years the number of survivors at the end of each half-year.