CHAPTER VII.

PRESENT SUICIDE RATE AND INCREASE.

It is a matter of the greatest difficulty to obtain recent statistics of the actual numbers of suicides, either in our own country, or in the Continental States.

Each nation has its own methods of obtaining these statistics, and its own modes of tabulation, and those variations render it very difficult to procure figures for comparison.

But beyond this hindrance to accuracy lies the deeper one, that whatever may be the State under consideration, even when we have obtained the authentic numbers supplied by Government, we may rest assured that these numbers fall very far short of the actual totals. In very many statistics in which scientific and medical men are interested, they are only confronted by the difficulty of want of accuracy of observation, but in this matter to want of accuracy is added intentional misrepresentation.

Relations, friends, and I must add family doctors, will all frequently combine to slur over the _self-done something_ which is the essence of the death cause.

But, were it even possible to avoid this source of error, there are others which also obscure our calculations; for example, of the total number of bodies found in our rivers, lakes, and ponds, and on the sea coast, a considerable number are never identified at all; and of those which are identified, in a considerable number of cases more, no evidence will be forthcoming which will be sufficient to prove by what means the deceased got into the water.

It then becomes necessary either to provide a valueless column of figures named “Found Drowned,” or else some official has to allot the cases by sentiment to suicide, murder, or misadventure, at his discretion.

As a proof, if any be needed, of the necessary inaccuracy of estimates regarding suicide totals, and the proportion which drowning bears as a means to the other means used, I add the numbers published in a Parliamentary paper for 1882-83 of the dead bodies found in the Thames, in the Metropolitan district.

In 1882 there were found 284 In 1883 „ „ „ 260 ─── Together, 544 violent deaths.

Inquests were held on all these cases, and the best evidence obtainable was produced.

The verdicts were─

Accidental death in 242 cases. Wilful murder 2 „ Suicide in 59 „ Found drowned, _i.e._, no opinion offered in 241 „

And again, in a recent year, from a total of 40 corpses found in the Regent’s Canal, in the London district, 22 were returned as “Cause of death not known”; and of 46 corpses found in the River Lea, 19 were also stated to have been “Found Drowned.”

The eminent authority, Brierre de Boismont, confesses, after a long investigation of some thousand suicides, purporting to be the total for Paris for a certain number of years, as follows: “One may then, without any fear of being inaccurate, estimate the number of suicides committed, as almost double the number of suicides registered.”

The following table will be found to give the latest calculations of the actual number of suicides per million of inhabitants in the different European States; and will shew the estimated increase or decrease during the stated number of preceding years.

─────┬──────────────────┬────────────┬──────────┬────── │ │ Number of │ Increase │ Term YEAR.│ COUNTRY. │ Suicides │ per │ of │ │per Million.│ Million. │Years. ─────┼──────────────────┼────────────┼──────────┼────── 1880 │Portugal │ 16 │ 3 │ 5 1880 │Spain │ 19 │ 2 │ 5 1883 │Ireland │ 24 │ 6 │ 5 1878 │Russia and Finland│ 35 │ Dec. 1·2 │ 6 1881 │Italy │ 44 │ 7 │ 5 1881 │Scotland │ 48 │ 11 │ 5 1880 │Holland │ 51 │Stationary│ 10 1882 │England │ 74 │ 7 │ 10 1875 │Norway │ 75 │ Dec. 33 │ 13 1879 │Belgium │ 90 │ 22 │ 5 1877 │Sweden │ 101 │ 15 │ 5 1880 │Bavaria │ 102 │ 11 │ 5 1877 │Austria │ 144 │ 24 │ 3 1880 │Hanover │ 150 │ 10 │ 5 1877 │Prussia │ 168 │ 34 │ 4 1880 │France │ 216 │ 56 │ 5 1881 │Switzerland │ 240 │ 25 │ 5 1878 │Denmark │ 265 │ 32 │ 5 1878 │Saxony │ 469 │ 170 │ 5 ─────┴──────────────────┴────────────┴──────────┴──────

In an endeavour to make an accurate estimate of the suicide rate of the various states, and the relative increase in the rates, we are met by the further difficulty that the periods of observation vary much in length; in Holland, for example, there was no formal collection of numbers until 1869; on the other hand, in Sweden, the amount of suicide has been estimated ever since 1750.

An enormous decrease may be observed in the figures relating to Norway; it may be due to the very stringent laws relating to intoxication, and to the regulations placed on the sale and consumption of alcoholic drinks about twenty years ago.

The calculation of the averages of the various countries is performed by the formula used by Professor Bodio: _x_ = 100 × (_a′_∕_a_-1)^{1∕_n_}: in which _a´_ = the number of suicides in the last year: _a_ = the number of suicides in the first year of the series: and _n_ = the number of years of observation.

The following table from Legoyt is interesting, but the data are not so recent as in the foregoing list, and hence do not coincide:─

TABLE showing the Difference in the Rates of Variation per cent. between Population and Suicide from 1865 to 1876.

───────────┬───────────┬─────────────── │ │ Suicide. │Population.│ ── COUNTRY. │ ── │ Increase per │Variation. │cent. on Total │ │ Numbers. ───────────┼───────────┼─────────────── England │ 14·6 │ 27·1 Austria │ 9·2 │ 66·5 Bavaria │ 5·2 │ 18·4 Belgium │ 7·0 │ 64·4 Denmark │ 12·1 │ 12·2 France │ A loss │ 17·3 Italy │ 10·5 │ 15·1 Norway │ 8·1 │ 14·3 Prussia │ 6·7 │ 49·0 Russia │ 11·0 │ 47·0 Saxony │ 18·8 │ 58·4 Sweden │ 7·6 │ 24·0 Switzerland│ 6·5 │ 63·6 Ireland │ A loss │ Stationary. Finland │ 5·3 │ Stationary. ───────────┴───────────┴───────────────

As a general _résumé_ of the consideration of the amount of Suicide, it appears that the civilized States of Europe (with three exceptions) show a gradual and uniform increase of Suicide rate; and that even since the beginning of the century self-destruction has increased, and still goes on increasing, more rapidly than the increase of population, and to a greater extent than the general death-rate.

From a consideration of the general statistics of various countries estimated annually, with regard to actual numbers and percentage of Suicides, we conclude that like similar statistics applied to subjects of a totally unvolitional nature, they vary from year to year and from country to country. But the variations in the two classes, of voluntary and involuntary incidents, do not range together constantly; in fact, the statistics of the continental observers seem to show that, if we class together

Suicide } Homicide } as VOLUNTARY ACTS, Marriage } and Illegitimate Births } Deaths } as INVOLUNTARY ACTS, Accidental Deaths }

and compare a period of several years in several countries, the greatest variations occur very rarely in suicide. Suicide, then, varies less than Illegitimate Births, Deaths and Accidental Deaths. Births have varied the least. It is a curious fact that illegitimate births, the general mortality, and accidental deaths, have often offered greater variations from the average, although the human will has no power over them, than suicide, homicide, and marriages which are voluntary actions.

Hence it has been argued, that social actions dependent on human volition, varying as they do proportionally from year to year, do not differ from those observed in phenomena of a physiologic or organic nature. For a lengthened discussion on this subject, see Morselli, Rümelin, and Rhenisch: the former states, “The laws of social life are not sufficiently known to enable us to attribute the variations in suicide to one cause, such as human liberty, or free-will, different and opposite to those natural forces on which we make births and deaths to depend; for we have no positive grounds for giving different interpretations to similar phenomena, merely because variations appear in psychical facts.”─Il Suicidio.