Viewing page 126 of 285

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

198] ANNUAL REGISTER 

[[5 Columned Table]]
| From Christmas 1735, to ditto | Births. | Average. | Burials| Averages |

| 1736 | 16491|  | 27582 | |
| 7 | 16760 | 16164 | 27823| 27494 |
| 8 | 16060 |  | 25825 | |
| 9 | 16281 |  | 25432 | |
| 40 | 15231 |  | 30811 | |
| 1741 | 14957 |  | 32169 | |
| 2 | 13751 |  | 27483 | |
| 3 | 15050 | 14419 | 25200 | 25270 |
| 4 | 14261 |  | 20206 | |
| 5 | 14078 |  | 21296 | |
| 6 | 14577 |  | 28157 | |
| 7 | 14942 |  | 25494 | |
| 8 | 14153 | 14496 | 23269 | 25232 |
| 9 | 14260 |  | 25516 | |
| 50 | 14548 |  | 23727 | |
| 1751 | 14691 |  | 21028 | |
| 2 | 15308 |  | 20485 | |
| 3 | 15443 | 15119 | 29276 | 23080 |
| 4 | 14947 |  | 22696 | |
| 5 | 15209 |  | 21917 | |
| 6 | 14830 |  | 20872 | |
| 7 | 14053 |  | 21313 | |
| 8 | 14209 | 14459 | 17576 | 19839 |
| 9 | 14253 |  | 19604 | |
| 60 | 14951 |  | 19830 | |
| 1761 | 16000 |  | 21063 | |
| 2 | 15351 |  | 26326 | |
| 3 | 15133 | 15886 | 26143 | 23798 |
| 4 | 16374 |  | 22230 | |
| 5 | 16574 |  | 23230 | |
| 6 | 16257 |  | 23911 | |
| 7 | 15980 |  | 22612 | |
| 8 | 16042 | 16422 | 23639 | 22888|
| 9 | 16724 |  | 21847 | |
| 1770 | 17109 |  | 22434 | |

Account of the History and Memoirs of the Society formed at Amsterdam, in the year 1767, for the Recovery of Drowned Persons.

The fame element to which the Hollanders are indebted for their wealth and their liberty, is to them a fource [sic] of loss and calamity. The sea, when it breaks in upon their ramparts, carries destruction along with it; and the frequent canals with which their country is intersected, are no less fatal and destructive. It is with nations as with individuals; the advantages they possess are ever accompanied with inconveniences. 

The almost incredible number of persons drowned annually at Amsterdam, excited attention and regret; and it having been found, on enquiry, that the majority of these died merely for want of assistance, a society was formed, which offered premiums to those who should save the life of a citizen that was in danger of perishing by water; and which proposed, from time to time, to publish the treatment and method of recovery followed in such situations. 

The utmost encouragement was every where given throughout the United Provinces, by the magistrates in particular, and afterwards by the states general, to so salutary an institution; and, from the short memorials before us, it appears that it has been attended with very considerable success, and will be productive of the most beneficial consequences. In a matter of such extensive and important concern, we think it our duty to extract from this interesting work a general account of the success which has attended the endeavours of this laudable society; and of the methods by which it was procured: promising a short rationale of the principles to which it is evidently to be attributed. 

It is certainly not very easy, in many cases, to ascertain 'precisely the state of an animal body which is called death; and in none, perhaps, more difficult than in bodies which have lain for some time under water. In these cases the principal, and often the only material change produced in the animal economy is, that by the pressure of the water on the epiglottis, and the want of air, an entire stop is put to respiration; consequently to the free passage of the blood through the lungs; and, as an effect of that obstruction, to its circulation throughout the whole body; so that the heart, after a few ineffectual struggles, and efforts to move the mass through the strengthened passages of the lungs, at last becomes quiescent. Neither the vital organs, however, nor the animal fluids, have perhaps received any irreparable or even material injury, by this state of rest in the one, or stagnation of the other; and nothing seems wanting to restore the yet unimpaired machine to the exercise of its accustomed functions, than merely to put it once more into motion. Former experience has shewn [sic] the justice of this reasoning, and of the conclusion which we have drawn from it; which is still more satisfactorily evinced by the very large number of well authenticated histories contained in these three publications. 

The most obvious methods of renewing the suspended motions of the heart and lungs, on which all the others depend, are, to blow air repeatedly into the last-mentioned organ, and to relieve the heart by lessening the moles movenda, the mass of blood, as quickly as possible, by bleeding in the jugulars or arm. The other methods may, we imagine, be all nearly comprehended under this one general indication; of applying to the whole body, or to those parts of it which are more peculiarly sensible or irritable, the most powerful and appropriate stimuli. such are those recommended by the members of this humane and truly patriotic  institution; as warmth; the blowing common air, or, which is preferable,