each sex marry, do The above table shows. under 25. years of age;

The ages at which the majority of not vary materially from year to year. that 35 per cent of the grooms were while 58 per cent of the brides married during the same period. There were 87 grooms who were minors at the time of marriage: of these one married a bride between 25 and 30, and another a bride between 30 and 40. Two grooms between 25 and 30 married brides between 40 and 50. On the other hand, three grooms between 40 and 50 married brides under 20; and 17 others chose wives between 20 and 25. There were also four grooms between 50 and 60, whose wives were between 20 and 25. There was one couple whose ages were over 70.

Of the grooms 32.27 per cent married above 30 years of age; while among the brides only 16.61 per cent married during the same period.

There were 78 male, and 86 female minors married; eight of the former were 18 years of age; 23 were 19; and 47 were 20. One of the brides was only 14 years of age (who married a groom of 22); four were 15; 22 were 16; and 59 were 17. one of the latter married a groom of 40. There were nine instances in which both parties were minors.

The marriages of

the minor grooms make 2.23 per cent of the whole number; and those of the brides 2.46 per cent.

In 522 instances, the brides were older than their husbands.

The first marriages of the grooms made 85.50 per cent of all the marriages; and the first marriages of the brides, 88.11 per cent. Three bachelors married brides who had been twice. widowed; and five widowers became third husbands to their wives.

Of the grooms, 2,894, and of the brides, 3,097, were residents of Boston at the time of marriage; 423 of the former and 252 of the latter were residents of other towns in the State; and 175 grooms, and 143 brides were residents of other States.

There were 84 colored couples married, and there were eleven instances in which the grooms were colored, and the brides white. The ratio of colored marriages was one in 41.49 of the colored population. Including the amalgamated marriages, the ratio was one in 36.68.

The occupations of 55.61 per cent of the grooms are given in the following table :

The number of deaths recorded in 1870 was 6,098, — 3,104 males, and 2,994 females- an increase of 575 compared with the preceding year. This number, however, embraces the

deaths in the Dorchester district. The deaths in the latter place in 1869 were 214, and in 1870, 213, a decrease of one; showing an increase in the other fifteen wards of 362; a result doubtless attributable to the prevalence of cholera infantum, diarrhoea, and kindred diseases. The death-rate accordingly appears in the ratio of 24.34 deaths to each one thousand of the population, a height not reached but three times during the last thirteen years, viz: in 1860, 1863, and 1864. When the almost unprecedented heat that prevailed during the summer months, and the almost total absence of rain are remembered, the unusual mortality will not awaken surprise. The following comparative statement of the death-rate in cities in various sections of the Union may not be uninteresting. The figures are from official sources:

The death rate in Boston in 1870 was one in a thousand above that of the preceding year; but it is considerably below that of Baltimore, New Haven, New York, and Richmond. The rate in New Orleans, it will be seen, largely exceeds that of the other cities named. Washington, according to the figures given, presents a ratio of only seventeen deaths in a thousand. The death-rate in Boston in 1844, when its population was very nearly the same as that of Washington in 1870, was nineteen in a thousand. The rate in Chicago in 1869, according to the report of the Board of Health, was 25.74 in a thousand. This report, however, embraces the still-births, not included in the foregoing table. Omitting these, the rate was 23.17.

The number and percentage of deaths in each quarter, compared with the statement of the preceding year, are seen in the following table:

It will be seen by the above table, that the percentage of deaths during the first, second and fourth quarters was considerably less than it was in the same periods of the preceding year, and that of the third quarter was much larger. The percentage of the mortality in the third quarter of each of the last twenty-two years is seen in the following table:

With the single exception of 1849 (the year of the cholera), the mortality during the third quarter (July, August, and September) was greater than in any quarter during the period embraced in the above table. During the summer months of 1849, bowel diseases prevailed to a great extent. There were 1,005 deaths during the month of August of that year. In the third quarter of 1854 (another year of the cholera), the percentage of the mortality fell slightly below that of 1870.

The third quarter was the only one in which the mortality was highest among the females, the deaths among the latter exceeded those among the males by eleven. The record is as follows: