Report to the Registrar General on the International Statistical Congress at Vienna / by William Farr.
- William Farr
- Date:
- [1857]
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Report to the Registrar General on the International Statistical Congress at Vienna / by William Farr. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.
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![and the commercial and shipping statistics of 1854 would speedily be published ; the latter would exhibit the destinations* of vessels, which had so often been desired. The learned Danish statist exhibited a means of expressing the density of population by means of curves. Dr. Engel, tlie representative of Saxony, has placed the oflicial statistics of that country among the first in Germany ; but he unfortunately made no re])ort of the recent progress of Saxon statistics. Ministerial Councillor Dietz reported briefly on the state of statistics in the Grand Duchy of Baden, and the encouragements to their study. Bavaria, by its publications under the direction of State Councillor Baron Hermann, still maintains in statistics a distinguished place in Germany. It has a grand map of the kingdom in 100 sheets, and a reduced topographical map of 15 sheets. Every proprietor can have for a small sum any of the 26,000 field maps. Among the most interesting recent publications of Bavaria, Baron Hermann enumerated tlie reports on charities; on the properties of public institutions and communes ; on criminal and police statistics (1849-55); on the post offices, railroads, steam navigation; on mines, manufactures, and salt works. The President Baron Czcernig concluded these communications by a luminous exposition of the recent progress of statistics in Austria. The question of the nomenclature of fatal diseases was discussed in Paris. The Minister of the Interior referred the nomenclature to the Vienna College of Physicians, who approved of its principles. It figured in the program and would be reported on by the first section. The railway accidents of 1856 are already compiled on the plan laid down at Paris ; so are also the statistics of the roads of Carinthia. Since 1853 the reports of the state railways have been most judiciously planned and most com- prehensive : they have been applied for by other states. Under actual circumstances it has been held that agricultural statistics could be most satisfactorily collected through the agency^of the agricultural societies, which exist in almost all the crown provinces. The Minister of the Interior has taken active steps in the matter, and in consequence many of the societies are already at work. I may cite for instance the returns of Bohemia, which are under collection by 2000 delegates in every part of that kingdom. Similar returns have already been collected in Styria and in Moravia. M. Fleury in an elaborate report lays it down, that in order to render the foreign trade returns really interna- tional, four things are necessary, (i.) The publication must immediately follow the close of each period. The Austrian Government has endea- voured to give effect to this principle : within six weeks of the end of the year the quantities and values of all exports and imports are published. This is not an easy matter in a monarchy which has to employ six hundred custom-houses on its long boundary line extending from the Bukowina to Lombardy. Each office makes monthly returns to the statistical department where they are grouped and published monthly, with a summary at the end of the year. A more elaborate report showing the countries from and to which goods proceed, with compa- risons between the returns of past periods, appears every year within twelve months of its close. (2.) The annual returns should all date from January ist. The Austrian returns did date from November ist, which is the beginning of the official year; but in compliance with the vote of the Paris Congress, the returns of 1855 are for that year, and will continue to he for the civil years dating from January ist. (3.) The same weights and measures should be used to express quan- tities. The Austrian Customs are now levied under the same laws as *frctchtfahrt. The return which apjiears to be here referred to is intended to show the countries from which vessels arrive and to which they are hound.](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b22349364_0013.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
