Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 3.djvu/66

 52 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

Turin, has informed me of the amazement he has felt at seeing women endure more easily and courageously than men every kind of dental operation. Mela, too, has found that men will, under such circumstances, faint oftener than women. 1

The same tolerance of pain and misery in women is shown by an examination of the number of male and female suicides from physical suffering. Von Oettingen states that in 30,000 cases the per cent, of suicides from physical suffering was in men 11.4, in women n.3, 2 and Lombroso, following Morselli, gives the following table representing the proportion out of a hundred suicides of each sex resulting from the same cause : 3

Men Women

Germany (1852-1861) - - 9.61 8.08

Prussia (1869-1877) - 6 7

Saxony (1875-1878), - - 4.61 6.21

Belgium, - 1.34 0.84

France (1873-1878), - 14.28 13.56

Italy (1866-1877), - 6.70 8.50

Vienna (1851-1859), - - 9.20 10.04

" (1869-1878), - 7-73 10.37

Paris (1851-1859), - 10.27 11.22

Madrid (1884),- 31.81 31.25

But these figures represent the number of suicides in each hundred of either sex, whereas suicide is three to four times as frequent among men as among women, and the absolute propor- tion of suicide among men from physical pain is, therefore, overwhelmingly great. Still more significant is a table given by Lombroso showing the per cent, of suicides from want. 3

Men Women

Germany (1852-1861), - 37-75 18.46

Saxony (1875-1878), 6.64 1.52

Belgium, - 4.65 4.02

Italy (1866-1877), 7 4.60

" " (financial reverses), - 12.80 2.20

Norway (1866-1870), 10.30 4.50

Vienna (1851-1859), 6.64 3.10

1 ELLIS, loc. '/., p. 123.

a A. VON OETTINGEN, loc. cit., p. 780.

3 LOMBROSO e FERRERO, loc. cit., chap. 16.