The author commences by laying down the following propositions in reference to the management of life assurance companies:—

(a) That the first consideration should he the interests of the assured

(b) That, therefore, the true test of success should be the pecuniary advantage derived by the assured from the company.

(c) That, nevertheless, the first consideration in several companies has been the increase of the business, and that the interests of the assured have been injured in consequence.

(d) That the amount of a company's business is not a test of success.

At one of the meetings of this Society last session a paper was read on this subject by Mr. Meikle, which gave rise to considerable discussion on the question; and as no definite result was arrived at, I believe a further investigation of the problem will not be without interest. Accordingly, I propose to go over the various formulas given for the value of this annuity, and offer some remarks upon each, stating wherein they are essentially different, and what appears to me to be the exact interpretation of each.

The recently published Experience of the Mutual Benefit Life Ins. Co., as given in Table (6) and columns (2) and (3) of the accompanying Percentage Table, is, in several important particulars, the most valuable contribution yet made to our American vital statistics. It is the most extensive that has thus far been furnished by any single company. The total number of deaths that had taken place in the Mutual Life when Mr. Homans constructed the American Experience Table, amounted to only about 2,900, while the Mutual Benefit records over 3,900, or about one-third more than the number on which that table was constructed.

The position of an entailed proprietor in Scotland (technically called an heir of entail in possession) differs in many important respects from those of a tenant for life and a tenant in tail in England. One fundamental difference is, that the entailed proprietor in Scotland has all the rights of a landed proprietor except those which are taken from him by the deed constituting the entail, whereas the tenant for life in England has only those rights which are expressly conferred upon him by the deed under which he holds. There is a still more important difference as regards the power to disentail the estate. Before the passing of the Rutherfurd Act (11 & 12 Vic., c. 36) Scotch entails were perpetual. The entail might sometimes be set aside after a suit in the Courts, in consequence of some defect or informality—perhaps very slight—in the deed constituting it; or an entail might expire, in consequence of the total failure of heirs; but under no other circumstances could the entail be got rid of.

The progress of life insurance in Germany in the year 1873 was far greater than could have been anticipated from the course of events during the year. For at a time of violent reaction, such as Germany and Austria experienced in the past year, succeeding a period during which mercantile speculations had been engaged in with such frantic eagerness by all classes of the community, we should not have expected to find men either willing or able to give that calm and self-denying consideration to the future, upon which life insurance depends. With the necessaries of life at exorbitant prices, it was natural to suppose that there would be a considerable diminution in the number of those who, after meeting the claims of the day, would be able to provide for the future. While the general state of society thus led to the conclusion that there would be a diminution in the number of insurances, there was also reason to fear that the mortality would be greatly increased through the recent outbreak of cholera, which extended over a large district, and held its ground very firmly for some time. In both respects, the returns for 1873 were more favourable than we expected; and this furnishes another proof of the fact that, in those parts of central Europe from which our returns are derived, life insurance has not yet become so general, that all the occurrences of domestic and social life, or even events involving important changes, have any distinct influence upon its development. It cannot be denied that in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, life insurance is not nearly so well understood as in Great Britain and the United States.