Six years ago I endeavoured to show, in a paper read before a quarterly meeting of the Medico-Psychological Association,∗ that there were not sufficient reasons to warrant the popular opinion, shared by some who had done more than accept a common notion without inquiry, that insanity was steadily increasing upon us year by year in this country; that, in fact, the undoubted great and rapid increase in the registered insane population of England was in the main to be attributed to other causes than an actual steady increase in the production of insanity. As the result of the enquiries, it seemed very uncertain whether we manufactured more madness now than formerly, but very certain that we take more care of, and know a great deal more about, the madness which we do manufacture.