be correct, the proportion of the insane to the whole population would be about one in two hundred and eighty.  This strikes us as a large estimate, and yet a committee of the legislature of that state in 1837, reported seven hundred and seven insane persons in the state, who were either wholly or in part supported as town paupers, or by charity.  It can hardly be supposed that more than two-thirds of the insane in Connecticut belong to families unable to support them.  On this supposition, the whole number would be greater than the estimate of the Medical Society sixteen years previous, when the population was perhaps thirty thousand less.  But to avoid the possibility of an over estimate, let us suppose the present number of insane persons in Connecticut to be only seven hundred.

The population of the state is now probably about three hundred and twenty thousand; according to this estimate, the proportion of the insane to the whole population, would be one to about four hundred and sixty.  Making this the basis of our calculation, and estimating the slaves in the United States at two millions, seven hundred thousand, their present probable number, and we come to this result, that there are about six thousand insane persons among the slaves of the United States.  We have no adequate data by which to judge whether the proportion of lunatics among slaves is greater or less than among the whites; some considerations favor the supposition that it is less.  But the dreadful physical violence to which the slaves are subjected, and the constant sunderings of their tenderest ties, might lead us to suppose that it would be more.  The only data in our possession is the official census of Chatham county, Georgia, for 1838, containing the number of lunatics among the whites and the slaves.—­(See the Savannah Georgian, July 24, 1838.) According to this census, the number of lunatics among eight thousand three hundred and seventy three whites in the country, is only two, whereas, the number among ten thousand eight hundred and ninety-one slaves, is fourteen.

2d. The Deaf and Dumb.—­The proportion of deaf and dumb persons to the other classes of the community, is about one in two thousand.  This is the testimony of the directors of the ’American Asylum for the Deaf and Dumb,’ located at Hartford, Connecticut.  Making this the basis of our estimate, there would be one thousand six hundred deaf and dumb persons among the slaves of the United States.

3d. The Blind.—­We have before us the last United States census, from which it appears, that in 1830, the number of blind persons in New Hampshire was one hundred and seventeen, out of a population of two hundred and sixty-nine thousand five hundred and thirty-three.  Adopting this as our basis, the number of blind slaves in the United States would be nearly one thousand three hundred.