there is some doubt as to the basis upon which the observations were made. He had never looked into the matter himself, but when he had spoken to French actuaries upon the subject, they had told him that the tables of Demonferrand are not to be relied upon. There is, however, one other important table which was published in the Journal des Actuaries Francais. That is a table by M. Kertanguy, from the experience of the Générale. Mr. Adler had asked whether the addition of 10 per-cent to the premium from the age of 60 is the practice of all the companies. He (Mr. Curtis) was unable to answer that question. He thought it probable that of late years that addition might be made by all the French companies; for the principal ones form a kind of club, where they discuss these matters. They are not overburdened with actuaries, and he thought that they consult merely one or two as to what they should do, and they all follow very much the same practice. Their premiums are all the same, and all based on 4 per-cent interest; and he had no doubt that what is adopted by one company is adopted by the others. At the same time, he happened to have a very complete prospectus of the Nationale, which was printed at a comparatively recent date; and those tables do not give the increase of 10 per-cent on the premium for ages over 60. It was very possible that the Nationale might now employ the increased premium, but they probably did not employ it at the time these tables were printed. It was certainly the case, as Mr. Walford had said, that life assurance had not taken root in France, but yet it is thriving there on account of the great energy and zeal which have been thrown into the operations of the companies. From a little table which had been published in the Moniteur des Assurances for 15 March 1876, he took the following figures:

That is amongst only twelve companies, and forms a very tolerable average for each. Perhaps it would be interesting to see what one office alone was doing. The Générale had whole life assurances for nearly £2,000,000, and term assurances £120,000. Then there were temporary assurances to the amount of about £40,000. Out of more than two millions and a half sterling insured, two millions were for whole life assurances. These whole life assurances are composed of several kinds. The prospectus of the Générale (published in 1862) includes under this head, besides the ordinary tables of annual premiums, assurances on two joint lives and assurances with limited payments. Endowment assurances (called by the French assurances mixtes) are always kept apart from the whole life assurances, and are stated separately in the accounts. For instance, in the Générale (Operations en cours au 31 Déc. 1873) there is a separate reserve of £1,300,000 for the whole life, and £440,000 for endowment assurances; and £31,000 à terme fixe. The last is a peculiar kind of

insurance, in which the premium is only payable during the life of the assuree, but the sum assured is payable absolutely at a given date. As to the meaning of rejecting the divisor (1+i), it would be very easily understood by looking at the formula for the calculation of a single 1-ia

premium,

What is the effect of that denominator 1+i? It is

1+i' to make the premium just a little lower than it would otherwise be. M. Maas (the father) thought that, since the French companies paid their claims immediately after death, and not at the end of the year, they might as well make the formula 1+i for half a year only—that is, with the addition of only 2 per-cent; and then, as it was such a very small figure, they might as well reject it altogether. This question of the rejection of the divisor 1+i was mentioned in a work, entitled Annuités Viagères, published many years ago by M. Maas. The rejection saved trouble in calculation, because it is very much more simple to have the formula 1-ia. He thanked Mr. Manly for raising the question of nomenclature. In making the translation he had taken the opportunity of slipping in the terms to which Mr. Manly had drawn attention, and he hoped that they might find favor with the Institute. The company was the assurer, who had contracted with the assuree, for an assurance upon the life assured.*

Mr. A. J. Cook thought the time was approaching when they would be able to get the statistical information desired respecting life insurance in France. The French companies had been subject to Government control for some time past, but such control had not, up to the present, been exercised to any great extent. The Minister of Agriculture and Commerce had, however, lately addressed a circular to the various companies, in which he expressed an opinion that the time had arrived when the supervision anticipated by the Act of Parliament should be more fully carried out, and greater obligations imposed upon the companies than hitherto. From the contents of the circular, and from articles which had appeared in the French insurance journals, he (Mr. Cook) felt sure that, amongst other things, the English system of depositing and publishing uniform and full accounts would be adopted in France.

* In connection with this suggestion, we believe our readers will be glad to be reminded of Dr. Farr's remarks in his letter appended to the RegistrarGeneral's 12th Report (p. 17, note). If a new term is wanted, to distinguish more clearly between the life insured and the policyholder, we think Dr. Farr's "Insurant", being so analogous to the recognized "Annuitant", is well worthy of favorable consideration. We entirely agree with Dr. Farr and Mr. C. Walford in thinking the phrase Life Insurance greatly preferable to Life Assurance.-ED. J. I. A.

66 6

Insurance' is the operation of engaging to pay-and of paying-for a premium-a certain sum of money in the event of a loss. The word is universally written in this form as applied to fire and ship insurance; but for some years 'Assurance' has been commonly used in cases where life is concerned, on the ground of the above distinction. But the operations in both cases are fundamentally the same; and as Assurance' has already a distinct and appropriate meaning, the phrase Life Insurance' is in every respect preferable to Life Assurance'. Two partics are concerned, the person who grants (Insurer), and the person whose life is in—the policy (Insuree). The Insuree performs two functions; which are separated where a third party (Insurant) procures the policy, and pays the premiums. Under one aspect the same person is the Insuree, under another he is the Insurant."

Some Account of the French General and National Life Insurance

Companies.

M. PHILIP DE BOSREDON, Manager of the French General Life Insurance Company, having kindly furnished us with the printed reports of that company for a series of years, and Mr. George W. Kilford having sent us a similar series of reports of the French National, it appeared to us that a notice of these reports would be of great interest to the readers of the Journal in connection with the preceding paper. We have therefore drawn up the following account of the companies, with the assistance of Mr. J. J. W. Deuchar, of the Standard Life Assurance Company, to whom is due the whole credit of preparing the various statistical tables.-ED. J. I. A.

If any of our readers wish to study for themselves the reports of the French Life Offices, they may perhaps find the following explanations useful.

According to French practice, the transactions of the life offices are divided broadly into two classes:-(1) Assurances en cas de déces, (2) Assurances en cas de vie. The former class includes contracts in which the payment of the office is to be made if the life (called in French, very neatly, la tête) dies, in other words, insurances, as commonly understood by us. The contracts in the latter class are those in which the payment of the office is to be made only if the life survives, and are therefore endowments (called assurances différées) and annuity contracts. Endowment insurances may be considered as belonging to both classes, and are therefore called assurances mixtes. There are also two kinds of insurances not known in this country. In the first, called "assurances à terme fixe" (which may be translated "term-certain" insurances), the sum insured is payable at a fixed date, whether the insured be dead or alive, while the payment of premium is made to depend on his continued existence. This affords a convenient form of provision for children by their guardians. The second class are the contre-assurances. When an endowment is effected, or a deferred annuity purchased, it is very usual in France, to take out at the same time 66 a contre-assurance", that is, an insurance to secure the return of the premiums paid, should death occur before the benefit is entered on. "Contre-assurances are thus temporary increasing insurances, and are classed with temporary insurances in the statements of business done.

The General was founded in 1819, and the National in 1830. Both are exclusively Life Offices. There is, however, a General Fire, and a General Marine Office, under the same auspices as the General Life. There was also a General Hail Insurance Office, but this was unsuccessful and has been lately wound up.

The following table shows the new insurance business of the two companies from 1863 to 1873:

NOTE.-The new business of the General for the year 1875 amounts to £2,508,714. By far the greatest part of the insurance business consists of wholelife policies with profits, as may be seen from the following table:Insurances in force 31 December 1873.

Of the above whole-life insurances, the sums of £234,919 in the General and £196,651 in the National are without profits. Endowment insurances and term-certain insurances are also granted on the with-profit plan.

The annuity business during the same period is shown by the following table:

NOTE. The immediate annuities granted in 1875 by the General amount to £35,438.

The year 1871 in these tables shows very clearly the effect of the war with Germany. It is interesting to note how insurance companies fare in war time, and with this object we will give a few extracts from the reports of the General. At the annual meeting on 15 July 1871, M. Paul de Hercé, the then manager, said:—

"The insurance branch of our business is the one most affected by our country's disasters, and I fear that the bonuses of the current period cannot fail to be considerably below those of the preceding period. On the one hand, we shall have a decrease in the income from our railway shares and our house property in Paris; and you know that the surplus interest is the principal source of our profits. On the other hand, the profit on our life insurance business will probably be small; for the standstill of more than nine months caused by the siege of Paris and the insurrection of 18 March, as well as the epidemic of small-pox which has raged throughout France, will reduce the ordinary profits from mortality. I do not mention the claims occasioned by the war, because they are not numerous enough to exercise a sensible influence on our accounts. We could, if so disposed, have disputed some of these claims, but your Board thought it was for the best interests of the company not to adhere too rigorously to our legal rights, and they have the satisfaction of informing you that all our losses have been settled without any litigation. You have already learned from the circular addressed to you, that, during the Insurrection, our cash and securities were placed under safeguard, and that our property in Paris only suffered damage to the extent of about £160. The damage to our property in the country, caused by the war, amounts to between £600 and £800".

M. Odier, who was "Inspecteur" for the year, an office which seems to correspond to that of chairman of a British company, continues:

"The calamities of the war overtook your company at a time when