SCIENCE AND SUICIDE.

Patea Mail, Volume VIII, Issue 996, 12 February 1883, Page 4

SCIENCE AND SUICIDE.

Witt regard to the recent snicicte of a girl by leaping from one of the towers of Notre Dame, Dr Bronardeli’s expressed view that asphyxiation in the rapid fall may have been the cause of death has given rise to some correspondence in La Nature. M. Bontemps points out that the depih of bill having been about 66 metres, the velocity acquired in the time (less than four seconds) cannot have been so great as that sometimes attained on railways— eg., 33 metres per second on the line between Chalons and Paris, where the effect would he the same; yet we never hear of asphyxiation of engine-drivers and stokers. ■. He considers it desirable that the idea in question should be exploded, as unhappy persons may bo led to choose suicide by a fall from a height, under the notion that they will. die before reaching the ground. Again, M.‘ Gossin. mentions that a few years ago a man threw himself from the top of the Column of July, and fell on an awning which sheltered workmen at the pedestal; ho suffered only a few slight contusions. M. Eemy says he has often seen nn Englishman, leap from an height of 81 metres (103, feet) into a deep i;iver, and he was shown in 1852, in the Island of Oahu, by missionaries, a native who had fallen from a verified height of more than 300 metres (say, 1000ft).’ His fall was broken near the end by a growth of ferns, &c., and he had only a few wounds. Asked as to his sensations in falling, he said he only; felt dazzled.— Nature.