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In recent years several writers have drawn attention to the dangers of relying upon "calendar year" reproduction rates, such as the conventional net reproduction rate, as indicators of future population prospects. The synthesis considered in the present paper is of the births to generations of women, and is thus free from these objections. In brief the defence of an analysis limited to females in England and Wales today is based on the shrinking proportions of females to males at the younger ages in the unmarried population and one may suppose, the decreasing dependence of the proportions of women marrying on the availability of potential husbands. In the simplest case, the definition was in terms of mortality and fertility rates, progressing to mortality, marriage and legitimate and illegitimate fertility rates and, if the pendulum had not swung away from this approach, no doubt further complexity would have been added introducing considerations of widowhood, divorce and re-marriage and distinguishing duration of marriage as an additional factor in fertility rates.

This short paper presents some results of an attempt to derive a suitable function to explain unit costs in the water supply industry in England and Wales. The data we used were the latest available at the time of writing. The data, in effect, were for the year 1965-66. It was not possible, because of lack of data, to carry out a time-series analysis to supplement our cross-section findings. At the moment the industry is composed of some 331 undertakings; our sample, which is based on data provided by I.M.T.A.,' covers 162 of those under- takings. In effect, it covers: 67 local authorities; 75 water boards; and 20 water companies. In this paper then we are concerned with the derivation of an industry average cost curve, or function. Although the resulting curve could be similar to the envelope curve, or to part of the envelope curve, as we know it, it will differ from the usual conception of that curve because of the nature of production conditions in the water supply industry. Section II notes the type and characteristics of the four cost functions we have fitted to the data. Section III briefly presents and assesses the statistical results obtained from using those functions. Section IV then makes some comments on the major issue of amalgamation in the light of the statistical results.

The paper describes the training of accountants in Great Britain, first discussing the situation in England and Wales and later mentioning ways in which the Scottish training differs. The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales has virtual control over the admission of people into the public accounting field in those two countries. There is no separate licensing of public accountants by a government. Membership in the Institute is comparable to holding a state license to practice as a certified public accountant in this country. Members are allowed to described themselves as "chartered accountants" and to use the abbreviations F.C.A. for fellows and A.C.A. for associates. Businessmen are accustomed to seeking the services of Institute members for their professional accounting needs, and "by far the most important part of professional accounting work is carried out by chartered accountants." To become a chartered accountant one must become an articled clerk under Institute regulation and supervision for a prescribed period of years, pass examinations prepared, administered, and graded by the Institute, be accepted by the Institute council for membership.

The article discusses a study on fertility of teachers in England and Wales, Great Britain. A sample of teachers differs from a population sample as it may be reduced not only by death but also by other factors which may have a direct bearing on fertility, such as health or change of occupation. In order to compare the fertility of teachers with other occupational groups, the Family Census material was used. The two samples are not entirely identical. The Family Census included divorced and widowed women provided they were divorced or widowed after their 45th birthday. The analysis which follows the pattern set by the Family census' of 1946 describes fertility in terms of numbers of live-born children per married male teacher by marriage cohort and duration of marriage. The data were collected partly by postal questionnaire and partly by personal interview. The postal and interview data were compared and showed no significant difference with respect to the factors under discussion in the present study and only minor differences for other factors.

The article focuses on the ecological and historical factors in the distributions of the British Helianthemum species. Among the specie of these plants is the Helianthemum chamaecistus which is widely distributed in short dry chalk and limestone grasslands in Wales and England. It is dominated by Festuca ovina, Seslerina caerulea, and Zerna erecta, and appears in substrata in dry Agrostis tenuis-Festuca ovina grasslands in Scotland. On the other hand, H. apenninum is confined to open xeric grasslands on slopes that faces south on Carboniferous and Devonian limestones in Southwest England.

The article looks into the rate of spread of Spartina townsendii in the sandy lower parts and relatively muddy upper areas of the Dovey estuary. It also examined the competition of two aspects of Spartina with other salt-marsh species. The invasion of established Spartina and the invasion of grazed saltings by Spartina were also investigated. Quadrats found in sandy and relatively muddy areas revealed that the muddy area was completely covered with Spartina in two or three years. The study also revealed that the invasion of established Spartina by other salt-marsh species is a conspicuous feature of the estuary. Existing vegetation in the estuary were not affected by the invasion of established Puccinellia, Armeria and Festuca sward by Spartina.

The article offers information on Impatiens parviflora, an erect annual herb, and its presence in Great Britain. The plant has stems branching from the axils of the cotyledons. Its flowers are 10 to 15 millimeters long including spur. Its seeds are oblong with fine longitudinal striations. The plant is frequently persistent in gardens and shady waste places in various parts of England, Wales and Scotland. It discusses the habitat, climatic and topographical limitations of the plant. It lists the most frequent species at more than 1 of 19 localities in England and Scotland.

The article offers observation on the ecology of Juncus conglomeratus and Juncus effusus in Great Britain. Differences in their capsule and stem are the only thing that separates the two species. It notes that the Biological Flora of the British Isles failed to take into account the very widespread distribution of the J. effusus variety, which is often mistaken for J. conglomeratus. Specimens of J. conglomeratus can be found in some Wales localities such as the Conway Valley and Cwm Gwara. The distribution of these species can be described as patchy and rare among an abundance of other rush species. However, J. effusus species and its variety have an extensive distribution on the mountain slopes, poor pastures retrogressive to moorland, and open parts of the woods in North Wales counties.

In evaluating the work of earlier writers on population statistics, it is not always easy to make a fair judgment. To see the faults of these writers, without appreciating the difficulties inherent in the situation or period in which they wrote is one danger. Especially so far as the population controversy is concerned, the writers of the period were hampered both by the lack of reliable statistics and by their own, personal, limitations. It is, of course, evident that a lengthy debate on the absolute growth or decline of the population of England and Wales could maintained only because of the inadequacy of contemporary population statistics. England was not singular in this respect it is true that a number of countries had made great progress in the collection of population statistics by the middle of the eighteenth century. Modern statisticians and demographers, fitting together the various sets of statistics dating from earlier periods, can sometimes produce a coherent and reliable account of the size and trend of populations in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. But to do so requires not only a knowledge of more advanced techniques of demographic analysis than were available in the eighteenth century, but also the background of experience which comes from having, over a long period, reliable and comprehensive population data.

It has long been believed that, although civil registration of births and deaths in England and Wales was prescribed by the 1836 Act and implemented in 1837, birth registration at least was not completely effective for some decades. In making these computations it is obvious that the approach cannot be of the type current in the U.S.A. and Canada, involving a search for the birth certificates of a group of individuals enumerated at a particular census. And any method applied solely to the published data is bound, at best, to be less satisfactory, since it must involve various assumptions, some of which are unverifiable. The main technical question is that of constructing estimates of child populations from the statistics of births and deaths, and the method applied here is that used, though for a different purpose, in connection with the 1911 census of England and Wales. At the same time, provided that births are fairly steady and that infant mortality does not fluctuate violently, the higher "separation factor" used in the above formula would not introduce any significant error.