The History of Lloyd's and of Marine Insurance in Great Britain With an Appendix Containing to Marine Insurance (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from The History of Lloyd's and of Marine Insurance in Great Britain: With an Appendix Containing to Marine Insurance The statistical appendix aims at laying a few foundation stones for a scientific basis of marine in surance. Whether this aim is capable of realization, is a question which time only can solve. What is undeniable is that marine insurance, though in exist ence centuries before life insurance was even thought of, is still behind the latter, in not resting, as this does, on the firm ground of mathematical calcula tions, drawing laws of probabilities from the results of experience. At this moment, the business of marine insurance is subject entirely to the exercise of per sonal and individual experience, fallible in its very nature, even when brought to the utmost possible perfection; while life insurance, on the other hand, stands on the solid foundation of mortality tables, and of actuarial computations derived from a vast amount of widely gathered statistics. To construct mortality tables for ships, the same as for human beings, is no doubt a matter of greater complication; still there appears no absolute impossibility for the accomplishment of the task. It will, doubtless, be a gigantic labour to gather the whole of the materials requisite for the work, and there is, probably, but one body of men capable of undertaking it, namely, the Corporation of Lloyd's. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.