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total population are by no means as remarkable for early marriages. Lancashire stands about halfway down in the list; Durham is only just (by three decimal parts) above the average of England in the early marriages of its females, while it exeeeds it in the prudence of its males. Monmouthshire and Warwickshire furnish examples in this respect that might well be followed by the general population of England, and particularly by most of its agricultural districts. The West Riding of Yorkshire is an exception to the general prudence of the manufacturing districts on this point; but it may be remembered, that it comprehends also a large agricultural population-and we shall find it preceded by four agricultural counties; Bedfordshire, (which stands first in the list for improvident marriages,) Herefordshire, Cambridgeshire, and Essex-and followed by eight more of a similar complexion, before we come to manufacturing and mining Staffordshire.*

Another feature in the distribution of ages, as affecting the

* The table to which we have been referring, shows results so different from what might have been expected, that we here give it entire. Proportion per cent of Married under 21 Years of Age, in the year 1841. -(Arranged with reference to the early Marriages of the Women.)

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proportion of births to the total population, ought to be shortly noticed; we mean the difference observable in the various counties or districts, between the proportion which those who have attained an age at which we no longer look for marriages or births, bear to the total population. When we find that in Herefordshire, out of 100,000 inhabitants, there would be 17,560 of both sexes above fifty years of age, while in the same number for Lancashire there would be only 10,680; or that the former county shows in every 100,000, an excess of 6880 persons so little likely to swell the number of marriages and births; we shall be less surprised at learning, that the annual number of marriages to every 100,000 are in Hereford only 688, while they are 893 in Lancashire; the births to the same number, when it includes the more venerable population, being 2592, while the substitution of more juvenile inhabitants for the 6880 quinquagenarians in which Lancashire is deficient, contributes to furnish 1113 additional births-raising the proportion of the latter county to 3705 births for every 100,000 inhabitants. However, in order more fully to illustrate and to test the truth of this supposition, let us take as examples two towns, Liverpool and Brighton; in the former of which, according to the last report of the RegistrarGeneral, the number of births and deaths to the population are much above the average of England-the births being 1 in 29, and the deaths also 1 in 29; while in Brighton the births are even to a greater degree below the average of England-being 1 to every 37 inhabitants, the deaths 1 to 42. Here is a very large discrepancy in the apparent rate of fecundity and of mortality, if tried by the usual mode of dividing the births and deaths over the whole population, without distinction of age.

Let us now apply the test we have suggested, of seeing how many children in each case are born to the males of an age most likely to be fathers, viz. between 20 and 35. We have

taken these ages without pretending that they will exhaust the whole number who are in a condition to become parents, but because it includes those of whom any preponderance is likely to increase to the greatest degree the number of births; and we have taken males instead of females, because we hold that an additional cause of the apparently greater fecundity in flourishing manufacturing towns is, that there the disproportion in the relative number of the two sexes, which is so general throughout the kingdom, is much diminished by immigration.*

* Our female readers, if indeed we could hope for any on such a subject, would, we are sure, have no difficulty in allowing, that the grand ob

With this explanation, and without going through the calculations, which any one can do for himself, we may state the result to be, that there are in Liverpool only 10 births annually for every 48 males between the ages of 20 and 35, (1 to 4.8;) while in Brighton there are the same number of births to every 38 males of the same ages, (1 to 3.8;) and that, for all England, the proportion would be 10 to every 35, (1 to 3.5.) Tried, therefore, by this test, and the simple rules of arithmetic, which no political bias or party object can bend to its purpose; the number of births, instead of being excessively stimulated by high wages and demand for labour, or, as some have also contended, by misery and hopeless wretchedness, would appear to be fewer than might have been reasonably expected from a careful view of the proportionate ages of the population, and even after making every due allowance for unregistered births.

Let us now try also, by figures, our second proposition—that the apparent excessive mortality is a consequence, rather than a cause, of the large proportion of births to the total population; that, in short, an excess in the proportion of mortality is to be ascribed principally to an excess in the proportion of those most exposed to mortality, viz. infant lives. Let us therefore, before proceeding in the usual manner to divide the total population by the annual deaths, first deduct, on the one side, the population at or under five; and, on the other, the deaths under five in each of the places compared together; and we shall then see what is the relative mortality, when relieved from the disturbing cause of an excessive proportion of infant lives. We shall then find, that whereas the difference in the mortality upon the general population was 1 in 29 in Liverpool against 1 in 42 in Brighton ; that between the population above five in the two places, was as 1 in 50 against 1 in 62; or, to make the difference more evident, out of 1200 persons living at Liverpool, of all ages from infancy upwards, there would die in Liverpool annually rather more than 41, and in Brighton not quite 29; while, of 1200 persons above the age of five, there would die within the year, in the healthy watering-place, 19, and in the crowded manufacturing district, only 24, being a difference of only five in 1200.

We feel sure that this explication of the comparative equality in the rate of mortality (when the first dangers of infancy are passed) between places so differently circumstanced, and in which

stacle to more numerous marriages is to be found in the too great scarcity of suitable husbands; and that where any accidental cause diminishes for a time, or in a particular locality, that deficiency, marriages go on briskly.

there would otherwise appear to be so alarming a difference, will come as a surprise upon those who have contented themselves with the rough results of calculations, quite correct in arithmetic, but which, as we contend, have led to too hasty conclusions. It is well known that about a sixth part for England generally, and in some districts a fifth part, of the numbers born, die in the first year, and that the deaths under one year form very nearly a fourth of the whole number of deaths at all ages; while those under five amount, in some cases, to nearly a half of the total deaths-reducing the numbers added to the population five years before by nearly a third, and in some instances by more. A due consideration of these facts will prepare us to estimate more correctly the importance of considering what proportion the infant lives bear to the whole population, before pronouncing upon the relative annual mortality in any place, from a mere statement of the total number of deaths.

In further confirmation of this view, of this cause of increased mortality in large towns, we would refer to a table in the Registrar-General's fifth report, (p. 194,) giving the causes of death in very large groups, first of rural and then of town districts; showing, at the first glance, an enormous excess of mortality against the towns. When we examine, however, the causes of death, as there distinguished, we find this alarming excess almost entirely composed of such childrens' complaints as teething, convulsions, croup, small-pox, measles, pneumonia, hydrocephalus, &c., and, therefore, to a great degree to be accounted for by the larger proportion the infants bear to the total population.

Do we bring forward these calculations with any party purpose ;—with a view to make out what may be called a case in favour of the Towns? Far from it. Our object is to show the real circumstances, illustrated as they are by information which had not been before at the disposal of candid enquirers. We wish to guard against exaggerated ideas, of the necessary mortality, among the large masses collected together in these seats of industry. We hope that even those who may not be prepared at first to go the whole extent of our conclusions, will at all events see the necessity of forming no general calculations of fecundity or of mortality, without giving due weight to the returns of ages, both of the living and the dying, and to the very great variations in these particulars that occur in different localities.

The importance of the conclusions that may be drawn from the propositions we have advanced, is evident. If the large ascertained increase, and the excessive fecundity or natural increase, observed in some places, be owing in a great degree, as

we have contended, the first to immigration, and the second to the excessive number of males of a certain age introduced by that immigration, we may expect to be at least spared the misery of seeing that great increase, and that excessive fecundity, continued in decaying places, towards which the tide of immigration ceases to flow. The remedy will thus, in certain localities, be supplied in exact proportion to the necessity for it.

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Again, by directing our attention to the real nature of the excess of mortality attributed to flourishing manufacturing towns

by showing that it is to a certain degree only an apparent, and not an actual excess; and further, that it is almost exclusively confined to the infant population, or that part which is under five years of age-do we not guard against unnecessary alarms, and also point out the exact direction which remedial measures of public or private application ought to take?

By referring the greater part of the excess to the first five years of life, we show how much exaggerated must be the actual loss of life, whether immediate or deferred, which has been attributed to the employments undertaken at the successive periods of life after that age;-to the factory system overtaxing the strength of growing children;-to the too protracted labours, the dissipated habits, and the fluctuating wages of their men ;-to the impure atmosphere and immoral temptations which surround their women-causes to which (while the apparent excess of mortality in large towns was supposed to be spread over all ages) much greater effects were attributed than would appear to be justified by the results.

Nor are the consequences of a due estimation of these particulars less interesting to the philanthropist. If all those circumstances, some of them unavoidable, some self-imposed, produced the effects, and prevailed to the extent which has been assumed, the humane legislator and the private benefactor might indeed despair of applying any adequate remedy. If, on the other hand, it is shown that improvements in the drainage, in the supply of water, in the admission of a free current of fresh air into what are now blind courts, in precautions against contagion, and, above all, in the attendance which is afforded to the mother and her infant in the first month of its existence, might check the havoc which is now made with the tender lungs, the delicate constitutions, and the susceptible systems of those who are daily added in such large proportions to our manufacturing popu lation-a distinct direction will be pointed out to the efforts of the well-intentioned; a definite object will be set before the philanthropist; and a justification afforded for the measures of the humane legislator.

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