at Herald Tue work of Malthus on population, written at the beginning of this century, indicates immense research and extreme caution on the part of the author in arriving at conclusions. Darwin confesses his obligations to and the philosophic spirit which animates it as shown in the patient searching out of the causes affecting the growth and decay of population in various countries, explains Darwin's admiration. The three causes which according to Mal-thus have led to an immense population. in China are the fertility of the soil, the encouragement given to agriculture and the practice of early marriages. He makes some mistakes, as when he says that infanticide is permitted; but those who know China best will make no objection to the opinion of this writer that these three causes have had great influence in swelling the number of the inhabitants of this country. He mentions as checks to population, droughts, hurricanes, wars, locusts and disease, as also the employment of great quantities of grain in distilleries. He derived his information from Duhalde, Amyot, and other Jesuit writers on China, as might be expected from the accuracy of his views. There is an elaborate chapter in Williams' " Middle Kingdom" on the population of China which contains many valuable hints and facts, We are now able to add some tables which the reader will find on another page. They consist of a new table from the Board of Revenue, and another new table just published in Russian from another official source, Both these tables give the numbers arrived at by a recent census of the greater part of the empire. Beside these, there is a table of the taxpaying population of the empire for each year from 1723 to 1734. Liability to pay taxes also means capability of bearing arms. The last table gives the population for the empire from the year 1821 to 1848. This is quite new and is taken from a work just: published.
The results of an examination of these tables will be found useful for correcting opinions formed by many persons it may be on insufficient data, The increase during the reign of Tau-kwang, 1821 to 1848, was, according to the annual registration 71,196,758 dividing this by twenty eight we obtain for the annual increase 2,542,500. This is 6.3 per cent. on 400,000,000 and it amounts to an increase of one Malthus mentions the increase annually orson to each group of 157 persons,
in Sweden as 1 to 108, in Russia 1 to 63, in Prussia 1 to 62, in France 1 to 157, in England 1 to 131. Among these China most nearly approaches France. At this rate of increase the population will double itself in 157 years. But in this case the Chinese population is increasing at a much slower rate according to the annual census than in many European countries. This moderation in the annual increase is in favour of its being accepted as not exaggerated, and rather suggests in fact that the numbers are understated. Malthus found that the estimate of population for England in 1800 was too little by 1 in 74. The registration of births was imperfect. Just so it is in China with the population returns required by law to be presented annually by local magistrates. It is the duty of the village bailiff
every spring. If he cannot write him-to report the Pee of his village self he asks a villager who can do so to make out the list. The return is sometimes under the truth, through the desire felt by the fathers of grownup sons to save them from conscription. Only persons at home are counted, but occasionally when some visitor is expected he is counted in, in order that suspicion may not fall on him as an unregistered person when he arrives
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.