THE BIRTH-RATE QUESTION.

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume XXIV, Issue 3833, 12 April 1899, Page 4

THE BIRTH-RATE QUESTION.

The returns for 1897 of the population of France, which have just been issued, should prore of interest to colonial readers at the present time, because a similar 1 process of depopulation, probably Sue to like causes, is in operation in ' New Zealand, reference towhich has recently been made in these columns. The French i returns show that, in 1897, the excess of birthsover deaths— in round numbers 859,000 births to 731*000 deaths— s?as due, , ;not to an increase of births, which were 6000 below the number in 1896, but to a diminution in the number of deaths, which, in 1896, had been 771,000. Elaboratestatistics have been prepared on the subject, and these goto show that if the French population be separated from the foreign population livingin France, theriß has been |6r several years past an actual exce»e of deaths ibver" -Birfiu.'',. ; ,'-v]^i6C!»aiiig fh.e question, the Medical Press says the disease is progressive, and a study of the different parts. ]of France shows that it tends •: to spread like a contagious malady, neighbouring provinces, which had hitherto shown an excess of births over deaths, gradually becoming implicated. It Is dear, thai> ; in the ultimate analysis, thestationary condition and tendency to decrease of the population of France are caused, by the default (voluntary or otherwise) of a large proportion of the married people in. France to become ptwents, leading to the disease which Aristotle called oliganthropy, which killed some of the great races of antiquity, and now threatens France. The following comparative figures are of interest:— For every 1000 juarried women, the number of annual, legitimate births in France is 115, as compared with 184 in Belgium and Italy, 176 in Switzerland, 186 in Norway, 190 in England, and Wales, 202 in Germany, 205 in Scotland, 206 in 1 Prussia, and 216 in Wurtemberg. Taking the census returns ofl 891, wefind that 2b per cen| of ihe total families in France had more than four living children in each ; 15 per cent had three living children in eacla; altogether 35 per cent of the total number of families had a sufficiency |of children to prevent thepopul,atiou of France from becoming stationary. On the other Jband, cent ;of the total families had only two living children, and 24 per 'cent had one living child, leaving il 9 percent without children. The Medical Press concludes: Whether selfishness will extend and become supreme at the expense of the general .good, and France be- j come in consequence a .second or even a third-rate Power in the j world, remains to be seen. The question has a wider aspect, which we can only mention in conclnsion. The birth rate in; England and in other countriesis decbning, though not with the rapidity of its decline in France. This decline jis probably due largely, to the saijae causes as in France. 1 The future of the world's history depends largely on the question as to which races will continue to multiply and to colonise until the limits of colonisation have been reached, when other races have, through the eierciso of selfish prudence, ceased to take part in ' this colonisation, and upon the re- j lative excess of births over deaths in the different European countries preceding the stage at which other nations^ Tike France . may have ceased to any i^aterial extent to add to the emigrant population.