THE VITAL STATISTICS OF NEW ZEALAND.

Press, Volume XXXI, Issue 4316, 30 May 1879, Page 3

THE VITAL STATISTICS OF NEW ZEALAND.

The following letter from the pen of Mr Charles R. Drysdaleappeara in the "Echo":— " The Blue Book which treata of the statistics of the Australian colonies, and which is issued yearly by Mi Hayter, gives the most surprising and wonderful description of human prosperity that I am acquainted with. A comparison between the population of China, which probably could not be made to double even in 1000 years, and that of New Zealand, which, as I read the statistics, might, without counting immigrants at all, and by the icere force of the excess of births over deaths, double in some fifteen yean, is one of the moat instructive possible. In China the remarkable attention which has always been devoted toagrioulture by the ruling classes has caused long ago such a large population to come into existence, that it is probable that the 403,009,000 that are said to occupy the territory of that empire has been maintained at its present amount many centuries, with occasional losses of some millions by famines, such as we have recently lived through. I am not able to ascertain what the birth rate of China is, or its death rate, but suspect that both are very high. The birth rate of England, we know, is about 35 per 1000 yearly; and the death rate, whioh is a very low one for Europe, about 23 per 1000. This shove a very high state of civilisation for an old country ; but, alas! we are enabled to judge how far we still are, even in this wise country, cut off by the positive checks to population, when we turn to New Zealand, which has the enormous birth rate of 41 per 1000, whilst it had in 1876'the wonderfully low death rate of 12.4 per 1000. The excess of births over deaths, which in France is sometimes hardly appreciable, and whioh in England and Wales is generally about tomess per cent., rote in New Zealand in 1876 to 230 per cent.! What, then, is the reason for this extraordinary healthiness of New Zealand ?; It resides greatly in tho fact, disclosed in an account given by one of your contemporaries, of the rate of wages in that happy colony. In New Zealand, it seems, the lowest rate of agricultural wages is at present Ss a day of eight hours work, in a country where wheat sells at 4s the bushel, and butchers' meat is about 41 the pound. There is now no mystery in the matter, since we know at Home that the mortality of the children of our rioher classes (Ansell) is only 8 per cant. in the first year of life, whilst as much as 30 per cent, among the children of the poor in' our large town* die in their first year. And, ■ again, the average age at death among our well-to-do classes is found to be about 55, whilst it is only 85 among the working claesee, who are often too hard-worked and but illfed.

The moral I would draw from the comparative statistics of New Zeaknd and England is as follows :—ln order to have a low death rate there must be a very slight pressure of population on food supplies. This is accomplished in New Zealand by the acquisition of immense tracts of. fertile land, capable of raising wheat and other products with little labor. . In Europe, if we with to have snob, a low death rate, we must consent to have such a very slow birth rate as to enable our population to press ac slightly on the powers of the soil, and we shall never have true happiness tratil this time arrivee."