When tho World will be Full.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XVIII, Issue 6001, 23 February 1891, Page 2

When tho World will be Full.

fThe Times, commenting on Mr Rave n stein's paper at the British Association on over-population, says : --Mr R^venstein estimates the population of tha world for the present year at 1,468,000,00, and, after making careful allowance for various unfavorable circumstances, he comes to the comforting conclusion that the human race may increase to the number of 5,994,000,0C0 without outrunning tho supply of foqd. As this is equal to more than four times the existing population, it may be feared that improvident persons j will find in his figures some encouragement to continued carelessness. Bub a closer examination will convince all but , the most thoughtless that, great as is the apparont margin, we cannot afford to dispense with caution and foresight. Mr Ravenstem has put to himself the pregnant question — Mow long will it be before the world is full of humanity if it persists in its present reckless ratu of increase— namely, 8 per cent, per decade. Most people will probably learn with pained surprise, that on these terms tho limit of expansion will be reached in 182 years. In the year 2072 unless tho human race mends its ways, there will be no moro room anywhere. But a single decade will see an increase of 479 millions, and in a single year—the year 2073 — a number of unfortunates exceeding the present population of tho United Kingdom will be bom into a world which will have no food to offer them. Imagination reels under the effort to realise the gigantic calamity thus clearly foreshadowed by tho operations of science. The interval may actually be bridged by a couple of lives. The babe born this year may live to see the birth of a grandchild or great grandchild in 1981, who, in turn, may live to witness the birth in 2073 of one of his descendants fated to endure either starvation or a diet of grass. Surely the most frivolous must pause at- the awful thought. Some throe weeks ago ?i young man named James Finney, residing at Stanmore, mysteriously disappeared while fishing at Manly, leaving an overcoat and fishing-basket behind. This, of course, led to the surmise that he had fallen into the water and been drowned, but the water police dragged the bay for several days and found no trace of him. The mystery has been to some extent solved, Fiuney'n wife having received a letter from him, stating thsit he was in New Zealand, but assigning no reason for his disappearance. — Fydney paper, >