THE POPULATION OF VICTORIA.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume V, Issue 260, 26 April 1878, Page 3

THE POPULATION OF VICTORIA.

(From the Argiis, February 23.) The population returns of "Victoria for 1877 arc published in yesterday's Gazette and we learn that Victoria now numbers 860,504 souls. This is an increase of 20,504 from the 31st December, 1876 to 31st December, 1877 — a gain somewhat in excess of the stunted growth of previous years, though considerably ""ess than the healthy increase which the year prior to 1872 witnessed. The strange feature of the returns is the continuation of the steady diminution of the birth-rate to which we have from time to time called attention before. Mr. Hayter tells us that the births were fewer in 1877 than in any year since 1869 aud we give figures which show the falling-off :—: — Total Births. 1873 28,100 1877 26,043 Yet iii 1873 the population was only 790,000 and iiow it is 860,000, and the total of births ought to be large in proportion. The immediate cause of the effect is not far to seek, Dr. Balls-Headly having . I recently written at length on the decrease of marriages in Victoria. But this only pushes the difficulty a stage further back, and brings us to the question, why should marriages be fewer in Victoria than before ? No question deserves a closer" study. A decrease in the birth rate— the ratio per 1000 of the population can be understood. It may be accounted for by an increase in the number of children who are not marriageable, but an absolute decrease in the munber of births, six children only coining into the world where seven came before, iv the same country, and substantially with the same population, it a phenomenon of which no explanation has "been offered except the very unsatisfactory one that men and women are more pinched for the means of living than ever they were before in Victoria, and thau they are in the adjacent colonies, where the population has not ceased to abundantly multiply in the laud. Some corresponding figures conic from New (South Wales. Putting aside immigration, the excess of births over deaths in the sister colony last year, was 16,414, aud in Victoria the excess was only 13,521, although we had much the larger population. Our gain, measured by the Sydney standard, ought to have been 20,000 from this source alone. New South Wales gained 16,072 by immigration, and we 7,253. Our total increase is 20,504 : hers 32,486. We are 800,504 in number ; New South Wales is 002,212 — the two colonies containing now a population of over one million and a half ; Victoria still considerably in advance, but New South Wales gaining rapidly.