Page:Immigration and the Commissioners of Emigration of the state of New York.djvu/179

Rh less than thirty years old; more than 46½ per cent. were from twenty to thirty-five; more than 60 per cent. were from fifteen to thirty-five, and nearly 90 per cent. less than forty years old. Moreover, the sexes approach equality only among children and youths. Of individuals under twenty years of age, about 18 per cent. were males, and 17 per cent. females, while the male immigrants from twenty-five to forty years of age were double the number of females of the same age.

Of the total immigration to the United States within the above-mentioned period (1819 to 1860), amounting to 5,459,421, the occupation of 2,978,599, including 2,074,633 females, is not stated, while 1,637,154 are put down as farmers and laborers, leaving 843,688 persons who were either mechanics or professional men. In the census tables for that period, we find 407,524 mechanics, 4,326 clergymen, 2,676 lawyers, 7,109 physicians, 2,016 engineers, 2,490 artists, 1,528 teachers, 3,120 manufacturers, 3,882 clerks, and 5,246 seamstresses and milliners, enumerated among the immigrants. This enumeration, incomplete as it is, shows that about 15 per cent. of the immigration belong to that class of population which produces more than the common laborer, and that therefore the 5 per cent., if so many, of helpless and unproductive emigrants are more than balanced by the percentage of higher mechanical and professional ability.

We will next consider not only the increase of population by the immigrants proper, but also that produced by their descendants. It is the great merit of Mr. L. Schade, of "Washington City, to have first applied the proper principle in computing the gain of population in this country from immigration. As he has shown, if it had been the policy of the Government to exclude all aliens from our shores, the growth of the population of the United States would represent simply the excess of births over deaths. In 1790, the population of the United States, exclusive of slaves, was 3,231,930. In the census returns for 1850, we find that among the white and free colored population, the number of births was 548,835, and the number of deaths 271,890. The excess of the former over the latter—276,945—represented the increase of population for 1850. The whole population of whites and free colored persons in 1850 was 19,987,573. This increase,