Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 23.djvu/450

434 but living in other States and the Territories was 566,848. This number is made up by emigration from the different States as follows: From Massachusetts, 175,349; from Vermont, 117,590; from Connecticut, 108,797; from Maine, 93,256; from New Hampshire, 49,397; and from Rhode Island, 22,459.

From another point of view it will be seen how these natives of New England are distributed. New York has 133,272; Illinois, 53,128; California, 46,908; Iowa, 38,170; Michigan, 37,865; Wisconsin, 37,615; Minnesota, 34,636; Ohio, 32,819; Pennsylvania, 26,787; Kansas, 19,338; New Jersey, 18,148; and other States under 10,000 and much less. Vermont has sent away the largest number for its population, and New Hampshire the least. Maine and Massachusetts have sent the largest delegations to California, being three fourths of all the emigrants in that State from New England. It appears by the census that the States bordering on New York—Vermont, Massachusetts, and Connecticut—have sent over 100,000 persons to that State, while the other New England States have sent only some 20,000. The representation from New England (178,207) in the Middle States is much larger than is generally supposed. This emigration has now been going on for three fourths of a century, and it would constitute a fact of great interest if we could ascertain the number of persons born in New England who have ever removed from her borders to the Middle and Western States as well as to the Territories.

The census of 1850 shows that at that time there were 454,626; in 1860 there were 562,997; in 1870 there were 615,747, and in 1880, 566,848. It will be seen by these figures that for twenty years the number has been very stationary, the new emigrants making not quite good the number who had deceased.

It is full two generations since this emigration commenced. As nearly all those persons emigrating were between the ages of twenty and forty, great numbers must have died at various periods. The exact amount of this mortality it is impossible to ascertain, and the data for forming anything like a correct estimate are altogether too uncertain. It may have been a quarter of a million, and possibly a half million. What has been the effect of this steady and large drain of people on New England opens a question of much interest.

Without entering upon the discussion of the subject, we make two or three suggestions. It will be admitted, we presume, that those young men and women, leaving their homes, possessed, as a general thing, more physical energy and mental stamina than those remaining behind. Such a loss of physical vigor and character must have had a decided effect upon business interests as well as the present state of society. But, from another point of view, the loss may have had a more decided and lasting influence, that is, in its permanent effect upon physical and mental development. The better the principles of physiology are understood the more we discover what a