Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 48.djvu/260

248 "Then came the foreigner, making his way into the little village, bringing, small blame to him, not only a vastly lower standard of living, but too often an actual present incapacity even to understand the refinements of life and thought in the community in which he sought a home. Our people had to look upon houses that were mere shells for human habitations, the gate unhung, the shutters flapping or falling, green pools in the yard, babes and young children rolling about half naked or worse—neglected, dirty, unkempt. "Was there not in this sentimental reason something strong enough to give a shock to the principle of population?"

The native of that time was utterly unable to compete in dirt and degradation with the low Irish and European peasantry. He lost heart and interest; in many cases he sank to the level of his competitor; and even when he did not actually sink in his personal habits, he had not the same high incentives as before.

It is a remarkable fact and should be remembered that in New England, which received scarcely any immigration between 1640 and 1820, the greatest growth of population ever known in America took place. The New-Englanders overflowed their borders, and settled a large part of western New York, the Western Reserve of Ohio, the Wyoming Valley of Pennsylvania, and hundreds of towns and counties in the far West. Some years ago the number of people of New England origin was estimated at a third of the whole population. The place of strongest nativism was the place of the most rapid growth.

Washington was much impressed in 1796 with the overflow of the New-Englanders. "Their numbers are not augmented by foreign emigrants; yet from their circumscribed limits, compact situation, and natural population, they are filling the western parts of the State of New York and the country on the Ohio with their own surplusage." (Works, vol. xii, p. 323.)

Madison was in favor of immigration, but in 1820 he could not help noticing the wonderful increase of New England without the aid of the foreigner. "It is worth remarking that New England, which has sent out such a continued swarm to other parts of the Union for a number of years, has continued at the same time, as the census shows, to increase in population, although it is well known that she has received but comparatively few immigrants from any quarter." (Works, vol. iii, p. 213.)

It has been suggested that the correspondence in time between the increase of immigration and the decrease of the rate of growth does not necessarily imply a relation of cause and effect, because it can be accounted for by the fact that advanced civilization always lessens the rate of childbearing and the rate of increase of