Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 60.djvu/123

Rh has fallen off as compared with what it formerly was. But this explanation also fails, as far as the official figures carry us. The proportion of immigration to the total increase of population in each census period since 1820, previous to which I have not been able to obtain figures, has been as follows:

 Proportion of Immigration to Total Increase of Population in the undermentioned Periods in the United States.

Immigration, according to these figures, has thus in late years played as important a part as it formerly did in the increase of population in the United States. Possibly the official figures of immigration of late years are a little exaggerated, as the United States Government does not show a balance between immigration and emigration; but whatever corrections may be made on this account, the recent figures of immigration are too large to permit the supposition that the failure of immigrants accounts in the main for the diminished rate of increase of the population generally. The ten years' percentage of increase without immigrants, I may say, varied before 1860 between 24 and 33 per cent., and has since fallen to 14 and 15 per cent. Even if the latter figures should be increased a little to allow for the overestimate of immigration, the change would be enormous.

Passing from the United States, we meet with similar phenomena in Australasia. Indeed, what has happened in Australasia of late has been attracting a good deal of attention. The following short table, which is extracted from the statistics of Mr. Coghlan, the able statistician of the Government of New South Wales, gives an idea of what has occurred:

 Population of Australasia at different Dates, with the Annual Increase Per Cent. in each Period.

Supplementary Table of Rate per Cent, of Increase since 1890.