Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 11.djvu/59

* ITALY. 43 ITALY. Provinces and Compar- TIMENTI Area in square miles Population 1881 Population 1901 1,448 1,015 725 987 1,250 954 715 876 457,474 230,807 251,110 279,254 267,306 226,717 225,764 244,959 527,642 271,467 i'orll 279,072 322.617 294,312 245,049 235,766 Keggio neir Emilia .... 275,827 7,967 2,183,391 2.451,752 Arezzo 1,273 2,265 1,738 133 558 687 1,179 1,471 238,744 790,776 114,295 121,612 284,484 169,469 283,563 205,926 272,359 937 786 144,825 124 088 Lucca 318,610 Massa e Carrara Pisa 195,840 320,020 .Siena 234 626 9,304 2,208,869 2,548.154 2,030 2,568 l,22i 433,9i-S 451,185 372,723 482,788 ■Cosenza 462,893 Reggio di Calabria 430,079 5,819 1,257,883 1,375,760 1,263 1,917 1,172 1,246 1,948 1,442 948 266,379 563,457 312,487 460,924 699,151 341,526 283,977 330,972 Catania 711,923 371,471 Messina 548 S9S 785,016 Syracuse 427,429 353,557 Sicily 9.936 2,927,901 3,529,266 5,204 4,090 420,635 261,367 482,000 .Sassari 307 314 Sardinia 9,294 682,002 789 314 Kingdom of Italy 110,6;!3 28,459,628 32,449.754 The following list shows the increase of popula- -tion, during the nineteenth century, within the present territory of the Kingdom: 1816 18,383,000 1848 23.617,000 1861 25,000.000 1871 26,801,154 1881 28,4.59,628 1901 32,449,754 Tims there has been an increase of 4,000,000 people, or about 14 per cent., in twenty years. ''ith respect to densitj- of population, over 293 people per .square mile, Italy ranks third among the countries of Continental Europe, coming after Belgium and the Netherlands. In genera!, the northern portion of Italy, extending as far south as Florence, is more densely populated than the remaining portions. The population is remark- ably homogeneous, the number of distinctly non- Italian inhabitants being small and concentrated in a few districts; as. for instance, the 80.000 peonle of French orisin in the Province of Turin; ftO.OOO Albanians in Sicilv and Southern Italy; 30.000 C4reeks in Calabria and on the Adriatic coast; 30,000 Slavs in Xortheast Italy, in the vicinity of the Austrian frontier; 11,500 Germans living mostly in the north, and some 10.1100 Spanish in Sardinia. The number of foreigners residing temporarily in Italy is very small — about 06.000 in 1001. Contrary to the experience of most Eurojjean countries, there is a slight excess of males over females in Italy. The following table includes all towns having a population of over 100,000 in 1901 : Vol. XI.— 4. 1894 1901 527,000 464,000 44,i,000 345,000 281,000 220,000 204,000 154,000 148.000 148,000 123.000 604,000 403.000 491.000 3:j,0UO 310 000 Konie Palermo 235,000 205.000 152,000 150 (inii Florence., Bologna 150,000 160,000 Catania Emigration. The unsatisfactory condition of public affairs is responsible for the enormous tide of emigration. More than 2.000,000 Italian emigrants are living in foreign countries, and their number increases from year to year by hundreds of thousands. The growtli of emigra- tion in the last quarter of the nineteenth century was as follows: 1876 108,771 1880 1 19,901 1885 157,193 1891 293,631 1896 307,482 1898 283,715 1900 : 352,782 It will be" seen that the emigration increased more than threefold in the period indicated. As the conditions responsible for this exodus from the country do not seem to improve much, there are no reasons to expect any decline of emigra- tion in the near future. The region contributing most to the emigration is the less productive and more poorly developed southern portion of the Peninsula from Naples southward, and the emi- grants are chiefly peasants or representatives of other lower classes. The Province of Genoa con- tributes more than any other province in the liortli to the' stream of emigration. The country most vitally interested in this question is the United States. As late as 1888 less than 12 per cent, of all the Italian emigrants went to the United States, while more than 33 per cent, went to Brazil, and about 23 per cent, to Argentina, Uruguay, and Paraguay. In 1900 the proportion was reversed, the number of immigrants to the United States. Brazil, and Argentina being 136,- 000, 11. .500, and 72.000. or 38.5, 3.3, and 20.4 per cent., respectively. About one-half go to European countries, especially France, Switzer- land, Austria, and Germany. The majority of Ihe.se ultimalely return home, and the remainder finally embark for America. BiRTii.s, Deaths, and ^Marriages. The birth- rate of Italy, although fully up to the normal, has been slowly declining. While it annually exceeded 37 per 1000 inhabitants prior to the last decade of the nineteenth century, in 1897 it was only 35.11. On the other hand, the death- rate has declined much more rapidly, having de- creased from 28.10 per 1000 inhabitants in 1887 to 22.16 in 1897, the Italian Government justly priding itself on the sanitary improvements which have made such results possible. The excess of births over deaths, which was only 7.19 per 1000 inhabitants in 1872, increased to 12.94 in twenty-five years. Eeligion. The great bulk of the inhabitants of Italy belong to the Roman Catholic Church. Especial prominence attaches to the Church in Italy from the fact that the seat of the central administration of the Church is in Kome. The welfare and harmony of the