ENGLAND'S GROWTH.

Te Aroha News, Volume IV, Issue 192, 19 February 1887, Page 8

ENGLAND'S GROWTH.

A mo.st notoworthy article appears in the "Contemporary lie view "for December, from the pen of Mr M. G. Mulhall, one of the most eminono of living statisticians. His conclusions are certain to cause an animated discussion, ts they deal with the present material and moral condition of the United , Kingdom, on which such a variety cf contending views are held by the authorities considered competent to speak on the subject at all. Mr Mulhall works out his figures with great clearness, and hi- paper on "Ton Years of Rational Growth " is, at any rate, entirely free from the Hrjness almost inseparabfe from the treatment of a fltatistical subject, and will be found readable ty persons who ordinarily turn away from statistics with abhorrence. His contusions avo set down under ten differentheads, and from their ,/han»cter it is necea sary, to avoid mieapprehersion, tint they should be given in his own language :— Firstly, ye find that the reproductive power 01 our people, aa shown by the number of children to each marriage, has de olinod 4 par cent, since 18S0, and that this decline hao been coincident with a tide of emigration unprecedented in the record* of the United Kingdom. It appears, thoie fore, highly probable that there is a closa relationship between these facts, and that ac emigration increaeee, there w ill be a corresponding diminution in the fertility of marriages. Secondly, that the low ratio of martiagea and births in Ireland shows that country to be in a lamentable condition ; in fact, there is no other country in the world with so 1 low a birbh rate, which has further declined V percent. «ince 1880. It would appear aa if agricultural depreaaion and the exactions of landlord 3 bad ao far ruined the people that they could not marry. Thirdly, that; the death rate of the th-9e kingdoms has fallen very notably einco 1830, •which may be ascribed either to sanitary improvements in towns or to the iacreasoJ cotiBumption of meat and other food. Fourthly, that the moral condition o? the people has improved marvellouely ?'mcv 1870, pauperism having decreased 33 per cent., and crime 36 per cent. Moreover, zn the last ten yoara the consumption of liquor has declined 24 per cent,, and the number of school children to population risen from 3 to 12 per cent. Fifthly, that the savings of the working classes have increased steadily at the rate of millions per annum, having risen 82 per cent, pince 1875. Sixthly, that 70 per cent, of the wheat and 30 par cent, of the meat consumed in the United Kingdom ia imported, and that the moro we import the cheaper is food, and so much the better fed are the working classes. Seventhly, that the British shipping has iccreaeed ten millions tons of carrying power in ten years, and that three seamen now perform as much a3 four did in 1875. Eighthly, that our imports and exports ebow an apparent decline of trade equal to 2 per cent «ince 1875, but that if prices had remained the came the trade of 1885 would have represented 772 millions, on increase ?l 23 per cent,