and a half fold, while the former had scarcely doubled to the annexation of additional provinces. their numbers. Wonderful as has been the progress as regards population of the United Kingdom itself, it is even surpassed in this respect by the numerous British colonies and dependencies abroad. The population of the British Empire, as a whole, stood in the year 1851 at about 159,000,000 souls. In 1871 the grand total had increased to nearly 235,000,000, showing an increase The Aus tralian colonies had but 437,000 inhabitants in 1850; in 1871 their population had increased more than fourfold, their aggregate numbers being close upon 2,000,000. The population of Cape Colony, Natal, and the rest of the British territories in Africa, was little more than 600,000 in 1850; by 1871 it had considerably more than doubled itself, its numbers being nearly 1,500,000. The colonies of North America were peopled by 2,500,000 in 1950, and by 3,750,000 in 1871, showing an increase of as much as 50 per cent. in the twenty years. The West Indies, with the Bermudas, Honduras, and British Guiana, had rather less than 500,000 inhabitants in 1850; they had 1,300,000 in 1871. And even the small possessions in Europe-Gibraltar, Malta, and Heligoland-show an increase in their population from 70,000 in 1850, to 176,000 in 1871; this increase being, however, partly due to the military not having been included in the earlier returns. The British Empire in 1871 covered a surface twice as large as that of all the sections of the race, or, in other words, that we are overshadowed by America and Australia. The rise to power of our southern colonies is, however, distant, and an alliance between ourselves and America is still one to be made on equal terms. Although we are forced to contemplate the speedy loss of our manufacturing supremacy as coal becomes cheaper in America, and dearer in Old England, we have, nevertheless, as much to bestow on America as she has to confer on us. The possession of India offers to ourselves that element of vastness of Europe, its aggregate area in round numbers having, at secure widinion which, in this age, is needed to that date, reached the huge total of 7,500,000 square miles. The East Indian and other Asiatic possessions alone comprise an area of little less than 1,000,000 s square miles. Of the rest of the colonies, which cover 6,500,000 square miles of the earth's surface, by far the greater portion has been colonised by settlers mainly of British and Irish origin-a fact pregnant with the most momentous consequences for the future of the AngloSaxon race. of thought and nobility of purpose; but to the English race, our possession of India, of the coasts of Africa, and of the ports of China, offers the possibility of planting free institutions among the dark-skinned races of the world. "The ultimate future of any one section of our race, however, is of little moment by the side of its triumph as a whole, but the power of English laws and English principles of government is not merely an English question-its continuance is essential to the freedom of mankind." The population and extent of the British Empire were ascertained more completely at the great imperial census of 1871 than at any previous period. The various details of the elaborate arrangement under which this census was carried out were probably as perfect, humanly speaking, as they could be made; and the benefits resulting from the information-which was alike novel and interesting-then obtained were corre spondingly important. With few exceptions, the area and number of inhabitants of every province in the empire were enumerated simultaneously in that year. The final and revised results of this census, together with the populations, as estimated or enumerated in 1851, are stated in detail in the annexed table : In his work entitled Greater Britain," Sir Charles Dilke, who in the years 1866 and 1867 travelled through all the English-speaking countries of the globe, in depicting "the grandeur of our race, already girdling the earth, which it is destined, perhaps, eventually to overspread," remarked that "the countries ruled by a race whose very scum and outcasts have founded empires in every portion of the globe, even now consist of nine and a half millions of square miles, and contain a population of three hundred millions of people. Their surface," he continues, "is five times as great as that of the empire of Darius, and four and a half times as great as the Roman Empire at its greatest extent. It is no exaggeration to say that, in power, the English countries would be more than a match for the remaining nations of the world, whom, in the intelligence of their people and in the extent and wealth of their dominions, they POPULATION AND EXTENT OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE already considerably surpass. Russia gains ground steadily, we are told, but so do we. If we take the maps of the English-governed countries and of the Russian countries of fifty years ago, and compare them with the English and Russian countries of to-day, we find that the Saxon has outstripped the Muscovite both in conquest and in colonisation. The extensions of the United States alone are equal to all those of Russia. Chili, La Plata, and Peru must eventually become English; the Red Indian race that now occupies those countries cannot stand against our colonists; and the future of the table-lands of Africa and that of Japan and of China is equally clear. Even in the tropical plains, the negroes alone seem able to withstand us. No possible series of events can prevent the English race itself in 1970 numbering three hundred millions of beings, of one national character and one tongue. Italy, Spain, France, Russia become pigmies by the side of such a people. "Many who are well aware of the power of the English nations are nevertheless disposed to believe that our own is morally, as well as physically, the least powerful of EUROPE: Province. Total of United Kingdom. 31,629,299* 27,745,949 IN 1871 AND 1851. Population. 1871. 1851. Area in Square Miles. England and Wales. 22,712,266 17,927,600 58,311 Scotland. 3,360,018 2,8-8,742 30,463 32,531 Islands of British Seas 303 212,194 121,608 A.D. 1851-71.] THE POPULATION OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE. 573 THE BRITISH EMPIRE IN 1871 AND 1851-continued. rate than the population of urban districts. In 1851 the Total of Australasia. 1,925,595 523,859 468 21 200,610 17,800 11,172 708 224 342 640 45 32 13 2,960,722 Total of Colonics & Dependencies 203,133,291 130,750,773 7,647,841 Grand Total of British Empire. 231,762,593 158,496,727 7,769,449 The large additions which we have remarked as having been made to the inhabitants of England and Wales in recent years, have been accompanied by a significant change or movement in their relative distribution and grouping. The additional population has not spread itself equally over the surface of the country, but has tended more and more to congregate together in masses. There has, in other words, been a decided movement towards the towns. Though the rural population has not remained stationary, it has increased at a far less rapid The population of Aden is included in that of India. inhabitants of the town districts of England and Wales differed from those of the rural districts by less than half a million in number. In the year 1871 the former numbered nearly thirteen millions (12,900,297), while the latter had increased to but little more than nine and three-quarter millions (9,803,811). Thus, while the town populations had, in the course of the twenty years, increased by more than 40 per cent., those of the country districts had added but 8 per cent. to their numbers. Speaking of the growth of the population between the years 1851 and 1861, the Census Commissioners observed that "three-fourths of the total increase of population had taken place in the towns." The seventy-two largest towns in the country, which had an aggregate population of 2,221,753 in 1801, and 7,677,622 in 1861, had, in the ten years preceding 1861, added to their numbers at "double the rate at which the rest of the population increased." "The county and assize towns increased in the ten years since 1851 at the rate of 1.39 annually; the manufacturing towns where silk and woollen goods and gloves were made increasing most slowly, the towns famous for cotton, stockings, shoes, and straw plait increasing most rapidly. The increase of population was most rapid in the seaport towns, and in the towns amidst the mining districts where hardware is made." "England is in this age still a great agricultural country; but its cities are extending beyond their ancient borders. Villages and small places are rising up to the importance of large towns." Thus Barrow-in-Furness, in Lancashire, was a village, not important enough even to bo mentioned by name in the census of 1861; but in 1871 it had risen to the dignity of a town, with nearly 20,000 inhabitants, and had, within the brief space of ten years, attained the status of a municipal borough, governed by a mayor and corporation. Another instance is that of Middlesborough, in Yorkshire, which, in the year 1831, had a population of 383 persons. In 1871 its inhabitants numbered close upon forty thousand (39,563). In 1871 there were 103 towns in England and Wales with upwards of 20,000 inhabitants. Their aggregate population at that date was 9,543,968, an increase of nearly seven and a quarter millions since 1801. Theso 103 towns in 1871 contained a larger population than all England and Wales at the beginning of the century. Within seventy years from that time these 103 towns had quadrupled their population, while the population of the rest of the country had barely doubled its numbers. England and Wales at the same date contained, besides the 103 towns just mentioned, 118 towns with a popula tion of between 10,000 and 20,000; 220 towns of from 5,000 to 10,000 inhabitants; 358 towns of from 2,000 to 5,000 inhabitants; and 100 of from 1,000 to 2,000 inhabitants, besides thirty-eight other places which, though having less than 1,000 inhabitants, are classified with the towns on account of their possessing local boards, or other forms of local self-government. These 937 towns possessed in 1871 an aggregate population of 14,041,404. In 1861 their inhabitants numbered 12,026,546, so that they had added 2,014,858 persons to their population in the ten years. The population of the rest of the country was 8,039,678 in 1861, and only added 631,184 thereto in the ten succeeding years. The town populations, according to this mode of division, had therefore increased by 17 per cent., while the remaining population had only increased 8 per cent.; and, according to this principle of division, of the population of England and Wales, nearly two-thirds (62 per cent.) belonged to the towns, and rather more than one-third (38 per cent.) to the rural districts. While the prevailing tendency of the population has thus, beyond doubt, been to gravitate to the towns, there are not wanting symptoms of an incipient movement in the very opposite direction, more particularly in the most recent years. Numbers of merchants and tradesmen, more particularly those of the wealthier class, who were formerly compelled by the exigencies of their business to dwell in the larger towns, have recently been enabled, by the rapid development of railway communication, to remove to private residences in the country. The resident population of the City of London, which in 1861 numbered 112,063, had sunk in 1871 to 74,897. For centuries this portion of the metropolis had never had a population of less than 110,000. In the year 1631 its inhabitants are estimated to have numbered 111,608, and in 1801 they were as many as 128,269. The sudden and unprecedented decrease of 37,166 persons, or 33 per cent., which took place in the ten years from 1861 to 1871, is no doubt partly due to street improvements, but it is also in great measure to be attributed to the increasing habit in certain ranks of society of seeking their places of residence as far away from the centres of business as circumstances allow. Thus the central portions, not only of the metropolis, but also of almost all the largest towns in England, have of late years been increasingly abandoned to commerce and industry. Soon after the middle of the nineteenth century, the phenomenon was for the first time seen of merchants in the City of London who travelled a hundred miles a day simply between their places of residence and their offices of business-a phenomenon probably still without a parallel in any other nation in the world. The fact of a returning tide from the towns towards the country is quite consistent with, if not confirmed by, the relative progress of the urban and rural populations at the last two censuses. Thus the rate of progress of the rural population (reckoning under this head the utmost which can possibly be conceded) was only 4 per cent. in the ten years, 1851 to 1861. It was 7 per cent. in the following ten years. The urban population in the earlier decennium added 19 per cent., but in the latter period only 18 per cent., to its numbers. This reverse current, however, has, as appears from the numbers just quoted, hitherto been on too small a scale to affect materially the truth of the assertion that the urban population has in recent times been progressing at a far more rapid rate than that of the rural districts. As the pursuits of town populations are chiefly of a manufacturing and commercial character, so those of the country are mainly agricultural, and the more rapid growth of the former is a clear indication of the fact-which is abundantly confirmed from other sources, hereafter to be mentioned that England was every day becoming more and more a manufacturing and commercial nation, and relatively less and less agricultural in its pursuits. A comparison of the number of persons engaged in the various classes of occupations at each of the last three censuses likewise bears witness to the same fact. Thus the actual number of persons occupied in agriculture in England fell from 2,011,447 in the year 1851, to 1,924,110 in 1861, and to 1,559,037 in 1871. The classes of persons not strictly engaged in agriculture rose from 15,916,162 in 1851, to 18,142,114 in 1861, and to 21,153,229 in 1871. In the occupations classed as commercial there were 815,424 persons engaged in 1871, as against 623,710 in 1861, an increase of 30 per cent. Again, in industrial or manufacturing employments the number of persons occupied in 1861 was 4,828,399, while in 1871 it was 5,137,725, an increase of nearly 6} per cent. in the ten years. Within the same period, the population engaged in farming and the cultivation of the earth had decreased as much as 19 per cent.; and was, therefore, receding three times as fast as the manufacturing classes were advancing. It must be remembered that these statements refer simply to the mere numbers of the persons engaged in the various classes of occupations mentioned. The effect which has been produced upon the general welfare of the respective classes of persons in question is not capable of being determined by a mere knowledge of the changes which have taken place in their numbers alone. To enable us to form a judgment upon that point, additional data of a different kind, which will be adduced in a subsequent chapter, are requisite. Of the population not included in any of the three classes mentioned, the occupations described as professional were followed in 1861 by 481,957 persons, and in 1871 by 684,102, showing an increase of more than 200,000, or nearly 40 per cent., in that brief period. The domestic class, which includes, among others, married women and widows engaged in the management of households, as well as domestic servants, housekeepers, innkeepers, &c., rose from 4,287,020 in 1861, to 5,905,171 in 1871. The rest of the population-the indefinite and non-productive class, which, besides including all the children and scholars under twenty years of age, comprises all persons of rank and property, as well as those whose occupation could not be determined with precisionnumbered 7,683,794 in 1861, and 8,512,706 in 1871. In the three last-mentioned classes there has thus been an aggregate increase of 2,648,914 persons during the ten years in question-a fact which, as the persons in question are mainly dependent for their subsistence upon the agricultural, commercial, and manufacturing portion of the community, tends to show that the labour of these latter classes has been more productive than formerly, and that the nation at large is to the same extent more wealthy. The smaller relative importance of agriculture as compared with other occupations, which we have observed in the case of England and Wales, is also found to obtain in the case of Ireland and Scotland, though not in the same degree. In regard to Ireland, the case may be |