592 INCREASE OF HAPPINESS. 



the present, and hope for the future, should have been regarded 

 as opposed to the principles of Christianity or the interests of 

 true religion. 



But even if the theory of "natural selection" should even- 

 tually prove to be untenable, and if those are right who believe 

 that neither our minds nor our bodies are susceptible of any 

 important change, any great improvement, still I think we 

 are justified in believing that the happiness of man is greatly 

 on the increase. It is generally admitted that if any animal 

 increases in numbers, it must be because the conditions are 

 becoming more favourable to it in other words, because it is 

 happier and more comfortable. Now how will this test apply 

 to man? Schoolcraft estimates* that in a population which 

 lives on the produce of the chase, each hunter requires on 

 an average 50,000 acres, or 78 square miles, for his support. 

 Again, he tells us^ that, excluding Michigan territory, west 

 of Lake Michigan, and north of Illinois, there were in the 

 United States in 1825 about 97,000 Indians, occupying 

 77,000,000 of acres, or 120,312 square miles. This gives one 

 inhabitant to every 1J square miles. In this case, however, 

 the Indians lived partly on the subsidies granted them by 

 Government in exchange for land, and the population was 

 therefore greater than would have been the case if they had 

 lived entirely on the produce of the chase. The same reason 

 affects, though to a smaller extent, the Indians in the Hudson's 

 Bay territory. These tribes were estimated by Sir George 

 Simpson, late Governor of the territories belonging to the 

 Hudson's Bay Company, in his evidence given before the 

 Committee of the House of Commons in 1857, at 139,000, 

 and the extent is supposed to be more than 1,400,000 square 

 miles, to which we must add 13,000 more for Vancouver's 

 Island, making a total of more than 900,000,000 of acres ; 

 about 6500 acres, or 10 square miles, to each, individual. 

 * Indian Tribes, vol. i. p. 433. t 1. c. vol. iii. p. 575. 



