136 ANNUAL OF SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY. 



functions of the 3,220 registrars, or dividers of districts, ceased. The 

 summaries and enumeration books (as far as England and "Wales were 

 concerned) were now in the hands of 624 superintendent- registrars. 



The chief duties of the superintendent-registrars were to expedite the 

 investigation, but they had also further to revise the summaries and 

 enumeration books, and to transmit them to the census office, there to 

 undergo a still further revision before the commencement of the abstracts. 



o 



CURIOSITIES OF THE AMERICAN CENSUS. 



Prom the statistics collected under the seventh census of the United 

 States, the following interesting facts have been deduced : 



1. Law of Growth. This has been so uniform that the general ratio is 

 a well-known fact ; but the mode in which that growth has been made is 

 very little known. Many persons have given too much weight to immigra- 

 tion, and others have supposed the increase of the African race more rapid 

 than it is. Mr. Darby, in his " View of the UnHed Strifes," gave the law 

 of population to the year 1940, which, although published twenty years 

 ago, gave the population of 1850 but a million and a half beyond what it 

 is ; and the whole error was in the estimate of the African race, which lie 

 made 5,700,000, when it is really but 3,636,000. There has been a 

 tendency at all times to exaggerate the increase and importance of the 

 African as well as the immigrant population. Neither of them can ever 

 occupy any thing but a subordinate position in a nation whose whole 

 genius and institutions are so completely Anglo-American. This fact the 

 census demonstrates.. 



The number of inhabitants prior to the Revolution cannot be obtained 

 with accuracy ; but since 1780 we have it with great exactness. Taking 

 the decimal periods, we ascertain a very uniform law of progression, thus : 



In 1790 3,929,827 



In 1800 5,305,925 Increase 35 per cent. 



In 1810 7,239,814 Increase 36 per cent. 



In 1820 . . 9,638,131 Increase 33 percent. 



In 1830 12,866,920 Increase 33 per cent. 



In 1840 17,062,566 Increase 32.J per cent. 



In 1850 23,191,876 Increase 36 percent. 



The law of growth has, for sixty years, been but slightly variant from 34 

 per cent. This is so fixed and certain that, allowing for a very little dimi- 

 nution of ratio, we may assume 33 and one-third per cent, (or one-third the 

 existent population) as the decimal increase of growth for the next half 

 century. We may predict, with almost certainty, that in 1910 (sixty 

 years) the American Republic will have one hu.i-ln'd and twenty millions 

 of people an empire which, when its vigor, resources, and institutions are 

 considered, will in power exceed any thing which exists, or has existed, 

 among nations. 



