6 



THE POPULAR SCIEXCE M0XTELY.—SUPPLE1IEXT. 



And do not statistical tables oftentimes conceal 

 from the observer the very things it concerns 

 him to know — the thoughts and the inmost feel- 

 ings, whereof manners and institutions are only 

 the outer forms'? True it is that in statistics we 

 possess data of inestimable value, but their con- 

 tents are not all of equal weight by any means. 

 Even when they have been collected with the utmost 

 care, such data are not strictly comparable among 

 themselves, inasmuch as they diifer in their mode 

 of collection, in the purposes for which they are 

 brought together, and in the methods of their cal- 

 culation. " There is no kind of information," 

 says the " Sixth Annual Report of the Massachu- 

 setts Bureau of Statistics of Labor," "so valua- 

 ble to the worker in problems of social science as 

 the statistical, when it is derived from original 

 investigation, honestly made by competent per- 

 sons ; but, when any of these requisites are want- 

 ing, it is the most misleading and worthless." 

 The same " Report " points out the defects of the 

 system too commonly employed, which consists in 

 sending out blank tables to be filled up by differ- 

 ent hands and then sent back to a central bureau. 

 All that then remains for the bureau to do is to 

 make additions of its own, to calculate averages 

 which oftentimes are erroneous, and finally to 

 publish documents whose authority is always ques- 

 tionable. The Massachusetts Bureau, however, 

 combining practice with precept, adopts the 

 method of direct investigation and actual obser- 

 vation. Its officers seem, like M. Le Play, to be 

 inspired by the counsels of Descartes : " I aban- 

 doned entirely," writes the author of the "Dis- 

 cours sur la Mcthode," " the study of letters. 1 

 devoted the remainder of my youthful years to 

 traveling, and associating with people of differ- 

 ent moods and conditions. . . . For it appeared 

 to me that I should find far more truths in the 

 I asoningsof men concerning their own affairs, 

 where mistakes carry their own penalties, than in 

 the reasonings of a man of letters in his cabinet, 

 upon speculations that produce no effect, and 

 whose only consequence is, that perhaps they 

 inflate their author's vanity in proportion as they 

 depart from common-sense, inasmuch as it i 

 art and skill to make such arguments plausible." 

 When, in a personal research like this, we 

 abandon theoretical speculation and deal with 

 facts, we quickly discover that, if we would gain 

 corn' :is to the status of a society, or even 



if we would understand the special condition of a 

 working-population, it is not enough to study in 

 that organism the atom, that is to say, the indi- 

 vidual isolated from his surroundings : we have 



to observe the living cell ; in other words, the 

 family, which is the true social unit. A people is 

 not made up of citizens that were born foundlings 

 and that will die celibates. Memory of ancestors, 

 interest in descendants, care of infancy, and pro- 

 tection of old age, attachment to the home and 

 domestic occupations, all conspire to make the 

 family a little world of sentiments and interests — 

 the type and at the same time the groundwork of 

 the nation. The families of working-people, and 

 more especially of the rural population, would nat- 

 urally be chosen by the observer as subjects for 

 investigation; there, in" fact, is to be found the 

 very root of the nation.-- Being less exposed than 

 the higher classes to social fluctuations, and more 

 subordinated in their physical life and activity to 

 the climate and the productions of the soil, the 

 working-classes, by that very fact, present the 

 best characteristics of the nationality and the 

 plainest impress of the local genius. While the 

 traditions of the past, ancient manners, superan- 

 nuated usages, and forgotten patois, are here 

 more persistent, at the same time the slightest 

 changes produced by progress do not fail to mani- 

 fest themselves in modifications of land-tenure, 

 of factory-management, of family-customs, of 

 class-relations, and of state-institutions. A thou- 

 sand minute details of social relations, that would 

 hardly be noticed even by an attentive observer, 

 will be found reflected in the home life of the 

 family. Bousing, food, clothing, rents, taxes, 

 insurance, religion, education, sanitary police, 

 recreation, revenues, salaries, commonage, poor- 

 law relief — whatever concerns the moral needs or 

 the economic interests of the household, has its 

 corresponding debit or credit in money or in 

 kind. Finally, the savings of a family furnish 

 the best criterion for judging whether it is capa- 

 ble of rising, by its virtues, in the social scale. 

 Hence the main thing in the " family mono- 

 graph " is to fix the annual budget : this is the 

 distinguishing characteristic of the method set 

 forth, both in theory sfnd in practice, by the au- 

 thor of " Lcs Ouvricrs Europeens," Let us brief- 

 ly examine this method : 



In the first place, a " family monograph," if it 

 is to be of any use, must be inspired by a sincere 

 love of science, which leads to investigation of 

 truth and scrupulous exactitude in noting down 

 facts. It is not to be denied that an author will 

 oftentimes set about his work with the purpose 

 of demonstrating an erroneous principle with 

 which he is in sympathy; yet, even so, impartial 

 application of the method will suffice to distin- 

 guish for him the true from the false. Then we 



