INQUIRY INTO THE POPULATION OF CHINA, 671 



rate the ])opnlation of Che-kiano; would double itself by natural 

 increase in 417 years. 



Newsholnie/' calculatin<jf the average birth rate and death rate for 

 the five years 1891-1895, found that in Prussia the population would 

 double itself by natural increase in 49.2 years; in England in 59.1 

 years; in Italy in G5.7 years; in Austria in 74.1 years, and in France 

 in 591 years, the annual increase in the period named averaging in 

 the latter country only 0.08 per 1,000. Conditions of life in other 

 provinces of the P^mpire of China are approximately the same as in 

 Che-kiang — in fact, in a number they are worse, particularly as 

 regards the frequency of famines, floods, and epidemics; neverthe- 

 less, Chinese enumerations would have us believe that the population 

 in China increases more rapidl}' than in the most favored countries of 

 the world. 



In the case of China, natural increase is the only one to be taken in 

 line of count; immigration into China is practically nil, and emigra- 

 tion from China proper to other portions of the Empire, excluding 

 Asia, has only within quite recent times become of considerable size, 

 and even now it is not sufficient to appreciably affect the sum total 

 of the population in the approximate count we are trying to make of 

 it. The only migratory movements of the Chinese have been from 

 province to province of the Empire. Without going far back into 

 the past it will suffice to mention the repopulation of the provinces of 

 Ssu-ch'uan and Yiin-nan after the Manchu conquest from the Hu 

 Kuang provinces and the similar movement to Ssu-ch'uan during 

 the great T'ai-p'ing rebellion. The emigration from Shan-hsi into 

 southern and eastern Mongolia after the famine of 1877-78, and that 

 from Shan-tung and Chih-li into Manchuria still going on, are the 

 most important recent movements of population to outlying parts 

 of the Chinese Empire. The emigration to southern Asia and to 

 remoter parts of the world is drawn exclusively from the provinces 

 of Fu-kien and Kuang-tung, and though considerable, is not so large 

 as to affect to an}^ appreciable degree the rough figures of population 

 we hope to establish.'' 



Very little accurate information has come to us as to the death 

 rate in any given locality of China; in fact, the only official data I 

 know of is the death rate in Peking during one year, 1845, for which 

 3'ear we have also the returns of a detailed census of the population 

 within the Peking city walls. These were obtained by Sacharoff 

 and published in his valuable study, cited previously. According to 



a Elem. Vital Statistics, p. 15. 



''The following figures relative to Chineso eiuigration, talveii from Export of 

 April 14, 1904, a German paper devoted to commercial geograjiliy, lirst api)eared 

 in Gottwaldt's work on Chinese emigration. The greater i)art of the Chiiiese 

 emigration originates in the southern provinces, Shan-tung being the only 



