104 



MICHIGAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCE. 



Fecundity of marriage in Michigan* 



*Twenty-eighth Annual Registration Report of Michigan, 1894, p. 119. 



Children to a marriage in various countries. 



Country. 



Russia in Europe, 1888 



Ireland 



New Zealand 



Italy 



Scotland 



Holland 



Children 



to each 



marriage. 



5.7 

 5.5 

 5.2 

 4.6 

 4.4 

 4 3 



Country. 



Victoria 

 Belgium. 

 England. 

 Sweden. 

 Denmarli 

 France. . 



Children 



to each 



marriage. 



4.2 

 4.2 

 4.2 

 4.0 

 3.6 

 3.0 



It is scarcely necessary to expatiate on the above statistics. The 

 figures speak for themselves. There has been some decline in the rates 

 of fecundity, both for native and for foreign-born mothers, in the suc- 

 cessive, quinquennial periods, but the relative rates have remained about 

 the same. About three-fifths as many children are born to native women 

 as to foreign women in proportion to the number married. The signifi- 

 cance of the low rate of fecundity reached by the native-born women 

 of Michigan appears further from comparison with the corresponding 

 rates of European countries, and especially with that of France. The 

 population of France is now stationary, or even decreases in certain 

 years; the normal natural increase of population depending upon the 

 excess of births over deaths has almost entirely disappeared. The at- 

 tention of French demographers has been emphatically called to the con- 

 dition existing, and French patriotism has been excited, for it is certain 

 that France, if her population fails to increase while that of Germany 

 continues to augment in the usual ratio from year to year, will never 

 be able to avenge Sedan, nor even to long retain her place as a first-rate 

 European power. 



Now the fecundity of the native-born women in Michigan is the same 

 as the fecundity of the women of France. If that fecundity is unable to 

 maintain the French people intact, then it is highly probable that the 

 native inhabitants of Michigan are failing to hold their own. The com- 



