MASSACHUSETTS. 



477 



| shown to 1..-, in Barnstable County, 1,051; 

 I, 208 ; Frnnklin, Hi ; Nan- 

 1; rivniouth, I,i'J4. The a!> 



III.- tagagM i the naval ser- 



f.ir tin- fulling off in 



. According to this intimate 



b one living child for 



-ons; one person out, of every 



married; and one death to not quite 44 



of the population the largest ratio of deaths 



en recorded. Compared with 



Liirn-i of IMJO, wo liavo 5,602 fewer births, 

 li".i more, marriages, and 5,665 more deaths 

 showing tin.' disturbing influences of the war on 

 the ordinary relations of births, marriages and 

 deaths. The births have diminished in Berk- 

 shire, Franklin, Middlesex and Suffolk Counties, 

 and have increased in all the others. The 

 oeaths have increased in all the counties except- 

 ing Berkshire, Franklin, Ilampden, and Ply- 

 mouth. The average age of those who died 



:^.30, an addition of four-tenths of a year 

 to the duration of life. The extremes of the 

 ratio are 36.30 years in Franklin County, and 

 'j:',.7"> years, in Suffolk County. 



In connection -with the vital statistics of 

 Massachusetts may he mentioned an address 

 delivered by Dr. Nathan Allen, of Lowell, be- 

 fore an agricultural society of the State, in 

 which ho asserted that the native population 

 was rapidly diminishing, as compared with the 



:i element. In 1860, he said, the foreign 

 population produced nearly one thousand more 

 children than the entire American popula- 

 tion ; and ho added that the American births 

 are less than the American deaths, and that the 

 size of American families is becoming less with 

 every generation. The records of different 

 towns have been examined to verify these 

 statements. In one town the first generations 

 averaged 9.50 children to a family ; the second, 

 7.31; the third, 7.69; the fourth, 7.25; the 

 fifth, 4.90; the sixth, 2.84. lu all the towns 

 examined the first settlers, on an average, had 

 in each family from 8 to 10 children ; the three 

 succeeding generations ranged from 7 to 8 to 

 each family ; the fifth about 5 ; while the sixth 

 decreased to less than 3. In one small town, 

 settled in 1655, the records attest that there 

 were 26 families with 10 children each ; 20 

 families with 11 children each ; 24 families with 

 12 rhildren each; 13 families with 13 children 

 each; one family with 15, and one with 21 chil- 

 dren. Eighty-five families could show 973 chil- 

 dren. "Then," he says, "large families were 

 common now the exception ; then it was rare 

 to find married people having only one, two, or 



children now it is very common 1 Then 

 it was regarded as a calamity for a married couple 

 to have no children now such calamities are 

 found on every side of us; in fact, they are 



;iable." Again, those counties of Massa- 

 chusetts which contain the least of the foreign 

 element, returned, in 1864 and 1865, more 

 deaths than births: and all the cities and towns 

 which contained a large foreign element re- 



I more births than deaths. An analysis 

 of tin- birthg in every case shows, ho asserts, 

 that it is the foreign element alone wh 

 augmenting the population by natural increase, 

 and that those counties which are purely Ameri- 

 can are declining in population. Arid this 

 American decrease is not confined to the cities, 

 but is quite as general in the country towns and 

 rural districts. 



The conclusions reached by Dr. Allen, in 

 regard to the degeneracy and diminution of the 

 native population of New England, are not 

 received with assent hy the medical profession. 

 Thus, when he says that in Massachusetts such 

 a number of American and such a number of 

 foreign children are born, it is the nativity of 

 the parents which guides him in his application 

 of the adjectives " American " and " foreign ; " 

 but when he comes to speak of the number of 

 deaths in Massachusetts, the nativity of the 

 parents no longer governs him, but the nativity 

 of the person deceased. By such a method, he 

 reaches results which wear an unfavorable 

 appearance. The error of his conclusions, eo 

 far as concerns the single case of Boston, is 

 shown by a writer in the Medical and Surgical 

 jReporter. Dr. Allen says that in 1865 the 

 births in Boston were as follows: Foreign, 

 3,575; American, 1,641; unknown, 60. The 

 deaths in the same year were as follows : Fo- 

 reign, 1,398 ; American, 3,143. Here, ho says, 

 the whole number of births exceeded the whole 

 number of deaths by 734 ; hut the deaths of 

 Americans exceed the births by 1,520. But, in 

 order to be counted by Dr. Allen as a foreign 

 decedent, it is necessary that the deceased 

 person should have been horn abroad; when 

 counted as a foreigner in the list of births, he 

 only exacts that the child's parents, or one of 

 them, should have been horn abroad. But 

 should the computation of births and deaths 

 alike be made with reference to parentage, the 

 following result appears : children of American 

 mothers, 1,650; of foreign, 3,587; of unknown, 

 88 ; total, 4,541. Decedents of American 

 parentage, 1,245 ; of foreign, 2,868 ; of un- 

 known, 428; total, 4,541. The results of the 

 correct calculation may be summed up as fol- 

 lows : American parentage births, 1,650; 

 deaths, 1,245 ; gain, 405. Foreign parentage 

 births, 8,587; deaths, 2,868; gain, 719. Un- 

 known parentage births, 88 ; deaths, 428 : 

 loss, 390. So, instead of a loss of 1,502 to the 

 native American population, there really is a 

 gain of 405 relatively a greater gain than that 

 to the foreign-born population. 



An act of the legislature of 1866 imposed 

 upon the Governor and Council the general 

 supervision of the work upon the Troy and 

 Greenfield railroad and Hoosac tunnel, and the 

 duty of visiting and inspecting the same at 

 least once in each year. In accordance with 

 this provision, Governor Bullock visited and 

 inspected the works at the tunnel three times 

 in 1866. In accordance with another provision 

 of the same act, Benjamin II. Latrohe, of Balt't- 



