402 VITAL STATISTICS. 



similarity between the numbers living at each age. To institute a com- 

 parison between South Carolina and the country at large, in this regard, 

 the diagram on the opposite page has been prepared. The number of 

 living persons at the five ages specified were obtained from the 7th, 8th 

 and 0th United States Census, and their percentage of the aggregate 

 population of the United States and of South Carolina was calculated. 

 A perpendicular line, A B, was marked off in lengths corresponding with 

 the number of years in each period of life from one to one hundred. The 

 scale used was too small to show the relative height for those under one 

 year of age, and this class are represented higher than it should be. The 

 percentage of the population found in each period was divided by the 

 number of years included in the period, and the quotient gave the 

 breadth of the block representing the living of that period. 



It will be remarked that while the number under one year old is greater 

 in the country at large than in South Carolina, the decrease and conse- 

 quent mortality from one to fifteen years is much more marked for the 

 whole country than for South Carolina. In the working period of life, 

 from fifteen to sixty, the numbers for the country at large considerably 

 exceed those in South Carolina. This, however, is unfortunately not due 

 to greater healthfulness, but to the large accession of foreign immigrants, 

 persons mostly between those ages, very few of whom come to South Car- 

 olina. In fact. South Carolina lost heavily by emigration, the emigrants 

 being largely of the working age, (see Chapter on Population). Naturally 

 it would be expected that the greater numbers between these ages would 

 give the United States a marked superiority over South Carolina during 

 the succeeding period of life, from sixty to one hundred. It is observed, 

 however, that such is not the case. The explanation is found in the excep- 

 tionally large death rate of foreigners exposed to the vicissitudes and 

 rigors of the northern climate, where the large majority seek homes. 

 This death rate is estimated in the census of 1860 as 4.261 per cent, for 

 the males who preponderate, while the death rate for the whole country 

 is 23ut at 1.75 per cent., and for the white population of the eleven largest 

 cities at 2.75 per cent. 



It appears that the black spaces, which represent the dead, are less in 

 South Carolina than in the country at large. Still they are of appalling 

 magnitude, and if the health of a people be a matter of the first conse- 

 quence it would seem that government, alone able to effect it, is called 

 on to collect and preserve vital statistics to the end that some light at 

 least might be thrown on this great darkness, so pregnant with human woe. 



I. — The proportion of white and colored in the aggregate population of 

 South Carolina is summarized in the following table, taken from the 

 records of the United States Census ; 



