in the United States in Fifty Years. 65 



majority are also known to be males, this partial and small increase 

 in the proportion of males may be attributed, in part, to immigration, 

 and in part, perhaps, to the greater mortality of women at this 

 period of life. But to whatever cause we ascribe it, the census 

 conclusively shows in the subsequent periods a diminished mortality 

 of females, with the single exception of the small number who live 

 above a century. 



From this exception, conflicting as it does with the excess and 

 increasing excess of females shown in the periods of life immediately 

 preceding, we are not warranted in deducing any general rule on 

 the comparative probabilities of life between the sexes, unless we 

 knew the circumstances, or, at least, the place of birth, of these 

 rare instances of longevity ; for if the greater part, or even a con- 

 siderable part of them were of foreign birth, and from countries of 

 greater average salubrity than the United States, that fact, from 

 the known disproportion of male immigrants, would tend to in- 

 crease the proportion of males in the advanced stages of life ; and 

 whilst such increase would not be manifested in classes that con- 

 sisted of thousands, (as do all those under 100,) it might have so 

 much effect in the few hundreds above that age as to produce the 

 excess of males that we see, and thus explain the seeming anomaly. 



In comparing the chances of longevity in this country with those 

 of other countries, we must take into account our more rapid in- 

 crease of numbers. Thus, to ascertain what proportion of our 

 population attain the age of 100, we must compare the number of 

 those who have attained it, not with the present population, but 

 with that which existed 100 years since; and this, at a moderate 

 estimate of the intermediate increase, was less than one-sixteenth 

 of our present numbers ; whereas, in most densely peopled coun- 

 tries, the increase, in the same period, may not have been from 

 one-eighth to one-fourth as great.* To make, then, the comparison 

 fairly, we must multiply the number of persons in this country of the 

 age supposed in the same proportion. In like manner, to compute 

 the chances of here attaining the age of fifty, we must compare the 

 number who have now reached that age with the population at the 

 first census, when it was less than one-fourth of its present amount. 



As the census has, since 1830, made quinquennial classes of the 



* In England, the population in 1730 was 5,687,993, and in 1831 was 14,174,204, 

 less than 2J times as great ; and from 1700 to 1800 the numbers had not even doubled. 

 In every other part of Europe, except Russia, the increase is yet more slow. 



6* 



