FOOD AND POPULATION. 



Since 1870 food has, relatively to population, been more abundant and procurable 

 at a less expouditure of lalior tlian at ;uiy tinii^ in the history of tlie race, and the absence 

 of war and the abundance and cheapness of the means of subsistence have, among th« 

 industrial classes, stimulated marriage with the result of unprecedented additions to the 

 populations of European blood and the enthusiast, without over-much reflection, haa 

 assumed that humanity was entering upon an age when neither war, want nor scarcity- 

 would be known. It is, however, very questionable if this view of the situation is tena- 

 ble, and investigations— begun some years since by the writer— the results of which are 

 now embodied in tabulations of official data, as to the relative rates of increase of the 

 consuming populations and the productive power (as shown by the acreage at the close of 

 the 7th, 8th and 9th decades) of the fields of the temperate zones render it more than 

 doubtful as to any prolongation of this period of abundance and cheapness. 



That the treatment of this question may partake as little as possible of the specu- 

 lative and explore only that future, where probable conditions may reasonably be assumed 

 from those now existaut. it is the purpose to limit the period under review to the eighth 

 and ninth decades of the nineteenth century I'u 1 extend the prevision no farther than 

 the close of the first decade of the tweutietji. 



Such limitation of the retrospective is rendered necessary by the fact that agricult. 

 ural statistics are of such recent growth that "looking backward" beyond 1870 would be 

 venturing into a realm where no reliable data exists. 



Under the designations of "bread-eating populations" and "bread-eaters" are 

 included only the peoples of Europe, the United States, British America, the Cape regions 

 of South Africa, Australasia, South America south of the tropics, and the colonial 

 European populations of the islands and tropical regions, the geographical distribution 

 having been as follows at the close of the last three decades: 



1876 1H.S0 1S90 



Europe .303 000,000 329,000,000 3fiK 000,000 



United States 38,000,000 .50,200,000 G2 .'")(I0,000 



Canada 3,000,000..: 4,300,01)0 .5,300,000 



Australasia 2,000,000 2,900 000 4,200,000 



Temperate South America .5,000 000 6,600.000 8,200.000 



South Africa and Islands 6,800,000 7.000,000 7,800,000 



Totals 359,000,000 400,000,000 456 000,000 



For the reasons stated the aggregate increase of the bread-eating populations and 

 the rate of increase, during the eighth decade, were greater than ever before known, 

 necessitating the opening of new sources of food supply, such sources having been mostly 

 found upon the fertile plains of North America and in newly developed Indian ex]:>ort3 

 and the supplies from these sources increased so rapidly that in the latter part of the 

 decade they became excessive, as is clear from the descending scale of prices then obtain- 

 ing and the fact that the per capita quota of land in wheat increased from .427 of an acre 

 in 1870 to .443 of an acre in 1880 and this apparently trifling addition — aggregating, how- 

 ever, 6 400,000 acres — to the acreage quota resulted in unusual aluuidance, great reduction 

 in the cost of bread and all primary food staples and a proportionate lowering of the 

 returns of cultivator and laii<llord and showing with what certainty, and to what degrto, 

 even so trifling a disturbance of the exact and delicate relations existing between produc- 

 tion and consumption will afTect the price of those things which render civilized life 

 possible. 



The cheapening of the means of subsistence and accompanying peace has, in Eurupe, 

 been folhwed by an increase in the relative number of marriages and births and at the 

 same time cheap and more abundant nourishment, coupled with better sanitary eoiidi- 

 lions, have added to the average duration of life, the result being that the bread-eaters oj 



