and part of the increase is suburban in character; the other two, 

 Colesville and Damascus, are as strictly rural as any districts in 

 the county, but their gain was very small, 42 in one instance and 39 

 in the other. A closer examination of the figures shows that the rural 

 population of the county has decreased since 1900, and is steadily de- 

 creasing. For the six districts showing an increase, 66% of the increase 

 was of suburban, village or town population; for the seven districts 

 showing a decrease, 91% of the decrease was of rural population. The 

 increase for the whole county was 1,638; the increase in suburban, 

 village and town population was 2,402; the decrease in rural population 

 was 764. Seven districts, Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 10, show a decrease in 

 rural population. The net loss in rural population is thus about 4%. 

 Excluding districts 7 and 13 (in which approximately two-thirds of the 

 area is not farmed) there are about 460 square miles of open country 

 in the county, with a population density of about 46 to the square mile. 

 Here the total population has slightly decreased, though the population 

 of the towns and villages has increased. (See Table No. 11, Appendix, 

 page TV). 



Obviously there is a movement, marked though not of serious ])ro- 

 portions, out of the rural districts. This does not, however, necessarily 

 offer any very urgent problem, when it is remembered that the number 

 of farms over the same period has increased from 2,085 to 2,442. It is 

 evidently not the farmers who are making their exit, but either the class 

 from which have been drawn the laborers on the farms or in the country 

 stores, blacksmith shops, mills, etc., or the ''floating" population, colored 

 mostly, who in the past have been making their living, none knows how 

 but themselves, and who economically have not been a productive force 

 but rather a drag upon the community. 



Of the population 28.8% are colored. The figures for the county are: 



White 22,847 



Colored 9,235 



Other non- white 7 



Seventy-five percent., probably, of the colored population are found 

 either in little settlements and villages scattered through the county, or 

 in the colored sections of the larger towns. 



k The county as a whole has a relatively stable population; the suburban 

 population is of course rather a shifting element, but for the remainder of 

 the county, probably 90% of the farm owners are old settlers, i.e., have 

 been in the county 15 years or more. In many sections the proportion 

 is even higher. There is some tendency, to move from one location to 

 another within the county. This fact and the fact that a fourth of the 

 farming population are tenants would make the proportion of old resid- 



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