240 HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY OF NEWFOUNDLAND 



exports by £3,047,000, and the State debt rose from 

 £240,000 to £1,900,000. After 1894 the State debt rose from 

 £1,900,000 to £4,600,000, in spite of which between 1894 

 and 1908 exports exceeded imports by more than two 

 million pounds, that is to say by the average annual imports 

 of a few years previously. The explanation of this anomaly 

 is — first, that the increase of the State debt represented to 

 a large extent a mere transfer of past debt from capitalists 

 to the State; secondly, that the debt so transferred was 

 reproductive, and paid interest and repaid part of its prin- 

 cipal ; thirdly, that things had returned to normal. 



Some of these figures as to the State debt are given in the 

 following Table, which relates mainly to population. 



Immigra- There has been very little immigration into Newfoundland 



tion plays 



little part, during this period. The import of West of England fisher- 

 men for two summers and a winter seems to have continued 

 until the Thirties, and in 1848 Sir J. Gaspard Le Marchant 

 wrote that ' vast bodies of emigrants ' had come from Ireland 

 bringing typhus. This year was a record year for immigra- 

 tion from the United Kingdom, the grand (or little) total 

 being 993, of whom 757 were Irish. During thirty-four years 

 (1842-75) Irish immigrants numbered 4,940, English and 

 Scotch 2,702, making a puny total of 7,642 immigrants. 

 The population quadrupled itself in fifty years (1822 et seq.) 

 by means of natural increase. As for revenue, in 1822 the 

 cost to England of the garrison of St. John's exceeded the 

 cost to Newfoundland of its whole government, and the 

 government was poor until it became free. Under autocracy 

 (1822) revenue was 4^". dd., under Council ioj., under 

 representative government 12^"., and under responsible govern- 

 ment between £1 and £2 a head. Democratic governments 

 were far richer than those that were less democratic. Figures 

 as to expenditure and as to State debts in early times are 

 omitted, because they are of no importance. 



