138 



THE TREND OF THE RACE 



In the classes graduating from Vassar College between i860 

 and 1892, 53 per cent had married, producing 1.91 children in 

 each family, or an average of one per graduate. The average 

 number of children per graduate up to the year 1900 was .8 of a 

 child. The average for Wellesley graduates between 1875 and 

 1899 was .83 of a child. 



The birth rates of four colleges are summarized in the fol- 

 lowing table compiled by Miss Nearing: 



The Fecundity of Graduates of Colleges for Women 



College 



Vassar 



Bryn Mawr. . 

 Wellesley. . . 

 Mt. Holyoke 



No. of Children per 100 Married Graduates 



iSyo-yg 



207.8 



i88o-8g 



167.3 

 166. 1 



i8go-gg 



147- 



171-5 

 no. I 



182.3 



igoo-og 



68.8 

 77-4 



91.2 



Of graduates before 1901 Smith College had 59.4, Vassar, 83.9, 

 Bryn Mawr, 82.3 and Mt. Holyoke, 73.0 children per hundred 

 graduates. 



Women graduates were found to marry, on the average, two 

 years later than the women who do not attend college. Notwith- 

 standing this fact, the fecundity of graduates is not markedly 

 lower than that of non-collegiate women of American birth 

 belonging to the general class from which graduates are 

 recruited. 



Professor Cattell has investigated the size of the families of 440 

 American men of science, choosing only those cases in which 

 the ages of the parents indicated that the family was completed. 

 The data collected show a remarkable low birth rate. It is true 

 that the death rate among the American men of science is unu- 

 sually small, being "seventy-five per thousand to the age of five 

 years and about one hundred and twenty to the age of marriage." 

 "The marriage rate for scientific men," says Cattell, "is high, 895 



