THE president's ADDRESS. 213 



shall not dwell on the social and economic causes which have 

 brought about this startling contrast. I will only safeguard 

 myself from misapprehension by saying that I find no reason in 

 the movement of our people to refrain from approving the 

 changes that have been made. Must we continue to feel pained 

 at the reduction of our home-dwelling numbers ? If we were 

 driven to the conclusion that this diminution of population 

 implied a dying-out of a race, a falling off in a contest with 

 continually worsening conditions of life, we might well be 

 shocked at the revelation. But I suppose it will be conceded by 

 all that the well being of those who live in the county has been 

 advanced during the last half century, that the standard of 

 existence has been raised, and that our countrymen have greater 

 comfort and a wider if not yet an ample margin of leisure 

 surrounding their toil. I do not feel always sure that the 

 standard of thinking has risen with the standard of material 

 living. But the doubt thus suggested may be one of over- 

 anxiety not having a real foundation. In the long run we may 

 hope better conditions of outward existence will be found 

 accompanied by better life. I put aside the thought that 

 Cornishmen in Cornwall are worse off than they used to be, and 

 the regret we may feel at their decline in numbers may turn into 

 something like triumph, if we find reason to believe that those 

 who are not found in the county have left it to improve their 

 condition elsewhere, and have gone forth to conquer the world. 



The population which in 1841 was 342,159 had increased in 

 1851 by 13,399, as against an increase of 40,853 in the previous 

 decennium. The reaction had already begun. It continued 

 between 1851 and 1861 when there was about the same increase, 

 namely, 13,832. But we have the best means of knowing that 

 this falling off of numbers within the county did not indicate a 

 falling off in the numbers of Cornishmen. Throughout the 

 decennium from 1851-1861 the number of births far exceeded 

 the number of deaths, and, had there not been an outward 

 movement of the population, would have shown much the same 

 growth as in the earlier part of the century. The figures we 

 have at hand do not indeed strictly apply to Cornwall as we 

 know it, the geographical county we recognise as our own. 

 They are the figures of what is called the registration county, 



