4 THE CENSUS OF 1861. 



manifestly incorrect, because the returns, from one end of the country 

 to the other, shewed a larger number living, than were said to have 

 been born. The number living under one at the end of the year ia 

 evidently that of the survivors of those born during the year, and if 

 the deaths under one had occurred with equal frequency in each 

 month of the ages of the children, we should have to add on the 

 average, one half of the number of deaths to the number living, to 

 make up the births ; but as a greater number die in the earlier months 

 we should have to add rather more. Taking the New York Census 

 as a guide, where the numbers dying for the first year are given from 

 three months to three months, we should add nearly two-thirds of the 

 deaths under one year. The births in Canada in 1851 would, upon 

 this principle, be about 80,200 instead of 69,420, as given in the 

 Census. 



In 1861, in order to avoid this evident anomaly, I suppose, the 

 column of births, as returned by the enumerators, and which was 

 clearly very imperfect, was omitted altogether ; but by some singular 

 confusion of ideas, the number living under one was headed "births." 

 I have examined some of the enumerators' schedules, and this appears 

 to have been the course adopted in the Census office ; but there is no 

 one now left in the department who was engaged in the work, and I 

 have not been able to ascertain the fact precisely ; it is certain, how- 

 ever, that the column headed births is added up in the total popula- 

 tion, as if it had been the number living under one. Assuming this 

 to be the case, and proceeding as before, the corrected births in Lower 

 Canada would be 43,264 instead of 40,788, and increasing those in 

 Upper Canada in the same proportion, they would be 56,406 instead 

 of 53,178, showing the percentage on the population respectively of 

 3.892 and 4.031. 



The manifest imperfection of the returns, as they stand, will become 

 evident from the following table, shewing the rates of births and 

 deaths to the whole population from the returns of other countries : 



