90 



SCIB^CU. 



[Vol. IX., No. 208 



but further investigation showed it to have become 

 changed into that peculiar substance known as 

 adipocere. Adipocere (adeps, ' fat,' and cera, 

 ' wax ') has somewhat the appearance and con- 

 sistence of cheese, and is a compound of oleic and 

 margaric acids with an alkali. It has usually 

 been formed in bodies that are buried in the earth, 

 and moisture has been supposed to be essential in 

 its formation. In the instance just referred to, the 

 body was in a dry vault. There seems to be no fixed 

 time necessary for this change to take place. One 

 instance is reported of an infant which had been 

 but three months in a cesspool, in which adipocere 

 had formed, while in other cases years seem to 

 have been necessary. 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. 



*t* Correspondents are requested to be as brief as possible. The 

 writer's na.iie is in all cases required as proof of good faith. 



National prosperity. 



In Mr. Atkinson's paper in the January Century 

 there are some uses made of statistics which seem to 

 a layman at least a little queer. 



He gives iis a table of enormous percentages to 

 show how greatly the United States have increased in 

 productiveness and wealth. 



Since 1865 we are told the yield of hay has in- 

 creased 106 per cent; of cotton, 194 per cent; of 

 grain, i.e., wheat, corn, oats, barley, rye, and buck- 

 wheat, 256 per cent ; railway mileage, 280 per cent ; 

 insurance against fire, 310 per cent ; output of pig- 

 iron, 386 per cent ; and population, 69 per cent. 

 The ratios are seemingly wonderful, but in some 

 cases very deceptive, most so in cotton. In 1865 the 

 number of bales was 2,228,951. and in 1885, 6,550,215, 

 a gain in twenty years of 194 per cent. Will it be 

 surprising to be told that the gain is not 194 per 

 ceiit, but only 22 per cent ? Here it is. 



In 1860 the number of bales recorded was 5,387,- 

 052, on which the gain in 1885 is but 22 per cent. 

 Why does the statistician take the phenomenally low 

 year of 1865, which was behind 1850 even? We have 

 merely regained the position of 1860, and advanced 

 22 per cent. 



And as to increase, the gain from 1850 to 1860 with 

 slave-labor was 118 per cent, in ten years, — an average 

 of lly^o Psr cent per year, which, compared with the 

 free-labor rate, 9^^ per cent per year, shows that the 

 increased production under free labor is somewhat of 

 a myth. At the slave-labor rate of increase, the twenty 

 years from 1865 to 1885 would have culminated in a 

 erop of 7,489,275 bales. In what, pray, does the 

 superiority of free labor make itself manifest ? 



Population, we are told, has increased 69 per cent 

 since 1865 ; from 1860 to 1870 the increase was 23 per 

 cent, 2j% per cent per year; from 1870 to 1880 it was 

 30 per cent, or 3 per cent per year; from 1880 to 

 1885 we find a gain of 14 per cent, or 2| per cent per 

 year. 



Now, from 1850 to 1860 the increase was 36 per cent, 

 or 3/^ per cent per year, a higher rate than that of any 

 decade since then. Had we increased from 1865 to 

 1885 at the rate of the decade before the war, we 

 should now number over 61,000,000 instead of 56,- 

 975,000. 



256 per cent, we are told, has our grain-crop in- 

 creased from 1865 to 1885. The grain-crop of 1865 

 was over 100,000,000 bushels less than that of 1860. 

 By decades we find that the increase between the 

 years 1860 and 1870 was 32 per cent ; 1870 to 1880, 

 50 per cent; and from 1880 to 1885, 23 per cent, or 

 3^^ per cent, 5 per cent, and i^jf per cent per year 

 respectively. The gain from 1850 to 1860 was 43 per 

 cent, or 4y'^ per cent per year ; and if we calculate 

 from 1860 to 1885 at the same rate. 43 per cent per 

 decade, we find due us a crop of 3,060,428,664 bushels 

 as against 3,014,063,984 ; and the marvellous gain of 

 256 per cent over 1865 appears less than was to be 

 expected from what we were doing before the war. 

 The hay-croj) of 1882 would have amounted to about 

 600,000 tons more, if it had been the result of an in- 

 crease as from 1850 to 1860. Since 1882 the hay- 

 crop jumped from 38,000,000 tons to 48,000,000 in 

 two years, a truly phenomenal increase. 



Railway mileage has increased 280 per cent since 

 1865 ; but, if we are to talk of per cents, let this gain 

 of twenty years be compared with 217 per cent, ten 

 years' gain from 1850 to 1860. In miles the gain has 

 been from 1850 to 1860, 21,500 ; 1860 to 1870, 22,400; 

 1870 to 1880, 40,700 ; 1880 to 1885, 32,000. 



It would be of interest to see if the net income has 

 increased pro rata. 



For progress in wealth we are shown a table of 

 fire-insurance risks, and an increase therein of 310 

 per cent since 1865. Why not take the assessed 

 vahie of all real and personal property? This was, 

 in 1850, $7,000,000,000; in 1860, $13,000,000,000; 

 and in 1880, $17,000,000,000. Of course, there is an 

 increase since 1865, but in per cent it does not com- 

 pare with that from 1850 to 1860. 



As to pig-iron and its 386 per cent increase since 

 1865, it will take a pretty stiff-necked protectionist 

 to understand how, under the conditions of its pro- 

 duction, it stands for 386 per cent increase of wealth 

 to the people v/ho have to use it and pay for it. 



And now, if, to make the showing a little more 

 comprehensive, we look at the number of acres of 

 improved land, we find that it increased 44 per cent 

 from 1850 to 1860, 16 per cent from 1860 to 1870, 

 and fifty per cent from 1870 to 1880, — an average of 

 3| per cent per year, — very close to the increase in 

 population. The value of agricultural implements in- 

 creases, from 1850 to 1860, 62 per cent ; 1860 to 1870, 

 37 per cent ; 1870 to 1880, 2 per cent ; annual aver- 

 age, 4 per cent. 



Eice production has fallen from 215,000,000 

 pounds in 1850 to 110,000,000 in 1880. Tobacco, 

 which gave an increase of 117 per cent from 1850 to 

 1860, and in 1860 had 434,000,000 pounds, has but 

 472,000,000 in 1880. 



Irish potatoes increase 69 per cent, 29 per cent, 

 18 per cent, respectively for the three decades, or the 

 average of d^jj per cent per year. 



Sweet-potatoes fall from 38,000,000 bushels in 

 1850 to 33,000,000 in 1880. Cheese, also, which was 

 at 105,000,000 pounds in 1850, is in 1880 only 27,- 

 000,000 pounds. Butter rises 46 per cent, 12 per 

 cent, and 21 per cent through the three decades, an 

 average of 2.6 per cent per year. Live-stock gains 

 100 per cent from 1850 to 1860, 40 per cent from 1860 

 to 1870, and falls off 6 per cent between 1870 and 

 1880, an average rate of increase of 4f per cent. 



And while our public debt has been decreased by 

 $876,970,833 between 1865 and 1880, we find on 

 hand in 1880 a state, county, and town debt of 



