432 Of the Checks to Population Bk. ii. 



some of the conclusions founded on the births 

 alone. Next to an accurate enumeration, a cal- 

 culation from the excess of births above the deaths 

 is the most to be depended upon. Indeed when 

 the registers contain all the births and deaths, and 

 there are the means of setting out from a known 

 population, it is obviously the same as an actual 

 enumeration; and where a nearly correct allow- 

 ance can be made for the omissions in the regis- 

 ters, and for the deaths abroad, a much nearer 

 approximation to it may be obtained in this way 

 than from the proportion of births to the whole 

 population, which is known to be liable to such 

 frequent variations. 



The whole number of births returned in the 

 twenty years, from 1780 to 1800, is 5,014,899, 

 and of the burials 3,840,455. If we add one-6th 

 to the former, and one- 12th to the latter, the two 

 numbers will be 5,850,715, and 4,160,492 ; and 

 subtracting the latter from the former, the excess 

 of the births above the deaths will be 1,690,223. 

 Adding this excess to the population of 1780, as 

 calculated in Mr. Rickman's tables, from the 

 births, which is 7,953,000, the result will be 

 9,643,000, a number which, after making a pro- 

 per allowance for the deaths abroad, is very much 

 above the population of 1800, as before corrected, 

 and still more above the number which is given in 

 the table as the result of the enumeration. 



But if we proceed upon the safer ground just 

 suggested, and, taking the corrected population of 

 1800 as established, subtract from it the excess of 



