PROPORTION OF THE SEXES. 237 



dom, I will here give such materials as I have been able to collect, 

 although they are extremely imperfect. They consist in only a 

 few instances of actual enumeration, and the numbers are not 

 very large. As the proportions are known with certainty only in 

 mankind, I will first give them as a standard of comparison. 



Man. — In England during ten years (from 1857 to 1866) the 

 average number of children born alive yearly was 707,120, in 

 the proportion of 104.5 males to 100 females. But in 1857 the 

 male births throughout England were as 105.2 and in 1865 as 

 104.0 to 100. Looking to separate districts, in Buckinghamshire 

 (where about 5000 children are annually born) the mean propor- 

 tion of male to female births, during the whole period of the above 

 ten years was as 102.8 to 100; whilst in N. Wales (where the 

 average annual births are 12,873) it was as high as 106.2 to 100. 

 Taking a still smaller district, viz., Rutlandshire (where the 

 annual births average only 739), in 1864 the male births were as 

 114.6, and in 1862 as only 97.0 to 100; but even in this small dis- 

 trict the average of the 7385 births during the whole ten years, 

 was as 104.5 to 100; that is in the same ratio as throughout Eng- 

 land.*' The proportions are sometimes slightly disturbed by un- 

 known causes; thus Prof. Faye states "that in some districts of 

 "Norway there has been during a decennial period a steady de- 

 "floiency of boys, whilst in others the opposite condition has 

 "existed." In France during forty-four years the male to the 

 female births have been as 106.2 to 100; but during this period 

 it has occurred five times in one department, and six times i» 

 another, that the female births have exceeded the males. In 

 Russia the average proportion is as high as 108.9, and in Phila- 

 delphia in the United States as 110.5 to 100.® The average for 

 Europe, deduced by Bickes from about seventy million births, 

 is 106 males to 100 females. On the other hand, with white chil- 

 dren born at the Cape of Good Hope, the proportion of males is so 

 low as to fluctuate during successive years between 90 and 99 

 males for every 100 females. It is a singular fact that with Jews 

 the proportion of male births is decidedly larger than with Chris- 

 tians: thus in Prussia the proportion is as 113, in Breslau as 

 114, and in Livonia as 120 to 100; the Christian births in these 



" 'Twenty-ninth Annual Report of the Registrar-General for 18GG.' 

 In this report (p. xii.) a special decennial table is given. 



« For Norway and Russia, see abstract of Prof. Faye's researches, 

 in 'British and Foreign Medico-Chirurg. Review,' April, 1867, pp. 343, 

 245. For France, the 'Annuaire pour I'An 1867,' p. 213. For Philadel- 

 phia, Dr. Stockton-Hough, 'Social Science Assoc' 1874. For the Cape 

 of Good Hope, Quetelet as quoted by Dr. H. H. Zouteveen, in the 

 Dutch Translation of this work (vol. i. p. 417), where much informa- 

 tion is given on the proportion of the sexes. 



