6 THE COMMON SENSE OF THE MILK QUESTION 



How, then, shall we account for the comparative 

 success of the French descendants in view of the no- 

 table failure of their blood relations in France ? May- 

 it not be that the racial distinction suggested by the 

 Canadian figures is an accident, of little or no influence, 

 and that the real reason for the great difference in the 

 birth-rate hes in the differences of social conditions 

 and intellectual development ? There is more poverty 

 and much more illiteracy among the French Canadians 

 than among the people of British origin, and these 

 are conditions which favor a high birth-rate. If this 

 be the real reason for the difference in fertility, Can- 

 ada's experience conforms to a universal fact of tre- 

 mendous importance, namely, that sterility almost 

 invariably accompanies intellectual and material 

 advance on the part of nations. 



In England the decline in the birth-rate is prin- 

 cipally due to the growing infertility of the richer, 

 and not the poorer, classes ; * in this country, likewise, 

 the decline is chiefly among the better-favored classes, 

 people of native American stock." There is no failure 

 among the poor and often ignorant immigrants who 

 crowd our cities, nor among the negroes. In South 

 Africa, again, it is the intelligent, progressive, educated 

 British who are infertile," just as it is the people of 

 British origin, alert, educated, prosperous, and pro- 

 gressive, who fail to maintain a healthy rate of increase 

 in the Australian states, despite all the advantages 



