316 DR MATTHEWS DUNCAN ON SOME 



more children in proportion to their number, than the married women of England, 

 it would have been extremely interesting to have ascertained whether that 

 depended on more of the Scottish married women being fruitful." 



On this point I may here interpolate the observation, that, in my opinion, it 

 is highly improbable that there is any essential difference in the fecundity of 

 women in England and in Scotland. The researches now published make it 

 necessary, with a view to settling the question raised by Dr Stark, to look into 

 the comparative ages at marriage of the women in England and Scotland ; a 

 difference in that respect alone may prove sufficient to afford the solution of the 

 whole matter. And like remarks are applicable to the supposed great fertility of 

 Irish women. 



" As it may," continues Dr Stark, " however, give a distant approximation, 

 it may be stated, that taking two of the largest registration districts of Glasgow, 

 it was found, that of 14,523 married persons living together, 11,718 had children 

 living with them ; while 2805 had no children with them. This would yield the 

 proportion of 80-686 per cent, with children, and 19*314 per cent, without 

 children ; or, without the decimals, that in every 100 married couples, 81 had 

 children, while 19 had none. These numbers may be safely taken as the propor- 

 tion in the town populations, seeing that for each district the proportions came 

 out within a very small decimal fraction of one another; also from the circum- 

 stance, that in other tables which have been published in the Registrar-General's 

 second detailed Annual Report, relative to the proportions of children born by 

 mothers at different ages in Edinburgh and in Glasgow, the results of the one 

 town almost exactly corresponded with those of the other.'" 



Chapter II. — Sterility of Wives. 



The wives who do not increase the population, may be called sterile. But a 

 wife who has one or several abortions, or who bears one or several dead children, 

 or to whom both of these events happen, adds not a unit to the population ; yet 

 such a wife cannot be said to be absolutely sterile. In order to discover the 

 amount of sterility of married women, I proceed on the following plan. I take 

 the registers of Edinburgh and Glasgow for 1855, and find what is the number of 

 first children produced in that year. With this I compare the number of mar- 

 riages in that year. It is evident that the first children only should be counted, 

 for they indicate all the wives who are not sterile. If one living child is born to 

 a marriage, that marriage is not sterile. Further, it is evident that, although 

 the first births in 1855 will not all pertain to the women married in that year, it 

 may be assumed that, if the marriages be nearly the same in number for a few 

 contiguous years, the first births in one year will give the fertility very accurately 



