202 



humboldt's cuba. 



political economy ; what they do prove is, that we 

 should not employ numerical elements, without 

 having first examined them, and ascertained the 

 extent of their errors. One is tempted to compare 

 the different degrees of probability presented by 

 statistical tables in the Ottoman Empire, in Spanish 

 and Portuguese America, in France or Prussia, by 

 geographical positions based on the eclipses of the 

 moon, on its distance from the sun, or on occultations 

 of the stars. 



In order to adapt a census made twenty years 

 since, to any other given time, we must ascertain the 

 rate of increase ; but this can be ascertained only 

 from the enumerations of 1791, 1810, and 1817, 

 taken in the eastern part of the island, which is the 

 least populous portion. When comparisons rest 

 upon too small masses, existing under the influence 

 of particular circumstances (as in seaports or in the 

 sugar planting districts), they cannot give the nume- 

 rical results proper to be used as a basis for the 

 entire country. 



It is generally supposed that the whites increase 

 more rapidly in the villages and haciendas than in 

 the towns ; that the free colored, who prefer a 

 make-shift residence in the towns to the labors 

 of agriculture, multiply with greater rapidity than 

 all the other classes; and that the slaves, among 



