Effects of epidemics on registers

demic years. The proportion of births to the whole population must therefore have decidedly changed. Another interval of 20 years in the same table gives a similar result, both with regard to the births and the marriages. The extremes of the proportions of births to marriages are 34 to 10, and 42 to 10, and the mean about 38 to 10. The 3 years beginning with 1757 were, as in the other tables, very fatal years.

In the dukedom of Magdeburg1 during 64 years ending with 1756, the average proportion of births to deaths was 123 to 100; in the first 28 years of the period 142 to 100, and in the last 34 years only 112 to 100; during one period of 5 years it was as high as 170 to 100, and in two periods the deaths exceeded the births. Slight epidemics appear to be interspersed rather thickly throughout the table. In the two instances where three or four occur in successive years, and diminish the population, they are followed by an increase of marriages and births. The extremes of the proportions of births to marriages are 42 to 10, and 34 to 10, and the mean of the 64 years 39 to 10. On this table Sussmilch remarks, that

1 Sussmilch, vol. i. Tables, p. 103.

of births, deaths, and marriages.

though the average number of deaths shows an increased population of one third from 1715 or 1720, yet that the births and marriages would prove it to be stationary or even declining. In drawing this conclusion however, he adds the three epidemic years ending with 1759, during which both the marriages and births seem to have diminished.

In the principality of Halberstadt,' the average proportion of births to deaths for 68 years, ending with 1756, was 124 to 100; but in some periods of 5 years it was as high as 160 to 100, and in others as low as 110 to 100. The increase in the whole 68 years was considerable, and yet for 5 years ending with 1723, the average number of births was 2818, and for 4 years ending with 1750, 2628, from which it would appear that the population in 27 years had considerably diminished. A similar appearance occurs with regard to the marriages, during a period of 32 years. In the 5 years ending with 1718, they were 727; in the 5 years ending with 1750, 689. During both these periods the proportion of deaths would have shown a considerable increase. Epidemics seem

1 Sussmilch, vol. i. Tables, p. 108.

Effects of epidemics on registers

to have occurred frequently, and in almost all the instances in which they were such as for the deaths to exceed the births, they were immediately succeeded by a more than usual proportion of marriages, and in a few years by an increased proportion of births. The greatest number of marriages in the whole table occurs in the year 1751, after an epidemic in the year 1750, in which the deaths had exceeded the births above one third, and the four or five following years contain the largest proportion of births. The extremes of the proportions of births to marriages are 42 to 10, and 34 to 10, the mean of the 68 years 38 to 10.

The remaining tables contain similar results, but these will be sufficient to show the variations which are continually occurring in the proportions of the births and marriages as well as of the deaths, to the whole population.

It will be observed that the least variable of the proportions is that which the births and marriages bear to each other, and the obvious reason is, that this proportion nearly expresses the prolificness of marriages, which will not of course be subject to great changes. We can hardly indeed suppose that the prolificness of marriages should vary so much as the extremes which have been mentioned.

of births, deaths, and marriages.

Nor is it necessary that it should, as another cause will contribute to produce the same effect. The births which are contemporary with the marriages of any particular year belong principally to marriages which had taken place some years before, and therefore if for four or five years a large proportion of marriages were to take place, and then accidentally for one or two years a small proportion, the effect would be a large proportion of births to marriages in the registers during these one or two years; and on the contrary, if for four or five years few marriages comparatively were to take place, and then for one or two years a great number, the effect would be a small proportion of births to marriages in the registers. This was strikingly illustrated in the table for Prussia and Lithuania, and would be confirmed by an inspection of all the other tables collected by Sussmilch, in which it appears that the extreme proportions of births to marriages are generally more affected by the number of marriages than the number of births, and consequently arise more from the variations in the disposition or encouragement to matrimony, than from the variations in the prolificness of marriages.

The common epidemical years that are inter

Effects of epidemics on registers

spersed throughout these tables will not of course have the same effects on the marriages and births, as the great plague in the table for Prussia; but in proportion to their magnitude, their operation will in general be found to be similar. From the registers of many other countries, and particularly of towns, it appears that the visitations of the plague were frequent at the latter end of the 17th and the beginning of the 18th centuries.

In contemplating the plagues and sickly seasons which occur in these tables, after a period of rapid increase, it is impossible not to be impressed with the idea that the number of inhabitants had, in these instances, exceeded the food and the accommodations necessary to preserve them in health. The mass of the people would, upon this supposition, be obliged to live worse, and a greater number of them would be crowded together in one house; and these natural causes would evidently contribute to produce sickness, even though the country, absolutely considered, might not be crowded and populous. In a country, even thinly inhabited, if an increase of population take place before more food is raised, and more houses are built, the inhabitants must be distressed for room and subsistence. If in the Highlands of Scotland,