The fertile islands of the Southern seas-Samoa, Fiji, the New Hebrides, New Ireland, New Guinea, and others-are all capable of producing unlimitedly maize, sugar, coffee, spices, tea, and nearly all the tropical fruits. These islands, too, in time will be peopled by the Anglo-Saxon race, and will no doubt become tributary to the new Commonwealth of Australia. Let it also be borne in mind that the six present colonies of Australia include an area equal to that of the United States and capable of sustaining as large a population. Notwithstanding the distance of 1,200 miles that separates New Zealand from the continent of Australia, it was represented at the recent Conference and took part in the proceedings, and it is to be hoped that it will become a part of the new Commonwealth. The New Zealand climate resembles that of Great Britain, but is more equable, the extremes of daily temperature varying throughout the year by an average of only 20°, while London is 4° colder than the South Island and 7° colder than the North Island. The mean temperature of the different seasons for the whole colony is in spring 55°, in summer 63°, in autumn 57°, and in winter 48°. Taking all things into consideration, there is no more desirable climate than that of New Zealand, and its inhabitants must always exercise a great, if not a controlling, influence in the future of the Southern Pacific countries.

Among the statesmen who represented the several colonies at the birth of the new Commonwealth, and whose signatures to the constitution will ever be a part of the Nation's history, are many possessing great ability. Such men as Hon. James Service, Sir Samuel Griffith, Sir Henry Parkes, Sir Thomas McIlwraith, J. M. Macrossan, and Messrs. Gillies, McMillan, Abbott, Forrest, Dibbs, and Moorehead are citizens of whom any country would be proud. Doubtless their statesmanship and patriotism has produced a Constitution that will require few amendments now or hereafter.

RODERICK W. CAMERON.

THE UNITED STATES CENSUS.

BEFORE proceeding to discuss the results of the eleventh census, it may be instructive and not without interest to consider what a census of the United States is, how it is taken, how it differs from a census of the European type, and what are its special liabilities to error. Historically, the census of the United States occupies a very proud position. We were the first nation of the world to institute a regular periodical enumeration of the people. Our first census was taken in 1790. The earliest census in England was that of 1801; in Ireland, that of 1811. The censuses of continental Europe came later; but they all came at last, so that to-day there is no civilized country which does not carry on this work at regular intervals.

The priority of this country in a matter of such great consequence has been made the subject of a very high eulogium by a French statistician of eminence, who declares that the United States present a phenomenon without parallel in history-" that of a people who instituted the statistics of their country on the very day when they founded their government, and who regulated by the same instrument the census of their inhabitants, their civil and political rights, and the destinies of their nation." Candor compels us to say that the praise of M. Moreau de Jonnès is not wholly merited. It was not an enlightened appreciation of the value of statistics which induced the statesmen of 1787 to incorporate in the national Constitution the provision requiring a decennial enumeration. The main, if not the sole, reason which actuated them was found in the character of the government which they proposed to set up. For by the Constitution of 1787 the States, while possessing equal powers in the Senate, were to have weight in the House of Representatives and in the Electoral College according to their respective numbers. For carrying out such a system of government a regular periodical enumeration was an absolute necessity. This, and not any felt need of accurate

statistics, led to the provision in question. Not philosophical, but purely political, considerations gave the United States priority among the nations in the institution of the modern census.

At first the census was confined strictly to its original object -that of ascertaining the number of the people for the purposes of representation or of direct taxation. Even the names of all the inhabitants were not taken; only the names of householders, with the numbers of their respective families, divided into classes according to age, sex, and color. Soon, however, the census began to grow more extensive and complicated in two different ways: first, through the multiplication of inquiries relating to individuals, upon the family schedule, and, secondly, through the introduction of altogether new subjects of investigation, such as agriculture, the fisheries, mining, and manufactures. The first of these ways of enlarging the work of the census did not involve a departure from its primary object. The earliest census had been too simple fully and fairly to secure that object. To make sure that an enumeration is correct, to be able to verify it in case of complaint or doubt, to eliminate all duplications, to supply all omissions, not a few particulars are necessary regarding each individual counted. For this purpose there are needed, at least, the name, age, sex, race, and occupation. The place of birth-whether abroad or at home, and in what foreign country or what State of the Union-may also become a decisive means of identification in case of dispute. Moreover, in order that the census may determine the natural militia of the country, it is important to have not only the number of males between eighteen and forty-five years of age, but also all ascertainable facts regarding mental sanity and physical soundness. This last consideration fully justifies the incorporation, in the family schedule, of the inquiries regarding blindness, deafness and muteness, idiocy, insanity, and permanent disabilities, which, in greater or less fullness, have long been a part of the census.

Certain other inquiries, long ago introduced into the family schedule, have not so clear a justification, according to the strict meaning and primary purpose of a census; yet they constitute no abuse of this agency, either theoretically or practically. For example, that the state may know what provision should be

made for public education, the inquiry as to illiteracy becomes of great importance. But whether we have regard to the interest and the attention of the enumerator, which should be concentrated on comparatively few subjects, or to the patience of the public, we must say that a highly conservative spirit should control the number and the nature of the census interrogatories. The commendable zeal and scientific ambition of the officers in charge may easily carry them over the line which marks the maximum value of a popular enumeration. The quality of the information to be obtained is generally of more importance than its quantity. A comparatively few interrogatories, searchingly put, carefully answered, and accurately recorded, will be worth more than a wider canvass conducted with any failure of interest and attention on the part of the enumerator, or with increasing impatience and irritation on the. part of the public.

A second way in which the census has been enlarged since 1790 is through the institution of inquiries not in any sense appropriate to the family schedule, especially such as relate to industry and to certain social interests. This movement toward the addition of new schedules to the census began as early as 1810, when an awakening regard for manufactures led to an attempted enumeration of the nascent industries of the country, which was only in a faint degree successful. At three subsequent censuses prior to 1850 more or less work of the same nature was undertaken, seldom with profit. The agencies established were ill adapted to the purpose; statistical science was hardly yet born; the public interest in the results was feeble; the enumerators were inadequately instructed for their work.

In 1850 a new law was enacted for the seventh census, and a truly vast addition was made to the scope of the inquiry. The agencies established by this act constituted an improvement in some respects upon those previously existing; but they were still far from adequate to the gigantic task undertaken. In spite of all deficiencies, however, the United States census of 1850, and those of 1860 and 1870, which were taken under the same law, assumed monumental proportions, which became the admiration of all foreign statisticians. A close and critical examination of the results would doubtless have qualified this feeling in

no inconsiderable degree; yet, when all was known, for good or for ill, it remained true that the statistics collected under the act of 1850 were, in amount and quality, highly honorable to a people so young and necessarily so crude, occupying so vast a territory, and enjoying so little of scientific and political education. In preparation for the tenth census, in 1880, a new law was enacted. Again there took place a large extension of the scope of inquiry; but this time agencies as nearly adequate to the work as the wisdom of those in charge could devise were freely provided. That law was substantially re-enacted for the census of 1890, and determines the present census system.

I have said that the necessary agencies for taking this great decennial inventory, which now embraces population, wealth, taxation, industry in all its forms, transportation, education, physical and mental infirmity, pauperism, and crime, have been freely provided by Congress. The only limit now to the usefulness of this great work is found in the limited ability of any one man to grasp so many subjects at once; to make fitting preparations for a canvass of a nation of such territory and population. as ours; to build in a few months, from the ground upward, the entire machinery of enumeration; to raise, organize, officer, equip, and instruct an army of fifty or sixty thousand men for this service; to set them at work on the first of June, all over the country, from Maine westward to Oregon and southward to Florida and Texas; and thereafter to keep them at work, vigorously, zealously, unfailingly, to the full completion of this mighty task. The limits spoken of are not theoretical merely. It is a question if those limits--whether as to brain power or as to will power-have not already been reached and overpassed. The labor of organizing and energizing a census is such as no man can conceive who has not himself undertaken it, or, at least, stood close by and watched the machine in full operation. Aside from the question of the superintendent's intellectual ability to comprehend his work in all its parts, and to make provision for every foreseen occasion and for every sudden exigency of the enumeration, the strain upon the nerve and the vital force of whomsoever is in charge of the census is something appalling. My successor in the tenth census, Col. Charles W. Seaton, was