TABLE LVII.

SHEWING THat the DiffeRENCE IN THE PROPORTION OF THE SEXES

AT BIRTH, WHICH IS GOVERNED BY THE DIFFERENCE IN THE AGES OF THE PARENTS, RESPECTIVELY, IS ADJUSTED TO THE LAW OF MORTALITY.

(18) The results presented by the foregoing table are so strikingly confirmatory of the principle advanced, that a suspicion may perhaps be excited that they have been obtained by some kind of selection or management. The contrary is, however, the case: and the ultimate coincidence of facts apparently unconnected, and collected originally for purposes entirely different from the present, was not less surprising to the author than it will probably be to the reader. I was prepared, indeed, by the train of proofs previously adduced, to expect the information collected in the last table to afford additional and unequivocal evidence of the truth of the position advanced; but I by no means anticipated results of so exact and regular a character, especially from so limited a number of facts.

(19) But it may, perhaps, be said that the last

column but one in the preceding table does not express the law of mortality in this country, but rather the law of population, differing as the latter unquestionably does from the former, in consequence of the increase of population, as well as of emigrations, &c., and exhibiting, therefore, a greater apparent diminution in the consecutive ages, especially of the males, than that which is occasioned by mortality only. It is admitted; and I now, therefore, come to a last remark on this most curious subject.

(20) It has been already mentioned that the preceding table has been constructed on the results of first marriages only. Now it is a most singular fact, that in the after-marriages, on the part of the husband, though such, it is evident, must be contracted at a later age than first ones, and, generally speaking, when the disparity in years between the husband and wife is greater, still the female births, contrary to the case as it respects first connexions, are, under whatever circumstances as to the relative ages of the parents, on the average more numerous than the male, and vice versâ. In the registers so often adverted to, the number of the second and subsequent marriages of those peers whose ages at marriage, together with that of their peeresses, could be ascertained, is 54; the male births resulting from which were 117, the female 129. In mentioning so curious a fact I do not presume to pronounce it to be fully established as a general law of nature, though I have adverted to other documentary proofs besides those furnished by the peerage, and have invariably found an excess of female children attending those marriages in which the father had been previously married. In extending my examination of the peerage registers beyond those instances where the age of both the

parents could be ascertained, and where that of the father was alone given, I obtained 107 instances, and found that these produced 460 children, 204 of whom were male, and 256 female. It may, perhaps, be interesting to the reader to give the exact results, which will shew the certainty of the fact, and that it is not affected by the age of the parent.

TABLE LVIII.

SHEWING, FROM THE REGISTERS OF THE PEERAGE, THAT THE MARRIAGES OF WIDOWERS ARE ATTENDED BY AN EXCESS OF FEMALE CHILDREN.

(21) It will not be denied, I think, but that this provision of Nature attending second marriages would compensate for the difference between the law of mortality and that of population, as noticed in a

preceding section, and fully justify the conclusion that the difference in the proportion of the sexes at birth is so regulated as to preserve that equipoise at the nubile period essential to the purposes of Nature. Adverting, however, to the proportion of such marriages, as previously computed, the physical fact last noticed may indeed seem to render the calculation unnecessarily complex ; but, on due consideration, I think it will appear otherwise; like many other of the operations of the Deity, accomplishing at once a variety of purposes, all clearly resolvable into his essential attributes of wisdom and benevolence. But I will not venture to explain the moral necessity for what I conceive may be a most singular rule of Nature, leaving it rather to the reader's perception.

(22) Hitherto we have been considering those laws of Nature, the obvious design of which is to secure the increase of the species: it only remains that we should notice one or two of an opposite, and equally important tendency; namely, those which are calculated to prevent their undue multiplication.

(23) It has been already observed that marriage is the sole conservator of the human race. Now this institution, it is quite obvious, limits, in effect, the period of male fruitfulness by that of the female; and the latter, it is unnecessary to remark, is shorter in reference to the whole term of existence, than, probably, in any other animated being in creation. Reckoning from the period of birth to that of mature age, the possible extent of that term barely comprises half the duration of life; its actual continuance, calculated on the average, falls short, probably, of a fifth of it; while another provision of Nature, which usually prevents the pregnancy of the female while she is performing that important duty which the vast majority of

mothers cannot delegate to others,-the feeding of her infant offspring at the bosom,-has the effect of still further diminishing the actually prolific season of life. Thus, then, at the very outset of the argument, human increase seems so limited as to guard against a too rapid augmentation of the numbers of mankind, and by means which, when duly considered, rise into so many direct manifestations of the tender regard of the First Great Cause for his offspring; securing the health of the mother by fixing the term of prolificness, limited as we have remarked it to be, at the most vigorous age; and, thus keeping the generations so apart, as to leave a sufficient space in which to exercise those charities, whether parental or filial, on which the health, the happiness, and the very existence of the human race depend.

(24) But to return. Even this period of female prolificness, physically limited and defined as it is, does not, any more than all the other processes of reproduction, conform to an inflexible law, operating equally under all circumstances, however different from each other. On the contrary, it manifests an adaptation to the state and situation of human beings, the more striking, because this provision of Nature, in reference to population, is, at all events, beyond the reach of human interference or control.

(25) First, then, it is too notorious a fact to need any proofs being adduced to establish it, that the period of female prolificness commences much earlier in some countries than in others; in the warmer climates, for instance. Now, if in the cases where that period is thus antedated, it should still be lengthened to as advanced an age as in those where it takes place later, it is obvious that, with an equal degree of annual fecundity, the increase in the population would be