the highest
birth-rate of all the Australasian colonies; it is without doubt the
most advanced of all in social and legislative matters; a variety of
social reforms, which other countries are struggling for, are, in New
Zealand, firmly established. Its prosperity is shown by the fact that it
has the lowest death-rate of any country in the world, only 10.2 per
thousand, as against 24 in Austria and 22 in France; it cannot even be
said that the marriage-rate is very low, for it is scarcely lower than
that of Austria, where the birth-rate is high. Yet the birth-rate in New
Zealand fell as the social prosperity of the country rose, reaching its
lowest point in 1899.

We thus find that from the three great Anglo-Saxon centres of the
world--north, west, and south--the same story comes. We need not
consider the case of South Africa, for it is well recognized that there
the English constitute a comparatively infertile fringe, mostly confined
to the towns, while the earlier Dutch element is far more prolific and
firmly rooted in the soil. The position of the Dutch there is much the
same as that of the French in Canada.

Thus we find that among highly civilized races generally, and not least
among the English-speaking peoples who were once regarded as peculiarly
prolific, a great diminution of reproductive activity has taken place
during the past forty years, and is in some countries still taking
place. But before we proceed to consider its significance it may be well
to look a little more closely at our facts.

We have seen that the "crude" birth-rate is not an altogether reliable
index of the reproductive energy of a nation. Various circumstances may
cause an excess or a defect of persons of reproductive age in a
community, and unless we allow for these variations, we cannot estimate
whether that community is exercising its reproductive powers in a fairly
normal manner. But there is another and still more important
consideration always to be borne in mind before we can attach any
far-reaching significance even to the corrected birth-rate. We have,
that is, to bear in mind that a high or a low birth-rate has no meaning,
so far as the growth of a nation is concerned, unless it is considered
in relation to the death-rate. The natural increase of a nation is not
the result of its birth-rate, but of its birth-rate minus its
death-rate. A low birth-rate with a low death-rate (as in Australasia)
produces a far greater natural incr