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Show 388 ACCLTMA'I'ION; OR, TTIE INI; LUJ~NCE OF may not havo its w ight, viz., the mixture of ?'aces and the law of l1yb1·idity. That tho mulattoes have at ud ncy towards extermination, is believed by many; but whether tho white and bla k races havo been mingl d in a ll'l' atcr proportion in tho British W st l ndics than in th Unit d tatcs, I have no means now of dot rmining. The actual ratio of mortality in the slave-population of the United Rt:atcs, I do not think can be arrived at,• with certainty, from any F'tu.tistics yet published. The census of tho United 'tatos, published by tho Govcmm nt, is I crfi ctly r liable in r spoot to tho actual 11umbor of negroes at each decennial p riocl, and the rate of incrcaRc in this population; but, I am satisG cl that tl1c ratio of mortality, taken from the same volume, should bo r ccivcd with ()'rcat caution, l>ccauso I have rca~wn to believe that the planters, from negligence, arc greatly wantinO' in accuracy on this point. 1'ho average mortality, fol' tho whole slave-population, is put down in tho census at one in sixty. This sounds as tho11gh it wcro b low th mark; but, wh n we reflect on the l'apid increase of this population, it may not ~>c so. We have positiv data for tho mol'tality of th frco negroes 1n N orthcrn tatcs, wb r th climate, as well as social condition, is 1mfavorablo to this claRs; and the ratio is from ono death in twenty, to one in thirty annually, of tho ntir number. In Bostou, the most northern point, th mortality is l1io·hcst · and rather less in Now York and Philacl lphia. I can p~o . ur~ no statistics from Canada, whore th blacks must snflcr te1Tihly from that climate. "The bl11cks imported from Afl'icn., ovorywhoro beyond the limits of the Sln.ve Sto.tes of North Amoricn., lend to extinction. 'l'he Libc1·ir1n experiment, tho most fnvorn.blo ever m&.de, is no oxception to thiH genoml tendency. Accot·ding to the Report of tho Colonizali? n ~ociety, for thirty-two years, ending in 1852, the number of colored persona sent to l.'obor111 amounted ~o 75_1>2-of which number only 6000 or 7000 rom11inctl. Tho slnvo-hol1ling 8tn.tes sent out n.s unmogmnts 671J2-the most of whom were. emancip11tod slaves: the nonRluve- holuing St::ttes sent out 457 person~. "The black moo is doomed to extinction in the West Indios, ns well ns in the Northern Stn.tos of this ro!Jublic, if tho p11st bo n. true index of the futnro, 11nloss tho dotel'iomtion nnd wn.ste o_f life shn.ll be eoutinually supplied by import11tionij frorn Africn, or by fngitivo lirld mnnumtttod sltwes from Southern Strttos. "M. HuMU?f.DT (P~ra~nal Narrative) hn.~, with his t18Uf11 n.ccurncy, compiled, fJ·om official ~ottrceA, the v1tnl stntJst1cs of tloo Wc~t Jn,lin Aln.ves, to nen.r tho close of the first qut11'tor of tho present century (one decennium before tho o.bolilion o.ct of Pnrlinmont). rro oslitnotcs tho sl11vos in these isln.ndR n.l l ,000,000; free nogroo~ inclntling Hayti 11t 870 000 · :~tf11, l,O!lO,OOO. Mn. MACOltiWOn, in his hugo volumes on ;he prog•·ess of A;nerien, 'give~ 10 to~o.l o.ggrogttto of bln.cks ttt l,:lOO,OOO in the ye11r 1847-showiug a decline, in the preecdmg quarter of n. century, of 060,000. . ·~ ~- IIuMuot.DT sn.ys lhn.t 'the sl11vcs would hn.ve diminished, since 1820, with great l11p•dity, but for tho f1·n.udulent contitouf\tion of the Rlnve-tmde.' "By o.nothor Cf1leuln.tion, it 11ppon.1·s tho.t, in tho whole West-lndin.n n.rchipelngo, tho free CLlMATE AND DISEASES ON MAN. 3 a colored nmnborod J ,212,000; tho sltwes, l, 147,500; tot1tl, 2,360,500- showing II doclin~, in loMs thn.n five yotLrR, of 400,li00, notwithstanding tho ILCCCSHion ?Y tho ~ln.v ·lr11<lc. * ~ -~ "1\:[, llumJoT.I>T sotyM: • 'l'he whole 11rchipolotgo of tho West Imhes, wboch uow oompnseH 2,400,000 neg•·ocs f1llll mul11ttocs, free itud sl11vcs, reccivotl, from 1070 lo 1826, nco.rly 5,000,000 AfriCf1US.' These extractB arc taken from an article by Dr. Bennet Dowler, editor of tho "Now Orl ans Modi ·al Joumal" (t::lopt. 1 56), wh t•cin a great many other interesting facts will be found, ii·om th ":ritingH of Turnbull, Long, Porter, and Tuck 1·, as w 11 as from Jns o_wn observations. We commend this article strongly to tl10 attontwn of Lbo reader. We however, fortunately, havo somo statistics whieh arc perfectly reliable at tho South· and which will aflord important light on th · value of life among ~he blacks. We allude to those of the city or Charleston, South Carolina. . . . By the United tatcs' census of 1850, the cntn·o popt1lat10n ot Charleston, white and colored, was 42,085-of which 20,012 were wL ito; 19,532 sltwcs; free color d, 3441; total colored, 22,703. . Some years aO'o, in several articles in the "Charlo ton McdJCal Journal,·, and tl~ "Now Orleans Commercial Review," I wo1·kcd up the vit;l stati!:ltics of Charleston, fi·om 1828 to 1845, in connection with tho subject of li£c-assul'ance. Tho ratio of mortality among the blacks, for those eighteen years, gave an average of d?aths per annum of 1 in 42; and that ratio of mortality was mnch mcrcasc<l by a scvc,·e epidemic of cholera, in 1836, wltich bore almost exclu-sively on tho color d populatio11. . Wo now propose to commence whore we loft off; and to gtve tlto statistics published by the city authoritic , whielt have been kopt with groat fidelity, as we havo good r ason to kn_ow. ~rheso tables, fo1· tou year , extend from 1 46 to 1855, both melus1vc; an<l the census of p f ulation being taken only in the year 1850, wo ~ust mako this tho ba ·is of calculation. As this year is ahOLlt the m1clcllc one of the ten above referred to, th p pulaLi n of this yea1· may be as umcd as the average of tho who] ; aucl if tho whole numbol' of colored population, of 1850, be divided uy tho av rage nnml~ct· of the deaths from 1846 to 1855, it will give the average mortahLy for the ton years, and tho result must approximate very nearly to the tmth. Tho New York Iferald (J1111. 20, 181\7) republi~hca, f1·om the Lo11d011 New&. (Doc. ~~), n. .. Jurious History of the Libe•·io.n llopublio," coufirnof\tory of tho othnolog•cnl opono011R expros~od by us in Typc8 of A/ankind (PP· 403-4, 465- 6), conc_eming lhc nhsolulo u~d\1-n ·~a of ncgro-populn.tions for ~olf-gove1·nmont. 'l'hc New8 pledges 1tsclf, mo•:cove•·, to ~rmg out a Liborin.n document, oonLnining "n pf\inful disclosure of _n. stf\to of. voo~ nnd m•scry {•Lt Mono·ovin.), which it might m11ko tho kind-hon.rtcd old Mo.dtson turn lll lns gr11vo to hrtve countenanced ot· helped to create.''- G. ll. 0.] |