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It will be seen that the deviation of the birth-rate from the even rate of decline
has been greater during the last ten years than at any previous time in the period
shown. The difference between the hypothetical rate of 22.3 and the estimated
rate of 20.0 for the five years 1921-25 represents an increased rate of decline
involving a reduction of the births by about 50,000 beyond that which would have
been recorded had the even rate of decline continued.
With regard to the marriage-rate, it is clear that there would have been a considerable
decrease during the past 50 years if it were not for the large increase
in marriages during war years, as some of these war-time marriages would
undoubtedly not have been recorded in London in normal times. It will be noted
that the decline in the marriage-rate in the five years 1921-25 is too small to have
played anything but a negligible part in the concurrent fall of the birth-rate.
In a presidential address to the Royal Statistical Society last November,
Mr. Udny Yule discussed the growth of population and the factors which control it.
He dealt mainly with the mathematical expression of the growth of population,
as formulated by Yerhulst, and he concludes, from the work of that writer and the
more recent work of Professor Raymond Pearl and others that the growth of population
is exhibited " as a biologically self-regulating process : indeed, a process of which
the regulation is extraordinarily sensitive " ; and further that, apart from migration,
changes in the birth-rate have been the main factor in moulding the curve of growth,
over long periods of time, closely to the simple logistic formula of Verhulst.
Following upon this address, Dr. Stevenson introduced a discussion on " The
Laws Governing Population " at the Royal Statistical Society in December, and
showed that the decline of the birth-rate was general throughout Europe from 1900
onwards. The population of the countries taken as representative of Europe
amounted in 1911-14 to 239 millions. In the course of the discussion, Sir William
Beveridge observed that " If fertility were being considered, and not the birth-rate
per thousand of population, there was no question at all of the turning point for
Europe, which was about 1880, a date differing from that suggested by either Mr.
Yule or Dr. Stevenson." That the change occurred about 1880 is, however, clearly
apparent also from the birth-rate movement, if regard be had to the concurrent
movement of the marriage-rate. In both England and Wales and the composite
population representative of Europe, the birth-rate fell in the period 1881-85, butin
both areas there was a rapid slackening of the rate of fall in the nineties, followed,
from 1900 onwards, by an accentuated rate of decline. The cause of this slackening
oc the rate of decline will be found in the movement of the marriage-rate during this
period, for, following upon years of decrease, there was a definite increase of the
marriage-rate throughout the nineties associated, one may suppose, with the