Our Future Population

In 1815 Mr. Elkanah Watson, of Philadelpliia, made a calcularon as to the decenniul iticreasc of the population of the United States. He had before tuni at tho time the return of the cencus taken in 1700, 1800 and 1810. The population in 1810 was 7,239,903. Mr. Watson predicted wbat lbo result of future censuaes would be, and his predictions and the aotual figures show a remarkable coincidence, as follows : Watson's Actuol estímate. census. 1820..... ;. 9,690,784 9,638151 1830 12,831,635 12,800,020 1840 17,116,520 17,062,566 1880 23,185,368 23,191,876 1860 31,853,824 81,448,238 Mr. Watson died in 1842, having lived to see his predietion almost literally verified in the censuses of the three deceDnial periods whioh had utervened. His estirnate for the remainder of the century was as followa: 18T0 42,328,432 1880 56,450,241 18ÍJ0 77,260,989 1900 190,305,985 Fcr the period beyond the close of the century Mr. Watson changed the basis of his estímate, and, assuming that in 1900 tbc population will bo 100,000,000, and in cousequence of dense populatiou, intetine and foreign wars, a possible sub-diviëion in consequenoe into severa] republics, ho estiniates tho future iucrease will bo one-third in each twenty years for tho ncxt forty years after the year 1890 ; ona third in the next thirty years, and oue-fifth for tho uexi forty years. This would give the followiug resült : 1920 133,000,000 1940 177,000,000 1970 ...236,000,000 2000 283,000,000 Whi'e this is an estímate of our pro bable future population, we suppose it involves an extensión of our territorial domain so as to realize the demands of thoee who want an "ocean-bound republic." The Washington ChronkU, from which we copy the above figures, states that the popularon of tbe British Islands in 1861 was 29,321,258. In 1868 this bad increased to 30,369,845. While this is true it should be remembered tbat British statesmen have reached tbe conclusión that those islands are too thickly populated ; and, with a view to reduoe population, tbe aid of tho goveroment is invoked to carry out an extensivo sygtem of deportation, or emigration to the British colonies, if possible, but emigration anyhow. It is very likely that, for the next oentury, the emigration to the United States from Qreat Britain and Ireland will equal the natural increase of tbe population of those islands.