THE

LONDON MAGAZINE.

No. IX. DECEMBER, 1828.

COMPARATIVE STATISTICS OF FRANCE AND GREAT BRITAIN.

Ar the commencement of the present year the indefatigable M. Charles Dupin published an important work on the productive and commercial powers of France. In this elaborate publication he has introduced a variety of comparative tables of the statistics of Great Britain, the results of his extensive inquiries while residing in this country in 1824. By this labour M. Dupin has rendered an important service to both countries, and particularly to our own; for it is a lamentable truth, that while we have the means of conducting statistical inquiries with singular correctness, through the agency of our Committees of Parliament, the mass of information which is thus acquired, at an immense cost of time and money, is scarcely ever digested, systematized, and condensed, so as to be useful to the nation at large. In some particulars, also, our machinery for conducting statistical inquiries is the most clumsy and imperfect that can well be imagined. The state of Education, for instance, cannot be deduced from any official returns; and although one distinguished individual, by whom, more than all men of his own or of past generations, the cause of Education has been mainly advanced, has collected a great body of facts (which we shall hereafter notice), the progress of knowledge amongst the people is rather felt than accurately traced. Again, with reference to the duration of life, and to the diseases by which life is shortened, the only documents we possess are the Bills of Mortality, exceedingly imperfect with regard to the numbers whom they embrace (for dissenters are not included in the registry), and most absurd in the data which they present for the classification of diseases, seeing that the searchers, whose duty it is to keep this record, are ignorant and drunken old women-not metaphysically, but literally, old women, intent only upon extorting a fee out of the weeping relatives of the deceased. In France, on the contrary, every important fact in the condition of the people is registered with the most minute accuracy. The value of correct statistical inquiries is, perhaps, more fully felt in France than amongst ourselves. Their men of letters are convinced with Plato, that numbers govern the world; and that by an accurate comparison of numerical results the rise and fall of empires may be best seen, and the progress of civilization most accurately traced. M. Charles DECEMBER, 1828. 2 P

66

Dupin is the principal labourer in this field; but he has able coadjutors. Independently of various distinct treatises published within the last two years, the Revue Encyclopédique," and the "Bulletin Universelle," contain a great mass of the most important statistical facts. From these various sources, compared with our own Parliamentary Returns, we may derive pretty accurate materials for a comparative view of the statistics of France and Great Britain; and we may not improperly devote some pages of the last number of our work for the current year, to the detail of facts, which may furnish abundant data for future inquiry and contemplation.

The surface of the French soil amounts to 52,562,300 hectares, or 154,000 square geographical miles. It may be divided as

follows:

Total 52,562,300

The kingdom of France contains 86 towns, which are capitals of departments, and 38,479 communes. The population, in January 1827, amounted to 31,845,428 inhabitants, of which number two-thirds, or thereabouts, were devoted to agriculture, and one-third was engaged in trade and manufactures.

In the third report of the Emigration Committee the following table for Great Britain is given :—

General Statement of the Cultivated, Uncultivated, and Unprofitable Land of the United Kingdom.

46,522,970 15,000,000 15,871,463 77,394,433

Of the cultivated land in Great Britain, it has been estimated that 14 millions of acres are arable, and 20 millions meadow and pasture.

The United Kingdom contains, according to the returns for Great Britain made in 1821, and the best returns for Ireland, 117 county towns, and 13,885 parishes, and possesses a population of 21,235,580 souls, constituting 4,253,416 families employed as follows:

In Agriculture

Trade, manufactures, &c.

1,198,186 families.
1,677,886

Not comprised in either of the preceding classes 1,377,344

Total 4,253,416

There exist no exact data of the population of France prior to the year 1780. At that period, according to the calculations of M. Necker, the kingdom contained 24,802,580 inhabitants. In 1821, the population amounted to 30,451,187, which gives an increase of about 23 in every hundred in the space of 40 years.

At the same epoch, 1780, the Three Kingdoms contained a population of 12,400,000 souls, or thereabouts; in 1821, the number of inhabitants had increased to 21,238,580, giving an increase of 61 in the hundred, an augmentation almost treble that which occurred in France.

This difference in the progress of population between France and England is attributed by French writers on the subject, and perhaps justly, to the effects of the war and of the civil dissensions which, in the interval between 1793 and 1815, cut off two millions of Frenchmen,-to the military conscriptions, which, by engrossing the flower of the youth of the country, suspended the natural production of the species, and to the general relaxation of morals, as evidenced by the number of natural children, who in the year 1824 alone amounted, taking the whole of France, to 71,174 in 984,152 births; and in Paris separately in the year 1826 to 10,502 in 29,970 births.

The increase of population in France, therefore, has only been 6,536 in the million of inhabitants; while the augmentation in England is 16,667 in the million. In Prussia the increase is 27,027 in the million; in the Netherlands 12,372; in the kingdom of the two Sicilies 11,111; in Russia 10,527, and in Austria 10,114. Supposing the annual increase of population to continue in the same proportion in the respective countries just named, the estimate would stand thus:

And thus France, says M. Dupin, would descend by degrees in the scale of nations below all the other countries, and would continue to nourish only 5,688 inhabitants in every square myriametre or 381 miles English, while in the same space, Great Britain, with a climate less genial, and a soil less fertile, would nourish 8,107. But this result is inconsistent with the progress which manufactures, commerce, arts and sciences have made in France since the overthrow of the empire.

In the interval between 1803 and 1815 twelve campaigns had deprived France of upwards of a million of men; and had consumed more than 6,000,000,000 of francs, or 240,000,000l. sterling. Two invasions by her enemies had taken from her all her recent conquests, and destroyed or consumed on her very territory to the amount of 1500,000,000 francs of her actual substance or produce in houses, manufactures, instruments, and animals indispensable to agriculture, manufactures, or commerce. Between 1815 and 1818, 200,000 foreign

soldiers had remained encamped on her soil, and 1500,000,000 of francs of indemnity had been paid to her conquerors. Thus in twelve years 9,000,000,000 of francs (360,000,000l. sterling) were drawn from the productive industry of France, and lost for ever.

In less than nine years, that is to say, from 1818, these injuries, great and profound as they were, have been recovered from. The population of France has increased since the peace 2,500,000 souls. The houses and farm buildings demolished by the enemy have been rebuilt; the contributions have been paid; the live stock of the countries shows an augmentation of 5,000,000 head of sheep, and of 400,000 horses, since the period of the invasion. A year of scarcity had occurred immediately after the return of the Bourbons, but in the following year France recovered from the effects of this calamity, and her losses were repaired.

The products of the soil of France in 1812, may be thus stated :*

In the last fifteen years the produce of agriculture in France has increased more than a tenth, and its total annual amount may be stated at 5,313,000,000 francs, made up as follows:+

Manufactures, however, have in France made much greater progress than agriculture. The foreign occupation had subjected them to immense losses, especially in the northern and western departments, where establishments which employed several hundreds of hands had *M. le Comte Chaptal on 'French Industry.'

The hectolitre is equal to 2.84 Winchester bushels, or in wine to 26 gallons, imperial measure.

+ Dupin.

been completely destroyed. These losses have not only been repaired, but have been succeeded by an opulence previously unknown.

In 1812, the manufactories of France worked 35,000,000 of killograms* of French wool: they now use 42,000,000, besides 8,000,000, of foreign wool. In 1812, the quantity of cotton spun in France was only 10,362,000 killograms: in 1825, the quantity spun was 28,000,000. The manufacture of silk, also, has increased considerably, and the population of Lyons (an infallible sign of the prosperity of this branch of industry) has increased 50,000.

Thus the progress of manufacturing has in France surpassed that of agricultural industry; this, again, has been exceeded by that of industry employed in the working of minerals.

In 1814, the manufacture of iron in France amounted to 100,000,000, killograms; in 1825, it reached 160,000,000 of killograms. In 1814, there were extracted from the mines of France 1,000,000,000 killograms of coal (houïlle); in 1825, the produce was upwards of 1,500,000,000, an increase of one half.

The produce of French industry is now estimated at 1,770,000,000 francs, composed of the following branches, at a calculation in round numbers:

To this abridged statement of the progress of French industry it should be added, that the interior trade of the kingdom has increased one-half since 1818; that the land-carriage of goods has doubled; that water-carriage has almost trebled; that the stamps, which are a kind of barometer of the amount of commercial transactions, have experienced an increase of 24 per cent.; that the tenth exacted by the government from the produce of the municipal duties, which is a cri*The killogram is equal to 23 lbs. English avoirdupois.