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Show stuff of true manhood that w want, not the Napoleonic food for cannon. Race elevation should bo th watchword not 1 race sutcide. th hysterica,! cry oT alarm. New York Evening Even-ing Post. births is due to "deliberate intention on th part of the parents." It is exceptionally marked where there is foresight and thrift. Tbia conclusion Is reinforced by the fact that among th Roman Catholics and Jews of th United Kingdom such deliberate regulation is leas frequent. Th Catholic element In th more populous towns account for their relatively re-latively high birth rate. Th tradition of the Jews Is in favor of large families. Certain political economists maintain that voluntary regulation of the birth rat is a cause of degeneracy; that it has proved so in the psst, and will prove so even more decidedly de-cidedly in th future. There Is doubtless some reason for this contention. But there Is certainly another side' to th question. Evolution can not have gone so sadly astray as to rusk the deliberate renunciation of parents, often on the highest ethical grounds, a thing realiy harmful. In the long run. to the race. The practice of the most prudent, the most conscientious, the most patriotic, can not be the terrible thing that the cry about race suicide Implies. When considerate fathers and mothers decide to have no more children than they can give to their country in full phyalcal well-being, educated, trained to care for themselves and to lead useful Uvea, are they to be told that they ought, rather, to Ignore all restraint and to b as reckless and animal aa th progenitors of th rickety, diseased, stunted, nandicapped and swarming children of the lowt quarters of cities? It Is not the bad example of the improvident which ought to be imitated by the foreslghted. but the self-sacrifice and prudence of the thoughtful which abould be mad to atrlke downward. Th moral pf th whole la not that the hotnea of h middle classes should be turned Into rabbit-warrens, rabbit-warrens, but that better, knowledge of what Galton calls eugenics should bo extended among the poor. Sanitation, the stamping out of disease, rigid inspection of aliens, the inculcation of better standards all round these are the 'things to go for. It la the DECLINING BIRTH RATE. The decline of the birth rata In England and Wales is causiea apprehension In the minds of some British moralists and statesmen. states-men. Sydney Webb, a judicious observer and analyzer, has been "correcting" statistics on the -subject.- He publishes-hls results in the London Times. SeldomJ have ures told ao significant, a story. - From 1896 to 1905 the total population of London showed an ln-r.resne ln-r.resne of 300.000. Nevertheless, the total number of chttdren between the ages of three and nre. on the school rolls, was diminished by 6067. All ever England and Wales moreover, more-over, during the last thirty years there has been a decrease of 1000 births to every 10.000 inThtstdecH'ne, says Mr. Webb, "is not merely the result of an alteration In the ages of the population, or In the number or proportion of married women, or in the ages of these. In Ireland there- baa been an absolute decline, de-cline, but emigration has taken ' many of the reproductive Inhabitants that the statistics of the. island really enow a relative Increase in fertility. In KwW mJ Wsles, however, it appears that nw for years between 1861 aadWOt. if thel birth rat had remained merely statlonair. 200.(00 more children would have been born than actually were born. . Mr Webb nnds- that the decline is especially espe-cially marked where the Inconvenience of having children 1. moat felt For eamM many married wonfen work to factories, and have to contribute to the support of their families. - The law forbids them to work within with-in a certain time after confinement La rge famines are no longer ao "le for the worklngman as when child Ubor was per-mittad per-mittad A comparison has been made of the eorVeSed birthrate, for 1901of five separate groups of London , boroughs arranged In r fades of average poverty: ; : This comparison gives us the Interesting r nit -that the --small group of three "rich" bcughVhav. pl0.000 population XH legitimate legi-timate births; the four groups comprising nineteen intermediate boroughs have almost IdenUeVl legitimate birth rates- of betweea aj to M90 per 10.000; while the poorest sWun of seven boroughs hss a legitimate bTrthVste oT no less thin J078. or 60 per cent more thi that n. the "rich" quarters. - jLn itrtliif;4licoTerr by Mr. Webb is ttist - while down to some date between 1861 and 1881 there wa a relatively stationary birth rate, there was subsquently a steady incline "due te some new cause." Formerly, deeese in the birth rat. used to be traced tothe postponement of marriage. "We know boweverT from Dr. Newsholme s corrected feirt"rsus. that no such cause aj a. greater peVtpoBementj of marriage with the corresponding corres-ponding rise lo the age of the average wife. anything to do with he -J" birth rate now recorded.1 The facta all axlatto-tbe-ncluaion that the decrease In . - : . . . . .4. .. . i .4 j '-.' .. t. ' ' f - |