VOL. 47 1CP4SmithsonianMiscellaneous CollectionsVol. 2 Quarterly Issue Part 3
INQUIRY INTO THE POPULATION OF CHINA
By WILLIAM WOODVILLE ROCK1 IILL
IFrom the earliest times of their history the Chinese have made,every few years, enumerations of the adult population of theEmpire. The history of the census in China may be divided intotwo parts : during the first, extending from the first recorded countin the XXIII century p.. C, down to 1712 A. D., with a few excep-tions, the number of tax-paying households alone was recorded. Inthe second period the total number of individuals is purposed to havebeen taken.In the first period the census was made solely for the purpose oflevying the taxes, and there is every reason to believe that the localofficials systematically kept the returns forwarded to the CentralGovernment below the real figures, so as to divert to their own useas much of the taxes levied as they possibly could. In the secondperiod, that reason no longer existing (see infra p. 307), it became amatter of pride with the officials, as well as good policy, to swell thereturns of population.There is much uncertainty as to the number of individuals con-tained in each recorded " household," or hit, and whether by theword " individual " (literally " mouth," k'ou) is to be understoodmale adults, or both sexes, or persons of all ages—exclusive of in-fants—who have never been included in the enumerations of anyperiod. In the time of Mencius (IV century b. c.) the "family"(ehia) was supposed to comprise eight months (k'ou). This was thenumber of persons whom 100 111011 (about 15 acres) of medium landwere computed to support. 1 Under some dynasties (as the Han) itwould seem that the " household " comprised from 4.8 to 5.2 in-dividuals ; in others, the T'ang for example, it rose to 5.8. During
1 Mencius, Bk. 1, Pt. 1, Ch. vn, 24. 303
304 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS [VOL. 47
others, as the Sung, it was only a fraction over two persons, accord-ing to Sacharoff, 1 though Biot 2 contends that in this period it was afraction more than 5 persons, as in the preceding period of theTang. Under the Yuan dynasty, according to Amiot, the " house-hold " comprised 5 persons, and in the succeeding Ming dynasty itseems to have varied from about 5 to over 6.6. Even during thepresent dynasty we are in grave doubt as to the numeric value ofthe term hu ("household," "family"). Father Amiot and otherforeign writers have thought it represented 5 persons, de Guignes 3says 2 to 3, but in the opinion of E. H. Parker it averaged 6 persons. 4In the census of 1842, which gave the number of households and ofindividuals, the former averaged 2.3 persons to the family ; and ina census of the city of Peking for 1846, it averaged 3.1. I am dis-posed to accept 4 as a fair figure for enumerations of the XVIIIand XIX centuries.'"'During the Han dynasty, from a. d. i to 156, we have ten enumer-ations, the first, taken in a. d. 1, gave 12,233,062 "households"and 59,594,978 " individuals." The last, taken in 156, gave 16,070,-906 " households " and only 50,066,856 " individuals." The terri-tory over which these censuses extended did not vary appreciablyduring the whole of this period of 155 years; it was substantiallythe same as at the present day. The population during this centuryand a half was nearly stationary.In a. d. 606, when China was again united under one rule, whathas been held by western writers to be a very careful census wastaken. It again gave the population of the Empire at about 55,-500,000/During the VII, VIII and IX centuries, although a considerablenumber of enumerations of the people are recorded, they are soconfused that it is impossible to fix with more than the roughestapproximation the population, at that time, of China proper, which
1 Hist. Uebersicht tier Bevblkerungs-Verhaltnisse China's, p. 157.2 Journal Asiatique, 1836, tome 1.3 J 'oyagc a Peking, ill, 69.
* See infra, pp. 307-308. In Japan the average number of persons by house-hold, which often includes several families, was 5.55 at the close of 189S.5 It is true that, in the case of the prefecture of Wen-chou in Che-kiang,n was found in 1881 that the average number of persons per home was about5.14 (see infra, p. 314), and in the case of Ch'ung-k'ing in Ssu-ch'uan in 1877a detailed census of the city gave about 4.3 persons to a family (E. C. Baber,Journ. of Explor. in West. China, p. 25).8 Ma Tuan-lin, Wen-hsien t'ung-k'ao, Bk. 10.7 See Biot, op. cit., pp. 451-452.
rockhill] the population of china 305
then covered about the same area as at present. The census whichappears to have been the mosl carefully made was that of the year756. It gave 8,814,708 families and 52,919,309 individuals for thefree population, exclusive of infants and very old people; it includedthe kingdom of Korea. The total population in a. d. 7^' may there-tori' have been about 61,000,000. Biot, using the censuses referredto in this paragraph, has calculated the average yearly increase oithe population of China proper between a. d. 650 and 755, and foundit to have been about O.O063 per cent.During the XI century, when the empire was again united underthe rule of the Sung, we have ten enumerations of the population,that of the year 1080 showing evidence of having been the mostcarefully taken. It gives the number of households of freeholders(chit) and tenants (k'o) as 14,852.686, or 33.303.889 individuals.No matter how numerous we allow the exempted and unenumeratedclasses to have been, it is not conceivable that they could have morethan doubled this number ; so we may, 1 think, safely assume that atthe end of the XI century the population of China proper was notmuch more than 60,000,000, the same as in the middle of the \ IIIcentury.Biot has calculated the average yearly increase during the Sungdynasty (a. d. 976 to 1102) and found that from 976 to 1021 it wasabout 0.02 per cent., and from 1021 to 1102 only 0.0103 per cent, or0.015 per cent, during these 125 years.In 1290, at the end of the Mongol conquest of China by KublaiKhan, a census of China proper gave 13,196,206 households of 58,-834,711 individuals. Admitting that vast numbers of Chinese hadbeen reduced to slavery by the Mongols and countless thousandshad been killed, the population at the end of the XIII century canhardly have been much in excess of 75,000,000.During the Ming dynasty there were no fewer than twenty-onecensuses between 1381 and 1578. The highest figure of the re-corded population during this period was 66,598,337 individuals in1403. and the lowest 46.802.005 in 1506. The last census, that of1578, taken at a time when the country was extremely prosperousand enjoying general peace, gave the population as 63,599,541 souls.While agreeing with SacharofT that the various censuses of thisperiod are not of a trustworthy character, I believe they may beconsidered sufficiently accurate to show that during the XV andXYI centuries the population of China increased very slowly, cer-tainly not more rapidly than during previous periods of its history.The following returns of the detailed censuses of 1393. 1491, and
^o6 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS [VOL. 471578, are taken from the Annals of the Ming. 1 It must be notedthat that of 1393 has no returns for several provinces of the Empire. 2
R0CKHILI.| THE POPULATION OF CHINA 307
1(151, taxed population [0,633,000 families.
1 mid. " [9,088,000
1 ('jo, " 19,396,0001680, '" 17.005,000T690, " 20,364,000
1 7no, " •' 20,411,0001710. " " 23,311,0001720, 24,720,000[730, " " -'5,480,000In the case of the census of 1720 we are told that there were, ex-clusive of the taxed population, 309,545 families free from taxation ;and 851,959 families in the case of that of 1730. Parker notes that
" evidence clearly shows " (but as usual with him he docs not go tothe trouble of giving any) that the numbers given above must bemultiplied by six, and not by five as was done by Amiot, in order toobtain the number of individuals." Pending production of evidence,I shall follow Father Amiot's views on this point, and would add 2per cent, for the tax-free families, which include officials, literati, thearmy, etc. On this basis we find that the total population of Chinaproper in 165 1, during the troublous times which accompanied theestablishment of Manchu supremacy, was about 55,000,000—justabout the number we should have assumed it to be had we to deductit from the data supplied by history alone. From 1651 down to thepresent time the figures of the returns vary with such extraordinaryrapidity, so unlike anything we have noted in the whole long list ofearlier Chinese enumerations, that one is inevitably brought to lookon them as fanciful and probably far remote from the truth. 1In 1 712 an imperial edict ordered that the number of families(24,621,334) given in the enumeration of the preceding year shouldremain the invariable basis for the assessment of the crown taxes,and that all subsequent censuses should give the total number ofinhabitants. Nevertheless, it was only in 1741, after repeated ordershad been given by the Imperial Government, that a return was madeof the total population of China. According to it the populationwas 143,412,000. For 1743 we find in the Institutes of the TaCh'ing dynasty (Ta Citing Hui-tien) a detailed census of the Seven-teen Provinces—corresponding to the Eighteen of the present day,but again given by households. This census gave the total num-
1 De Guignes (Voyage a Peking, in, 56-86), after a study of the Chi-nese census returns of 1743, 1761, and 1794, concluded that they were exag-gerated, and also that the figure five adopted by the missionaries to ascertainthe number of persons in a family was too high by half. He calculated thepopulation of China proper in 1789 at 150,000,000 as a maximum.
3o8 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS [VOL. 47ber of households (hu) as 28,877,364, comprising 143,621,460 in-dividuals or about 4.8 persons to a household. To this number,which corresponds very closely with that given for 1741, Amiotwould add 493,075 individuals for unenumerated officials, 2,470,000for the literati, and 4,115,325 for the army. To this again he wouldadd some 50,000,000 for the civil employes of government, themonks, nuns, brigands, vagabonds, troglodytes, etc., with which, hesays, China is full. Here I think he is unequestionably wrong, forthe civil employes were included either in the already accounted forclass of officials, or in the general returns -, 1 while as for monks, nuns,etc., the number was unquestionably so small that it may be omittedin such a rough estimate as that we are attempting to reach. Wemay adopt the number 143,000,000 individuals as a maximum forthe total population of China proper in 1743.The various estimates of the population made by the Governmentof China since 1743 are contained in the following table, in whichhave also been included the annual rates of increase or decreasebetween succeeding dates deducted from them
:
Date.
rockhill] the population of china 309them being based on the data supplied Popoff for 1879 and 1882.E. H. Parker 3 gives from Russian sources the population of thevarious provinces for 1894; this is the wildest guess yet made, andfoots up a total of 421,800,000. In 1903 the Statesman's Year Book(p. 506) published a table "issued by the Chinese Government asthe results of a census taken for the purpose of the apportionmentof the indemnity to the rowers," in which the population is esti-mated at 407,253,000. There is not a scintilla of evidence to showthat any census was taken for the purpose stated, and furthermorethere was no necessity for taking one, as the sums levied from thevarious provinces for the indemnity of 1900 were procured byindirect taxation. Here again we have nothing more than a guessof the Chinese Board of Revenue.
IIAn attempt will now be made to determine the value of the variousenumerations of population since that of 1741, which I am inclinedto believe was probably a closer approximation to the truth thanwere any subsequent ones, the Imperial Government being in strong,intelligent hands, its mandates executed with more faithfulness andprecision than at any other subsequent period, and the Empire en-joying perfect peace. I feel confident, however, that it was in ex-cess of the truth, for it must be borne in mind that no census, suchas we make in this country, has ever been attempted in China. TheStatutes of the Empire 2 require, it is true, that all families shouldmake returns of their members, and impose punishments for failureto comply or for falsification of returns ; it would therefore seemeasv to tabulate these returns at any time, but experience has provedthat such is not the case. In China all statements of populationare largely guess-work, and where numbers are guessed they arealways magnified, especially when there is no reason to keep themdown, as was the case prior to the Imperial Edict of 1712, referred topreviously.China enjoys a salubrious climate and a fertile soil, and the peoplehave alwavs been extraordinarily industrious and thrifty. As a gen-eral rule the taxation has been fairly equable, and life and propertysafe in times of peace. These conditions are all conducive to alarge increase in population. There is another reason which shouldfrom the remotest times have been potent in producing a larger in-
1 China, etc., 192.2 Ta Ch'ing Lii-li, 3d Div., Bk. 1, Sees. lxxv. lxxvi.
3IO SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS [VOL. 47
crease of population in China than in other countries enjoying likenatural advantages: I refer to the desire of every Chinese to haveposterity, to keep up the ancestral worship. We find Mencius (b. c.372-289) saying: " There are three unfilial acts, and to have no pos-terity is the greatest of them " (pu Iisiao yu son, wu hou wei ta). 1Failure to support one's parents enduring poverty is only second toit, for by failing to have posterity one offends against the whole lineof one's ancestors by putting an end to the sacrifices due them. Tothis belief is due the universal practice of early marriages which hasalways prevailed in China.The exceptional checks we find to a large increase of the popula-tion are, however, quite as potent as the encouragements to its in-crease just mentioned. Among these, famine, floods, and pestilencehave been the most constantly operating, and have arrested rapidincrease more even than the losses incurred through the fearfulbutcheries which have throughout China's history invariably accom-panied the suppression of every rebellion, the establishment ofevery new dynasty.Alexander Hosie in his paper on " Droughts in China from a. d.620 to 1643," 2 or during a period of 1,023 years, found that drought
1 Mencius, Bk. iv, Pt. i, Ch. xxvi.
" Hosie's inquiries, drawn from the great Chinese work called the T'n-shuchi ch'cng (see Journ. Ch. Br. Roy. Asiat. Soc, n. s., xii, 51 et seq.), may besummarized as follows :Between a. d. 620 and 700, inclusive, there were 41 years with droughts, ofwhich 2 were the results of great floods.From 701 to 800, inclusive, there were 46 years with drought. In 790 ty-phus raged.From 801 to 900, inclusive, there were 43 years with drought, 8 of whichwere of great severity.From 901 to 1000, inclusive, there were 60 years with drought, 13 being
" great droughts."From 1001 to 1100, inclusive, there were 68 years with drought, 6 being oflong duration, 8 "great droughts" and one (1086-87) universal and of longduration.From 1101 to 1200, inclusive, there are 60 recorded droughts, of which 9were "great droughts," 4 of long duration and 5 "very severe."From 1201 to 1300, inclusive, there were 76 droughts, of which 12 were
"great droughts" and 4 "very severe."From 1301 to 1400. inclusive, there were 59 years with drought, of which25 were "great droughts," 4 accompanied with floods in other sections of thecountry. 4 with locusts, and during 6 of the droughts the people resorted tocannibalism.From 1401 to 1500, inclusive, there were 57 years with drought, of which36 were "great droughts"; during 8 cannibalism i-< recorded, and during sev-eral typhus raged.
R0CKHILL i in POPUL \ I CON 01 CH [NA 3 l 'had occurred in 583 years in some one of the eighteen provinces,frequently in four or five of them at the same time, and in many casesthey were accompanied by floods, typhus, and other scourges. Fre-quently these droughts lasted in the same section of country foreral successive years or occurred at such close intervals that thecountry had not time to recover from them. To cite but two cases
:
from A. d. 1 601 to 1643 drought is recorded in some one province ofChina in 30 years, in 15 of which it occurred in the province of Shan-hsi, and in 11 in that of Che-kiang.The fearful loss of life which has marked every calamity that hasvisited any part of China, and the nearly incredible cruelty which hasbeen shown in the suppression of every uprising that has taken placefrom the earliest days down to the present time, are unfortunatelytoo well authenticated to be denied.Without going back to the early annals of the Chinese for ex-amples of the terrible mortality which has always attended naturalcalamities and warfare in China, a few in the last three centuries,vouched for by reliable European writers, or by foreigners residentin the country at the time of their occurrence, may be cited here.Father Du Halde 1 states that in the year 1 582 " there was such agreat drought in the Province of Shan-hsi, that it was impossible ti 1count the number of those who died of starvation. There were dugin various localities some sixty great ditches, each of which held athousand corpses, and were therefore called Van gin keng " (Wanjen k'eng), " Grave of a myriad men."The same author 2 says that on September 2, 1678, there was anearthquake in the Province of Chih-li when over 30,000 persons losttheir lives in the town of T'ung chou alone. On November 30, 1731.there was another earthquake in the same province, when over 100,-000 persons lost their lives in Peking, and more than that number inthe adjacent country.Father Amiot,3 writing from Peking, May 20, 1786, tells of aterrible drought which for the three past years had visited the prov-From 1501 to 1600 there were 84 years with drought, of which 69 were
"great droughts" (in A. D., 1568, it extended over 8 provinces) ; during sev-eral cannibalism is recorded.From 1601 to 1643 there were 15 years with drought. In 15 years it oc-curred in Shan-hsi and in 11 in Che-kiang.1 Description, 1, p. 522. The expression Wan jen k'eng is colloquially usedto designate a pit into which the bodies of executed criminals are thrown.See H. A. Giles, Chin. Diet., s. v.. k'eng.2 Ibid., 1, p. 543-'Mem. concernant les Chinois, xni, p. 425-
312 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS [VOL. 47inces of Kiang-nan, Ho-nan, and Shan-tung. The people in vastnumbers sought to reach other provinces, but thousands uponthousands died on the roads and their corpses were devoured by thesurvivors.As regards the extraordinary loss of life attending militarv opera-tions in China, Du Halde states 1 that in 1635 the Chinese, to de-fend the city of K'ai-feng Fu in Ho-nan against the rebels, cut theYellow River dykes. The whole city was submerged and 300,000persons lost their lives.The history of Ch'ang Hsien-chung, told by Du Halde, 2 by Fatherd'Orleans, 3 by Father de Mailla, 4 and others, is an example of whathas frequently occurred in China during its long history. In thedisturbed period which followed the overthrow of the Ming dynasty,this person overran with his troops the provinces of Ho-nan, Kiang-nan, Kiang-hsi, and Ssu-ch'uan. It is said that for the slightestoffense not only was the offender himself put to death, but the samepunishment was visited on all the inhabitants of the same street.Five thousand eunuchs were beheaded because one of their numberrefused to treat him as Emperor. He called some 10,000 studentsto the examinations at Ch'eng-tu Fu in Ssu-ch'uan and had them allput to death. He had butchered over 600,000 persons in that prov-ince alone ! On leaving Ch'eng-tu to march into the adjoiningprovince of Shen-hsi, he had all the inhabitants chained, led out ofthe city, and executed. Then he ordered his soldiers to put to deaththeir own wives as troublesome impediments in times of war, andhe gave the example by having his own wives executed. So readshis story ; if it is not all true, much of it certainly is.Turning to the XIX century, always on the authority of carefulEuropean investigators, Colonel Kuropatkin (the present Com-mander-in-chief of the Russian army in Manchuria) speaking5 of theMohammedan rebellion in Shen-hsi and Kan-su of 1861 and subse-quent years, states, on the authority of Sosnovski, that on the occa-sion of the siege of Ho-chou in Kan-su, which lasted seven months,20,000 men were put to death by the Chinese on the fall of that place.When the neighboring town of Hsi-ning Fu was captured, 9,000were put to death ; at the capture of Chin-chi P'u, the Mohammedan
•Op. cit., 1, p. 530.
-' Description, 1, p. 535.3 History of the Two Tartar Conquerors of China, Hakluyt Society edit.,p. 26.
1 Hist. Gen. de la Chine, x, 470-479; xi, 17-28.5 Kashgaria, English trans., p. 155.
rockhill] the population of china 313
stronghold, 50,000 were killed and a vast fruitful and thickly popu-lated tract turned into waste. At Chuguchak and its environs 40,-000 men perished at the hands of the Chinese, and the town wasleft without a single inhabitant.Doctor Macgowan, who was residing in China during the wholeof the T'ai-p'ing rebellion, says of it: 1 " Nine provinces had keendesolated by it ; flourishing towns and cities had been made heaps ofruins, and wild beasts made their dens within them ; whilst fullythirty millions of people had been put to death by these ruthlessrobbers " (rebels and imperialists).Another authority says: " During the first year of the great Tai-ping rebellion the registered population declined by two-fifths, hut,though many millions must have perished, it is not at all likely thatthe numbers of 1850 (414,493,000) were more than decimated.Even then, to kill or starve 43,000,000 people in ten years, wouldmean 12,000 a day, in addition to the 40,000 a day who (at the rateof 30 per thousand per annum) would die naturally, and wouldbalance about the same number of births. Moreover, the rebellioncovered only one-half the area of China, so that 24,000 a day is cer-tainly nearer than 1 2,000.
~
The loss of life attending the crushing of the two Mohammedanand the Nien-fei rebellions (1860-75) mounted certainly to over amillion. Then we have a quarter of a million killed in the suppres-sion of the Mohammedan rebellion in Kan-su in 1894-95. Ifwe add to this terrible source of loss of population that resultingfrom famines and floods, the total is nearly doubled. There weregreat famines in 1810, 181 1, 1846, and 1849, which, according to theTung luia hi, the best official authority we have on the subject, re-duced the population by 45,000,000. Although this figure may seemexcessive, we know that in the next great famine—that of 1877-78,which visited only four provinces of the Empire with great severity,no fewer than 9,500,000 persons fell its victims. This figure I quoteon the authority of the China Famine Relief Committee of Shanghai.We must add to this again the loss of life which attended the greatflood of 1888, when the Yellow River broke its hanks and floodednearly the whole province of Ho-nan. According to memorials sentat the time to the Emperor, about 2,000,000 were drowned or starvedto death by this catastrophe. Then there is the unknown, but cer-tainly terrible, mortality during the great drought and famine in
1 History of China, p. 575. Conf. S. Wells Williams, The Middle Kingdom,n, 623.2 E. H. Parker, China, p. 190.
314 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS [VOL. 47Shan-hsi, Shen-hsi, Chih-li, and southern Mongolia in 1892-93 and1894. There have also been numerous epidemics of cholera andplague which have devastated sections of the Empire in the lasttwenty to thirty years, and still we have not exhausted the list ofcauses of violent fluctuations, of extraordinary loss to the populationof China during the XIX century. 1It must not be lost sight of that these figures represent only themortality among adults ; it is extremely improbable that infants werecounted at all.Popoff, in his study on the population in China,2 estimates that thepopulation of China proper has not only not increased during theperiod of forty years, from 1842 to 1882, but has even diminished bythe considerable number of 30,942,592.The only reliable data I have found on the subject of Chinese vitalstatistics are the following
:
In 1880 the Governor of the Province of Che-kiang reported 3 tothe Emperor that as the result of a general census of the Provincetaken in 1879, it was found that the population was 11,541,054.Mr. Popoff, the Interpreter of the Russian Legation in China,was informed in 1882 by the Board of Revenue in Peking that thepopulation of this same province of Che-kiang was then 11,588,692,and in 1885 the same Board informed the writer of the present paperthat it was then 11,684,348.As corroborative evidence of the value of these figures, we learnthat Commissioner of Customs Alfred E. Hippisley4 found by acareful report made to him by the Taotai of the Prefecture of Wen-chou that the average number of persons per home was about 5.14,and that the total population of the prefecture was 1,841,690. " Thearea of the Prefecture being about 4,500 square miles, the averagepopulation would therefore seem to be about 409 to the square milein this prefecture, and thus largely in excess of the general averageof the province."The best available information concerning the area of the provinceof Che-kiaug5 gives it as 34,700 square miles. Assuming, then, that
1 1 was told in 1901 by the late Li Hung-chang that over 30,000 Chinese losttheir lives in Peking alone during the Boxer troubles of 1900. Admittingthat this figure and all those here given are exaggerated, it is true beyond alldoubt that the loss to the population from these causes has been fearful.2 P. S. Popoff in Novoe Vrcmya, No. 3066, 10th Sept., 18S4. Conf. S. WellsWilliams, The Middle Kingdom, I, 270.3 Peking Gazette, March 17, 1880.
* Trade Report of Wen-chou for 18S1, pp. 27-28.5 Statesman's Year Book, 1902, p. 495. It may be said that the returns for
rockhill] the population of china 315
the average population to the square mile is one-fifth less thanin the Prefecture of Wen-chou I say 325 to the square mile), the totalpopulation of the province in 1881 would have been about 11,145,000
—a figure substantially agreeing with that given by the Governor ofthe Province for 1879 and tnat supplied Popoff in 1882.The population of Che-kiang, according to the above figures, in-creased from 1879 to 1882—say about three years (1880-81) from
1 [.541,054 to 11,588,692, or 47,638. From 1882 to 1885 (also threeyears) it increased from 11,588,692 to 11,684,348, or 95.656. Thiswould be an annual increase from 1879 to 1882 of 0.206 percent,and from 1882 to 1885 of 0.275 percent, or an average yearly ratefrom 1879 to 1885 of 0.240 percent—this under the most favorablepossible circumstances, the country being blessed with peace andplenty during all that period and for some years previously. At thisrate the population of Che-kiang would double itself by natural in-crease in 417 years.Newsholme, 1 calculating the average birth-rate and death-ratefor the five years 1891-95, found that in Prussia the populationwould double itself by natural increase in 49.2 years ; in England in59.1 years; in Italy in 65.7 years; in Austria in 74.1 years; and inFrance in 591 years, the annual increase in the period named aver-aging in the latter country only 0.08 per 1,000. Conditions of life inother provinces of the Empire of China are approximately the sameas in Che-kiang—in fact, in a number they are worse, particularlyas regards the frequency of famines, floods, and epidemics ; neverthe-less, Chinese enumerations would have us believe that the popula-tion in China increases more rapidly than in the most favored coun-tries of the world.In the case of China, natural increase is the only one to be taken inline of count ; immigration into China is practically nil, and emigra-tion from China proper to other portions of the Empire, excludingAsia, has only within quite recent times become of considerable size,and even now it is not sufficient to appreciably affect the sum totalof the population in the approximate count we are trying to make ofit. The only migratory movements of the Chinese have been fromprovince to province of the Empire. Without going far back intothe past, it will suffice to mention the repopulation of the provinces ofChe-kiang show just the contrary of what I am seeking to prove, but it mustbe seen at once how fanciful must be the returns of population when the totalnumber in a vast province is deduced from a rough count in a small district.This is substantially the method the Chinese follow.1 Elem. Vital Statistics, p. 15.
316 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS [vol. 47Ssu-ch'uan and Yun-nan after the Manchu conquest from the HuKuang provinces and the similar movement to Ssu-ch'uan duringthe great T'ai-p'ing rebellion. The emigration from Shan-hsi intosouthern and eastern Mongolia after the famine of 1877-78, and thatfrom Shan-tung and Chih-li into Manchuria still going on—are themost important recent movements of population to outlying partsof the Chinese Empire. The emigration to southern Asia and toremoter parts of the world is drawn exclusively from the provincesof Fu-kien and Kuang-tung, and though considerable, is not so largeas to affect to any appreciable degree the rough figures of populationwe hope to establish. 1Very little accurate information has come to us as to the death-rate in any given locality of China ; in fact the only official data Iknow of is the death-rate in Peking during one year, 1845, ^or whichyear we have also the returns of a detailed census of the populationwithin the Peking city walls. These were obtained by Sacharoffand published in his valuable study, cited previously. According tothem the population of Peking within the walls in 1845 was 1,648,-814, and the number of deaths (exclusive of infants and small chil-dren—say under 5 years of age) during the whole year was 39,438,
1 The following figures relative to Chinese emigration, taken from Exportof April 14, 1904, a German paper devoted to commercial geography, firstappeared in Gottwaldt's work on Chinese emigration. The greater part ofthe Chinese emigration originates in the southern Provinces, Shan-tung beingthe only northern Province that furnishes any large proportion of emigrantsfrom China.The number of Chinese outside of China is as follows
:
Country Number.Formosa 2,600,000Siam 2,500,000Malay Peninsula 985,000Sunda Islands 600,000Hongkong 274,543America 272,829Indo-China 150,000Philippines 80,000
CountryMacaoBurmaAustraliaAsiatic RussiaJapanKoreaTotal
Number.74,56840,00030,00025,0007,0003,7io7,642,650The following figures show the number of persons that left China andHongkong and returned during the last twenty-six years
:
China and Hongkong.Amoy ( Fu-kien )Swatow ( Kuang-tung)Kiung-chou ( Hainan)Hongkong
Left.1,629,9471,794,298298,7721,130,000
Returned1,309,7871,307,744296,2331,090,000
rockhill] I in: POPULA I [ON OF CH i.na 317
or about 23.9 per 1,000 inhabitants—by no means an excessive rate.The death-rale among infants resulting from the highly insani-tary conditions in which the whole population, rich and poor,throughout the Empire constantly lives, and also from female in-fanticide, must be exceedingly high. This latter cause of infantmortality is accountable for a considerably increased death-rate inthe Provinces of Kuang-tung, Fu-kien, Che-kiang, Shan-hsi, Kiang-hsi, An-hni. and in most of the other provinces of die empire in alesser degree. 1Everything considered—especially the fact that in a very largepart of China the people live huddled together in towns and villages,and that nowhere is any attempt ever made toward sanitation or theprevention of the spread of contagious disease—it seems quite safeto put the death-rate in China at 30 per 1,000 as a minimum.
IllLet us revert now to the figures given by the Chinese governmentfor the population at the various periods since 1741 and see whetherthe annual rates of increase are at all reasonable. This examinationis distinctly disappointing; nothing less satisfactory could be con-ceived. Between 1743 and 1783—during which time China enjoyedextraordinary peace and prosperity, disturbed only by some uprisingsof aboriginal tribes in the mountainous regions of the west, and twosmall rebellions, one in Shan-tung in 1777, the other in Shen-hsi in1781 no great famines or other natural calamities are recorded.Nevertheless, the annual rate of increase of the population (theennmerations being all presumably made in the same manner, withthe same classes excepted), which between 1743 and 1749 was 2.90percent, fell from 1749 to 1757 to 0.91 percent, to rise between 1757to 1 76 1 to 1.37 percent, falling again to 0.73 percent between 1761and 1767 and to 0.57 percent from that date to 1771. The nextchange is phenomenal : between 1771 and 1776 it was 5.0 percent, butimmediately after, between 1776 and 1780 it fell, without any knownreason, to 0.86 percent, to rise again between that date and 1783 to
'See Journ. Nor. Ch. Br. Roy. Asiat. Sue. vol. xx, p. 25, et seq. New-holme {Elcm. Vital Statistics. 130) says that infant mortality in Europe islowest in Ireland with 164.6 in every 1,000, and highest in Russia in Europewith 422.9 in every 1,000. It must be at least this in China. In Japan, wherethere exists the same desire as in China to have posterity, the average num-ber of children to a marriage is about 3.5 ( Newsholme, op. cit., p. 70). I seeno reason to believe that the Chinese are more prolific. In the United States.according to the census of 1900, the annual death-rate of the whites, whereaccurately recorded, was about 17.8 per 1,000.
3 1
8 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS [VOL. 472.34 per cent. The average annual rate of increase during the wholeperiod was 1.83 percent. In Japan, where much more favorableconditions exist than in China, the average yearly increase of thepopulation from 1872 to 1899 has been only 1.04 percent.If we accept the figure given for the population in 1741 (143,412,-000) as being closer the truth than subsequent ones, and bearing inmind the reasons given previously for and against a rapid increase ofpopulation, we may assume that the population of China proper barelydoubled in the hundred years following; consequently in 1842, in-stead of being, as given in the official enumeration, 413,000,000, itwas probably about 250,000,000.Referring now to the extraordinary causes of mortality from1842 down to the present day, some of which are mentioned on pre-ceding pages, they may be tabulated as follows
:
Resulting loss ofpopulation.1846 Famine 225,0001849 Famine 13,750,0001854-64 T'ai-p'ing rebellion 20,000,0001861-78 Mohammedan rebellions 1,000,0001877-78 Famine 9,500,0001888 Yellow River inundation 2,000,000i892-'94 Famine 1,000,000 ( ?)i894-'95 Mohammedan rebellion 225,000Total loss of adults 47,700,000We are therefore led to the inevitable conclusion that the presentpopulation of China proper cannot greatly exceed that of 1842, aconclusion reached by another line of argument in 1881 by my friendA. E. Hippisley in his too brief study above referred to, and by Mr.Popoff in 1884.The following considerations tend to strengthen this opinion
:
The most recent enumeration of the population of China which canlay claim to any value, is that of 1885. In it we find that the returnsgiven for six provinces (Chih-li, An-hui, Kan-su, Kuang-hsi, Yun-nan, and Kuei-chou) are the same as those given in the earlier censusof 1882, but which in this latter were in reality for the year 1879.A comparison of the official estimates for these provinces with theestimates made by careful foreign investigators is highly interesting.In the case of the province of Ssu-ch'uan, which the Board ofRevenue estimated at 71,073,730 in 1885, all foreign writers agreethat it is quite impossible to believe that any such population exists
—
or can exist in it. Its western, northwestern, and southwestern partsare extremely mountainous and very sparsely inhabited ; furthermore,
rockhill] the population of china 319the province contains no extremely populous cities; Ch'eng-tu, thecapital, has about 350,000, and Ch'ung-k'ing about 130,000.The Lyons Commercial Mission, speaking of the year 1895-96,states its belief that the estimates of the Maritime Customs at Ch'ung-k'ing for 1891 of 30,000,000 to 35,000,000 for the province of Ssri-ch'uan is too low, but accepts that of from 40,000,000 to 45,ooo,ooo. 1G. J. L. Litton, writing in 1898, estimated the population of Ssu-ch'uan at more than double that given in the enumeration of 1812,and put it at 43,ooo,ooo. 2 F. S. A. Bourne, also writing in 1898, saysthat the population of Ssu-ch'uan is probably between 45,000,000 and55,000,000. In a report in 1904 Hosie gives it as 45,ooo,ooo. 3Kiang-hsi, for which the official returns give a population of morethan 24,000,000, is believed by W. J. Clennell, writing in 1903, tohave less than 1 2,000,000. 4 The same writer estimates the popula-tion of Fu-kien in 1903, at " certainly under 10 millions," whereas theChinese figure for 1885 is 23,502,794. As regards Yiin-nan, theLyons Mission 5 puts the population in 1896 at from 7,000,000 to8,000,000. F. S. A. Bourne, writing of Yiin-nan in 1896, says that" according to the best native authority the population is estimated atone-fifth of what it was before the (Mohammedan) rebellion " ; r>while Litton, in 1903, thought it was " not over 10 millions." 7 TheChinese estimate of the population of this province in 1879 ( tne samefigure is given for 1885) was 11,721,576, but only two years beforethat, in 1877, General Mesny 8 placed it at 5,600,000.Kuei-chou, in or about 1896, was thought to have about 7,000,000inhabitants, 9 in this agreeing with the Chinese estimate.Without going any farther we see that for the five provinces abovementioned, foreign investigators substantially agree that the Chineseestimates are too large by some 56,000,000. All the Chinese figuresare one-half to one-third too high. I have not the least doubt thatthe same reduction must apply to the estimates for most of the otherprovinces, the error in excess increasing presumably with the densityof the population. The conviction is therefore forced on me that thepresent population of China proper does not exceed 275,000,000—and is probably considerably under this figure.1 Mission Lyonnaise d'explor.-commer. en Chine, 1895-97, part 11, p. 232."Brit. Cons. Reports, No. 457, Misc. series.3 Brit. Cons. Reports, No. 458, Misc. series, p. 49. Blue Book; China, No.5 {1904), P. 4-4 Brit. Pari. Blue Book; China, No. 1, 1903.5 Op. cit., part 11, p. 129.6 Rep. Blackburn Chamber Commerce, p. 91.7 Brit. Pari. Blue Book; China, No. 3, 1903.8 Journ. Ch. Br. Roy. Asiat. Soc, xxv, p. 483.-* Mission Lyons., part 11, p. 207.
320 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS [VOL. 47The population of China is most unevenly distributed ; in certainsections for example, around Swatow, and in portions of Ho-nan,Shan-tung, and Chih-li, it is extraordinarily dense, while in others,as Kan-su, Yiin-nan, Kuei-chou, and Kuang-hsi, it is surprisinglysparse. Guesses of the population based on partial returns fromsome densely populated center would give a most erroneous ideaof the population not only of the province as a whole, but ofeven a smaller division of the country. I have traversed severaltimes all the northern provinces of China—Chih-li, Shan-hsi, Shen-hsi, and Kan-su—and can vouch for the fact that in none of themdoes the population appear to exceed in numbers what the soil caneasily support. The absence of easy lines of communication overwhich surplus produce can be readily exported, and the fact that theChinese do not raise cattle or any domestic animals in considerablenumbers, tend to restrict the areas cultivated by the farmer. It seemscertain that China could support a much larger population than itnow has—a condition which could not exist if the population hadreached the enormous figure which imaginative writers give us. Iam confirmed in this opinion by such a careful observer as F. S.A. Bourne, who referring to the journey of the Blackburn Cham-ber of Commerce Mission, 1 which traversed the whole Yang-tzuvalley and southwestern China, says : " From what we have seen onthis journey I should say that China could support twice her presentpopulation, and that each man might be twice as well off as he is now ;and this without any revolutionary change in their present mannerof life." 2
1 Rep. of Mission to China of Blackburn Chamber of Commerce, 1896-97,p. in.2 In a most interesting study entitled Tenure of Land in China and the Con-dition of the Rural Population (Jonrn. Cli. Br. Roy. Asiat. Soc, n. s., xxiii, pp.59-174), we find it stated (pp. 76-79) on excellent authority that " it is impos-sible to say with any sort of exactness what proportion of the whole soil ofChina is tilled by peasant owners, but probably it cannot be put at less thanone-half. The other moiety is owned in great measure by retired officials andtheir families, the class known as the literati and gentry. . . . Considerabletracts of land are owned by such families, and it is the invariable rule inthese cases to lease the land to small farmers. In the central and populousparts of China these holdings are exceedingly small, often less than an Eng-lish acre, seldom larger than three or four acres. . . . Most lands yield oneor more subsidiary crops in the course of the year, besides the principal crop.
. . . On the frontier provinces, where the soil is poorer and the populationmore sparse, the size of the holdings is in general much larger than in thecentra] provinces, and the people would seem as a rule to be better off. Butas population increases there seems everywhere to be a strong tendency forholdings to become reduced to the minimum size that will support a single
rockhill] rhe population of chinaEnumerations of the Population of China, 1761-1885. ?2IProvim is