The Milan exchange. (Milan, Gibson County, Tenn.) 1874-1978, 1880-11-11
The New Census---The Great Work OF
Preparing 1t for Publication.


A person standing on the bank of {
stream, where it empties its tribute Of
water into larger river or the sea,
may reflect that the brook which he
sees passing so clear and smooth has
met with many vicissitudes on it's busy
and useful journey. The current now
so strong and stately oozed into sight
drop by drop. The little pearly parti-
cles tumbled over one another in theiI
fall, broke against stones and shrubs,
were dispersed and united again and
again until they assumed a definite
character and gained recognition and
name. Then came many adventures.
The cattle and schoolboys sought the
brooks delights; it was dashed to mists
of spray at the village falls; it was
churned to foam by successive water
wheels, boiled in engines, subserved
the needs of village and now after ali
flows in a calm and pellucid stream to
the sea.
One who is familiar with the office
business of the census is reminded OF
some such natural analogy as this when
he learns that, after all necessary prep
aration, the results of the enumeration
are now in shape to warrant the Of
flee in beginning their publication. A
person not thus acquainted with the
sort and amount of work involved has
no conception of the difficulties to be
overcome. To begin with, there were
bad laws to revise, important executive
selections to make and suitable plans to
be adopted. Then nearly fifty million
persons were visited and asked their
name, age, occupation, with such other
particulars as were deemed important
| Ali of these millions do not reside in
brown-stone blocks. The enumerators
were advised in their instructions to be
careful to find those that live in lofts,
in public buildings, above stores, ware
houses, factories and stables, in
cabins, hutS or tents, on river
and canal boats, barges and
police stations. Many are ignorant
and vicious, many more are careless in
statements, suspicious or Indifferent.
Fathers and mothers, " especially the
latter" says the Superintendent, are
unwilling to tell the enumerator that a
child of theirs is blind, deaf and dumb,
insane, idiotic or crippled. Others are
averSe to giving information as to their
own age, color or business. Neverthe-
less the law required just these facts
from every one, and hence the more
than thirty thousand enumerators were
strictly charged to get at them, either
by direct inquiry of the persons them
selves, or their neighbOrs or through
any other source of information that
presented itself. They must sift as well
as receive statements. 1.-The enumera-
tor says the instructions, 50 is not re-
CURED to accept answers which he
knows or has reason to believe are
false" His Judgment, therefore. enters
as an element in the returns as made to
the office
Thus armed with eighteen pages of
instructions and four large schedules
the army of interrogation-points on legs
set out on the house to house and farm
to farm canvass of their respective dis
tricts. Some of them understood their
business; others did not. Some were
faithful and efficient; others were not.
A student of human nature will find
many varieties of mind and disposition
among thirty thousand men. Upon the
whole, and speaking broadly, the work
of enumeration and inquiry was well
done.
Thus the drops oozed forth, one by
one, more or less muddy, and came
together through the mails-somewha
at hap-hazard, it must be confessed, and
rejecting the frailties and perversities
OF the fallen finite mind. Think of it;
the statistics of nearly fifty million per-
sons, with many separate facts about
each, to be appropriately referred to
divisions, examined, compared, dis
cussed, corrected, revised and perfect
ed; illegible chirogaphy is to be deci-
phered, bad spelling corrected, obscure
figures determined, false totals detect
ed and the lurking errors traced and
set right; discrepancies corrected,
deficiencies supplied; all this takes
time, skill and money. The John
Smiths charged to the female column
and the Mary Smiths in the male col
umn had to be put into their proper
places. In column thirteen, in which
was reported the occupation of each
person ten years of age and upward,
the various interpretations of the emu
merators had to be reduced to the
nomenclature of the Office. If in dis
trict the total was one thousand and the
males and females, or native and
foreign, or white or colored amounted to
only nine hundred and ninety-nine the
discrepancy had to be noted, hunted
out and corrected.
1t is great work. People amuse
themselves by calculating how long a
time it will take them to count mill
ion. In the Census Bureau, the names
of nearly fifty million people are watch
fully counted twice-that makes in
round numbers one hundred million
the items of inaccuracy observable in
each name and its subjoined particulars
carefully noticed, comparison of the
counts made, aud the errors thus
brought to light analysed and. with
more or less facility, corrected. And
what tenacity of life Error sometimes
has, and what fecundity in propagating
its kind? How it vitiates one total and
one set of totals after another till, like
all error, it comes to light at last and is
thence ferreted out, step by step, to its
source.
In this patient fashion the crude ma
terials of the census refinery Ito adopt
a new comparison) have been worked
over again and again until now they be-
gin to be in shape to present to the
public. The first of the series of bulle-
tins contemplated by the Office is ex-
pected to be ready in a few days. 1t
will deal simply with the tables of pop
ulatiOn, giving, so far as has been as
certained, the totals of counties with
regard to sex, nativity and color, and