Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1900-08-11
THE POPULATION OF CHINA
EXACT NUMBER OF PEOPLE WILL
NEVER BE AsCERTAINED.
More Tricky settled Than the Most
rope-Preponderanc of villages.

Shdi aSleristics OF the Chinese people. In
speaking of the great number OF villages
and of the efforts that have been made to
determine the population Of China, which
have never resulted in more than approx
mate guesses as 10 the real number OF her
people. the author says in part:
There are in India alone over half a
million villages In all Asia, not improb-
ably. there may be four times that number.
BY far the larger part of the most numer-
Gus people on the globe live in villages
The traveller in the Chinese empire may
start from some seaport, as Tien Tsin. and
journey for several months together in the
same general direction before reaching its
frontiers on the other side. In the course
OF such tour he will be impressed as
only one who has ocular evidence can be
impressed with the inconcevably great
number of Chinese altogether outside of The
great centers OF urban population. Contrary
10 the current notions OF westerners the
number of great cities is not relatively to the
whole population. anything like SO large in
china as in western lands. Many of the
district cities. capitals Of divisions anaio-
gous TO what We call counties are merely
large villages with a wall and with govern
ment bureaus called yamens 1t is known
that in India three-four;hs OF the popula-
ton is rural. In China there is perhaps
less.
On such 4 Journey as VIC have supposed
me traveller unacquainted with the Chinese
ilnds himself perpetually inquiring OF him
sell: what are these incompatible millions
OF human beings thinking about? What is
the quality of the life which they live?
Mat is its content and scopeP
questions like these cannot be answered
inteIilgenty without much explanation The
conditions and environment Of Chinese life
are so totally unlike those to which We
are accustomed that II is unsafe to take
ahythinS Tor granted. Amid certain funda-
mental M unities the life of the Chinese is full
or oewiidering and ,nexpicable variety No
matter how long one may have lived in
emma, there Is always just as much as
ever that he never before heard of hut
which everyone is supposed to have known
by Intuition. The oldest resident Is n stu
dent like the rest
The traveller in China. constantly sur
rounded by countless towns and hamlets
way the population OF the region which
he Is traversfng. Should ne venture, how
ever. TO ask any one the number of peo-
pie In a city. or the district which il gov
ems. he would get no other information
than that there are not few or who
knows" Almost any intelligent person
could tell approximately how MANY NIL
lages there are In his own county, but as
some of them are large and some small,
ana as Chinese. like other orientals care
absolutely nothing for statistics and have
the crudest notion Of what we mean by
an average. one is none the wiser for th,.r
information.
1T appears to be well settled that no
real dependence can be placed upon the
Chinese official returns, yet that they are
the only basis upon which rational eSfi-
mates can be based. and there have a Ger
tain value SO far as We are aware, eff
forts to come at the real population Der
square mile have generally proceeded from
such extensive units as provinces, or at
least procedures. the foundation and super
structure being alike A mere pagoda of
guesseS.
Some wears ago an effort was made in
certain district to make a more exact
computation Of the population of very
limited area. as sort or unit Of measure
For this purpose circle was taken. the
radius OF which was twenty H. the for
eign residence being a the center A list
was drawn IN Of every village having re-
ceived famine relief in the year 1875 so
that it was not difficult to make a prax!-
mate guess at the average number of fam
lies The villages were $50 in number
and the average size taken as eighty
families. which. reckoning five ! ersons to
the family. gave a total OF 60.on persons
Allowing six miles to be the equivalent Of
twenty III the popula ton of the square
mile would be 531. about the same as the
average OF the Kingdom of Relginm Ghe
most densely populated country In Europe,.
which had in 1870 an average of only .s,4
to the square mile.
AT a distance OF a few miles beyond
this circle there is a tract called the "Thir-
teen Villages because that is the number
within distance of five III This shows
that the particular region in which this
estimate was made happens to be I'M
favorable one for the purpose. as a con-
siderable part of il is waste. owing to al
old bed OF the Yellow river. which has de
vastated a broad band of land. on which
are no villages There Is also a water
course leading from the Grand canal To the
sea, and long depression much below The
general average. thinly occupied ny vii
lagos, because it is liable to serious inunda-
ton.
For these reasons If scanned des;ra HE IN
make a new count in a better spot, and FOR
this purpose district was chosen. situated
about ninety III east OF the sub-prefecture
of Lin Ching, to which ii belongs. The area
taken was only half the size Of the former.
and instead of merely estimating the aver
age population OF the villages the actual
number of families in each was taken. so
far as this number is known To the ma
tives. The man who prepared the village
map of the area is a native Of the central
village and a person Of excellent sense. lie
put the population in every case somewhat
below the popular estimate as to he
certainly within bounds. The number of
persons to family was still taken at
five, though. as he pointed cut. this is
totally inadequate allowance. Many fam
flies live and have all things in common,
and are, therefore. counted one although
as in the case of this particular Individual,
the family may consist of some twenty
persons. To the traveller the villages ap-
pear to be both large and thickly clustered,
and the enumeration shows this to be the
case. Within a radius Of ten TT thrae
miles) there are sixty-four villages the
smallest having thirty families and the
largest more than 1000, while the average
is 1SS families. The total number Of fam
flies Is 1000. and the total number of per-
sons, at five to the family. is 200. or
more than double the estimate for the
gion with twice the diameter. This gives
a population OF 9. 100 TO the square mile
$50 far as appearances go. there are thou
sands of square miles in southern and CEN
trail Chih-li, western and southwestern
Shantung and northern Holman, where the
villages are as thick In this one tract
the contents of which We are thus able
approximately to compute. But for the
plain of north China as a whole Ii is prob
able that ii would be found more reason
able to estimate 200 persons to the square
mile for the more sparsely settled districts.
and from LOCO to 1900 for the more thickly
settled regions. In any case vivid impress
sion is thus gained OF the enormous num-
Der OF human beings crowded into thes6
fertile and historic plains, and also OF the
almost insuperable difficulties in the way
of exact knowledge Of the true CEN
sus.'
=. AZ.