DEPOPULATION IN FRANCE.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVIII, Issue 2709, 13 January 1910, Page 2

DEPOPULATION IN FRANCE.

BARON D’ESTOURNELLES’ REMEDIES.

The French “Journal Officiel” publishes statistics of the movement- of population in France for the first half of the present year as compared with the same period last year. The chief figures are as follows; 1909 1908. Marriages ••• 156,294 162,495 Divorces ••• 6,148 5,605 Births ... 395,710 411,402 Deaths ... 426,913 401,894 Thus there is a diminution of births of 12,692, and an increase of deaths of 50,019. The excess of d-eaths over births is 20,203, and if this proportion is maintained in the latter half of the present year the result will be even worse than iu the year 1907—the sixth year since the Franco-German War, in which the population of France lias shown an actual diminution.

Baron d’Estournelles de Constant contributes in the “Matin” an interesting article on the subject. He is not a believer in prizes for large families, but he points out that _ the presentfiscal legislation of France imposes, as it were, prizes for small ones. “It- favors celibacy, childless homes, and the exploitation of women. Childhood in France is not honored as it is in other countries. We are not disdainful towards our children however few they may be, they seem to ocemiv too much room in the house. We send them out to nurse, and get rid of them until they have to go to barracks or get married. A father of a family is ridiculed. A family .is taxed as -a luxury the . unmarried man being positively let off lightly, as though lie were a more useful servant of his country. The mother of a family cannot find employment, dogs and children are only admitted on sufferance into houses owned by respectable landlords.”