In Ceylon a considerable disparity is exhibited by the returns. According to Pridham, it is found in the greatest degree among the Sinhalese, among whom the surplus of men averages twelve per cent., but it is also observable in the case of the Malabar population in the northern province, where the surplus of men averages six per cent.[2920] Robert Orme states that, in India, the number of women exceeds that of men;[2921] but this is certainly not the case in every part of the country. In a census of the North-West Provinces, taken during the year 1866, the proportions between the sexes were found to be 100 men to 86·6 women, and, in the Panjab, even 100 to 81·8.[2922] In some districts of the Himalayas there is a surplus of males, in others of females.[2923] In Kashmir, the proportion of men to women is as three to one.[2924] In the Buddhist country of Ladakh, says Sir A. Cunningham, “it will be observed that the females outnumber the males, while the reverse is the case in the Mussulman districts along the Indus.”[2925] In Malwa, in Central India, the number of women surpasses the number of men,[2926] and the same, according to Sir John Bowring, is to a great extent the case in China.[2927] The Todas of the Neilgherry Hills, on the other hand, amounted in the year 1867, according to Mr. Breeks, to 455 males and 249 females of all ages, whilst Mr. Marshall some few years ago found the Toda males of all ages bear the proportion to females of all ages of 100 to 75.[2928] Among the Mongols, as we are informed by Prejevalsky, “the women are far less numerous than the men;”[2929] and the same is said to have been the case with the Massagetæ, and to be the case still in Kamchatka.[2930]
As for the peoples of Africa, I have found two cases only of an excess of men, the one among the population of Galega, to the north-east of Madagascar, the other among the Quissama tribe in Angola.[2931] The reverse seems decidedly to be the rule. Thus, from Morocco Dr. Churcher writes to me that “there appears to be a striking disproportion, though there is no such thing as statistics in this land.” In Ma Bung, in the Timannee country, Major Laing counted three women to one man.[2932] A census taken in Lagos in 1872 showed among the population of African origin, 27,774 men and 32,353 women.[2933] Among the Negroes of the Gold Coast, according to Bosman; in Latúka, according to Emin Pasha; among the Waguha of West Tanganyika, according to Mr. A. J. Swann; among the Wa-taïta, according to Mr. Joseph Thomson, women predominate.[2934] Mr. Cousins is inclined to think that the same is the case with the Cis-Natalian Kafirs, “as there are few bachelors, and the majority of men have more than one wife.”[2935] In Uganda, says the Rev. C. T. Wilson, “the female population is largely in excess of the male, the proportion being about three and a half to one.”[2936]
In European countries, the number of men and of women from fifteen to twenty years of age is generally almost the same; but in an earlier period of life there are more men than women, and, in a later, more women than men.[2937]
This disparity in the numbers of the sexes is due to various causes. The preponderance of women depends to a great extent upon the higher mortality of men. Dr. Sutherland found that the average age of 109 Eskimo was nearly 22 years—that of the females 24·5, that of the males 19·3 years.[2938] The men pass most of their time at sea, in snow and rain, heat and cold, and many of them are drowned. The result of this troublesome and dangerous life is that few of them attain the age of fifty, whereas many women reach the age of seventy or even eighty. This, according to Dr. King, is the reason why, among this people, there are generally fewer men than women.[2939] Mr. Bancroft states that, among the Ingaliks near the mouth of the Yukon, some of the women reach sixty, while the men rarely attain more than forty-five years.[2940] In Europe, the death-rate is higher among men than among women, partly because of the greater dangers they are exposed to. Among many savage and barbarous peoples, however, the greater mortality of the male population depends chiefly upon the destructive influence of war.[2941] “As all nations of Indians in their natural condition,” says Mr. Catlin, “are unceasingly at war with the tribes that are about them, ... their warriors are killed off to that extent, that in many instances two, or sometimes three women to a man are found in a tribe.”[2942] According to Ellis, it is supposed by the Missionaries in Madagascar that, in consequence of the destructive ravages of war, in some of the provinces there are among the free portion of the inhabitants five, and in other three, women to one man, whilst the proportion of the sexes seems to be equal at birth.[2943] But I am inclined to think that this cause operates principally at tolerably advanced stages of civilization, and only in a smaller degree among the rudest savages, who, devoid of any definite tribal organization, live a wandering life, scattered in families or hordes consisting of a few persons. Thus, with regard to the Yahgans of Tierra del Fuego, Mr. Bridges writes to me, “On several occasions when some hundreds of natives have been gathered together, I have taken censuses of them, and have always found the sexes equal or nearly so.... War was unknown, though fightings were frequent, but women took part in them as energetically as the men, and suffered equally with them—if anything, more.” Among the Australians also, as we have seen, wars do not cause any disproportion between the sexes.
The surplus of males is often due to female infanticide;[2944] and among certain peoples there is another cause which must be taken into account. Captain Lewin states that, among the Toungtha, women die at a comparatively early age because of the constant labour which their sex entails upon them, whereas the men live very long.[2945] And the same is said by Mr. Kirby with regard to the Kutchin.[2946]
Moreover, there is a disproportion between the sexes at birth. Among some peoples more boys are born, among others more girls; and the surplus is often considerable. Mr. Ross thinks that, among the Eastern Tinneh, “the proportion of births is rather in favour of females,” whilst the Aht women seem to have more boys than girls.[2947] Von Humboldt found by examining baptismal registers, that more boys than girls were born in some communities of New Spain.[2948] The same, according to M. Belly, is the case among the Indians of Guatemala and Nicaragua.[2949]
In the interior of Australia, Mr. Sturt met with several smaller tribes in which the number of girls was considerably greater than the number of boys, though in other tribes the proportion of births is in favour of males.[2950] Sir. G. Grey drew up a list of 222 births, and of these 93 were females, 129 males.[2951] In Tasmania, where the men were more numerous than the women, female infanticide was very rare.[2952] The same is the case with the Sinhalese. They hold in abhorrence the crime of exposing children, says Dr. Davy; and it is never committed except in some of the wildest parts of the country, and even there only when the parents themselves are on the brink of starvation, and must either sacrifice a part of the family or die.[2953] Haeckel assures us that among this people there is a permanent disproportion between male and female births, ten boys being born, on the average, to eight or nine girls.[2954] Among the Todas, as we are informed by Mr. Marshall, the male children under fourteen years of age bear to the female children of the same period—ages estimated from their personal appearance—the ratio of 100 to 80·0,[2955] though female infanticide is never practised, having long since become extinct through the action of the British Government.[2956] Mr. Man’s inquiries tended to show that, among the Andamanese, there is a slight predominance of female over male births.[2957]
Bruce observes, “From a diligent inquiry into the South and Scripture-part of Mesopotamia, Armenia, and Syria, from Mousul (or Nineveh) to Aleppo and Antioch, I find the proportion to be fully two women born to one man. There is indeed, a fraction over, but not a considerable one. From Latikea, Laodicea ad mare, down the coast of Syria to Sidon, the number is very nearly three, or two and three-fourths to one man. Through the Holy Land, the country called Horan, in the Isthmus of Suez, and the parts of the Delta, unfrequented by strangers, it is something less than three. But from Suez to the Straits of Babelmandeb, which contains the three Arabias, the portion is fully four women to one man, which, I have reason to believe, holds as far as the Line, and 30° beyond it.” The manner in which Bruce came to these conclusions he describes as follows:—“Whenever I went into a town, village, or inhabited place, dwelt long in a mountain, or travelled journeys with any set of people, I always made it my business to inquire how many children they had, or their fathers, their next neighbours, or acquaintance. This not being a captious question, or what any one would scruple to answer, there was no interest to deceive.... I say, therefore, that a medium of both sexes arising from three or four hundred families indiscriminately taken, shall be the proportion in which one differs from the other.”[2958]
This statement has been contradicted, but, so far as I know, it has not been proved to be wholly without foundation. It is to some extent made credible by what Dr. Churcher informs me regarding the disproportion of the sexes among the Moors of Morocco. As the result of his own observation, and that of a Mohammedan friend of his, he writes, “There is certainly a disproportion also at birth.... It would be safe to say that the female births are in the proportion of three females to one male; this partly accounts for the great rejoicing when a son is born. It reacts, however, in this way, that the people say, ‘Allah has given us more women than men, hence it is evident that polygamy is of God.’” In the Monbuttu country, according to Emin Pasha, “far more female children are born than males.”[2959] And, regarding the disproportion between the sexes in Uganda, Mr. Wilson says, “Careful observation has established the fact that there are a good many more female births than male, and, on taking the groups of children playing by the roadside, there will always be found to be more girls than boys.”[2960] Confronted by these definite statements, and by the fact that, in many African countries, there is a striking excess of women, we cannot with Süssmilch and Chervin[2961] dismiss as wholly groundless Montesquieu’s well-known assertion that in the hot regions of the Old World more girls are born than boys,[2962] although such disproportion certainly does not exist in every tropical country.
In Europe, the average male births outnumber the female by about five per cent., the still-born being excluded. But the rate varies in the different countries. Thus, in Russian Poland, only 101 boys are born to 100 girls, whilst, in Roumania and Greece, the proportion is 111 to 100.[2963] The excess of male over female births is less when they are illegitimate than when legitimate.[2964]