In the lowest line the same values are given, but more roughly, to the nearest whole percentage.
It will assist in comprehending the values of different grades of civic worth to compare them with the corresponding grades of adult male stature in our nation. I will take the figures from my “Natural Inheritance,” premising that the distribution of stature in various peoples has been well investigated and shown to be closely normal. The average height of the adult males, to whom my figures refer, was nearly 5 feet 8 inches, and the value of their “normal-talent” (which is a measure of the spread of distribution) was very nearly 1–3/4 inches. From these data it is easily reckoned that Class U would contain men whose heights exceed 6 feet 1–1/4 inches. Even they are tall enough to overlook a hatless mob, while the higher classes, such as V, W and X, tower above it in an increasingly marked degree. So the civic worth (however that term may be defined) of U-class men, and still more of V-class, are notably superior to the crowd, though they are far below the heroic order. The rarity of a V-class man in each specified quality or group of qualities is as 35 in 10,000, or say, for the convenience of using round numbers, as 1 to 300. A man of the W class is ten times rarer, and of the X class rarer still; but I shall avoid giving any more exact definition of X than as a value considerably rarer than V. This gives a general but just idea of the distribution throughout a population of each and every quality taken separately so far as it is normally distributed. As already mentioned, it does the same for any group of normal qualities; thus, if marks for classics and for mathematics were severally normal in their distribution, the combined marks gained by each candidate in both those subjects would be distributed normally also, this being one of the many interesting properties of the law of frequency.
Comparison of the Normal Classes with those of Mr. Booth.—Let us now compare the normal classes with those into which Mr. Charles Booth has divided the population of all London in a way that corresponds not unfairly with the ordinary conception of grades of civic worth. He reckons them from the lowest upwards, and gives the numbers in each class for East London. Afterwards he treats all London in a similar manner, except that sometimes he combines two classes into one and gives the joint result. For my present purpose, I had to couple them somewhat differently, first disentangling them as I best could. There seemed no better way of doing this than by assigning to the members of each couplet the same proportions that they had in East London. Though this was certainly not accurate, it is probably not far wrong. Mr. Booth has taken unheard of pains in this great work of his to arrive at accurate results, but he emphatically says that his classes cannot be separated sharply from one another. On the contrary, their frontiers blend, and this justifies me in taking slight liberties with his figures. His class A consists of criminals, semi-criminals, loafers and some others, who are in number at the rate of 1 per cent. in all London—that is 100 per 10,000, or nearly three times as many as the v class: they therefore include the whole of v and spread upwards into the u. His class B consists of very poor persons who subsist on casual earnings, many of whom are inevitably poor from shiftlessness, idleness or drink. The numbers in this and the A class combined closely correspond with those in t and all below t.
Table II.—Comparison of Mr. Booth’s Classification of All London with the Normal Classes.
| Nos. | Mr. Booth’s classes. | Approx. | Resorted. | Approx. | Nos. | Normal classes. | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 97 | H. All above G | 100 | 100 | 100 | 89 | T and above | ||||
| 200 |  | G. Lower Middle |  | 200 | | 150 | 150 | 161 | S | |
| F. High-class labour above 30s. per week | 50 | | 250 | 250 | R | |||||
| 382 | E. Regular standard earnings from 22s. to | | 400 | | 200 | |||||
| 30s. per week | 200 | | 250 | 250 | r | |||||
| 227 | | D. Regular earnings under 22s. per week | | 200 | | 50 | ||||
| C. Intermittent earnings, improvident, poor | 150 | 150 | 161 | s | ||||||
| 94 | | B. Casual; very poor A. Criminals, loafers, &c. | | 100 | 100 | 100 | 89 | t and below | ||
| 1000 | 1000 | 1000 | 1000 | |||||||
The two columns headed “Nos.” give respectively the numbers per thousand in Mr. Booth’s and in the Normal Classes.
Class C are supported by intermittent earnings; they are a hard-working people, but have a very bad character for improvidence and shiftlessness. In Class D the earnings are regular, but at the low rate of twenty-one shillings or less a week, so none of them rise above poverty, though none are very poor. D and C together correspond to the whole of s combined with the lower fifth of r. The next class, E, is the largest of any, and comprises all those with regular standard earnings of twenty-two to thirty shillings a week. This class is the recognised field for all forms of co-operation and combination; in short for trades unions. It corresponds to the upper four-fifths of r, combined with the lower four-fifths of R. It is therefore essentially the mediocre class, standing as far below the highest in civic worth as it stands above the lowest class with its criminals and semi-criminals. Next above this large mass of mediocrity comes the honourable class F, which consists of better paid artisans and foremen. These are able to provide adequately for old age, and their sons become clerks and so forth. G is the lower middle class of shopkeepers, small employers, clerks and subordinate professional men, who as a rule are hard-working, energetic and sober. F and G combined correspond to the upper fifth of R and the whole of S, and are, therefore, a counterpart to D and C. All above G are put together by Mr. Booth into one class H, which corresponds to our T, U, V and above, and is the counterpart of his two lowermost classes, A and B. So far, then, as these figures go, civic worth is distributed in fair approximation to the normal law of frequency. We also see that the classes t, u, v and below are undesirables.
Worth of Children.—The brains of the nation lie in the higher of our classes. If such people as would be classed W or X could be distinguishable as children and procurable by money in order to be reared as Englishmen, it would be a cheap bargain for the nation to buy them at the rate of many hundred or some thousands of pounds per head. Dr. Farr, the eminent statistician, endeavoured to estimate the money worth of an average baby born to the wife of an Essex labourer and thenceforward living during the usual time and in the ordinary way of his class. Dr. Farr, with accomplished actuarial skill, capitalised the value at the child’s birth of two classes of events, the one the cost of maintenance while a child and when helpless through old age, the other its earnings as boy and man. On balancing the two sides of the account the value of the baby was found to be five pounds. On a similar principle, the worth of an X-class baby would be reckoned in thousands of pounds. Some such “talented” folk fail, but most succeed, and many succeed greatly. They found great industries, establish vast undertakings, increase the wealth of multitudes and amass large fortunes for themselves. Others, whether they be rich or poor, are the guides and light of the nation, raising its tone, enlightening its difficulties and imposing its ideals. The great gain that England received through the immigration of the Huguenots would be insignificant to what she would derive from an annual addition of a few hundred children of the classes W and X. I have tried, but not yet succeeded to my satisfaction, to make an approximate estimate of the worth of a child at birth according to the class he is destined to occupy when adult. It is an eminently important subject for future investigators, for the amount of care and cost that might profitably be expended in improving the race clearly depends on its result.
Descent of Qualities in a Population.—Let us now endeavour to obtain a correct understanding of the way in which the varying qualities of each generation are derived from those of its predecessor. How many, for example, of the V class in the offspring come respectively from the V, U, T, S and other classes of parentage? The means of calculating this question for a normal population are given fully in my “Natural Inheritance.” There are three main senses in which the word parentage might be used. They differ widely, so the calculations must be modified accordingly, (1) The amount of the quality or faculty in question may be known in each parent. (2) It may be known in only one parent. (3) The two parents may belong to the same class, a V-class father in the scale of male classification always marrying a V-class mother, occupying identically the same position in the scale of female classification.