Loring's Massachusetts Register, or Record Book of Valuable Information, for the year 1817. Designed as a Suitable Companion for the Professional Man, the Merchant, the Public Officer, and the Private Citizen. Boston: James Loring, 132 Washington Street.
This volume is the eightieth of the Massachusetts Register, and its value as a work of reference will, we think, be appreciated by the public for as many years to come. Such a work is much needed by all classes of business men throughout the state. It comprises statistics of civil officers; professional men; societies and associations, literary, scientific, religious, and benevolent; commerce; mercantile affairs; naval and military officers; courts and justices; institutions of learning, and also those for benevolent purposes; corporations of all kinds. It is literally multum in parvo. Mr. Loring, who has much of a historical taste, deserves great praise for his endeavors to render it accurate and useful; and it should have an extensive circulation in the state.
The publishers of the Register have been as follows:
In 1767, Mein and Fleming, at the London Bookstore, north side of King street, now State street; in 1774, Mills and Hicks, School street, next door to Brackett's Tavern, sign of Cromwell's Head; in 1779, Thomas and John Fleet, sign of the Bible and Heart, corner of Cornhill and Water street; in 1801, John West and Manning and Loring, until 1813, when its publishers were West, Richardson, and Lord, and the present publisher, who has been a proprietor for forty-six years past.
A Statistical View of the Population of Massachusetts, from 1765 to 1840. By Jesse Chickering. Boston: Charles C. Little and James Brown. 1846. pp. 160.
"The object of this essay is to exhibit the increase of the population of Massachusetts, and the changes which have taken place in the number and proportion of the inhabitants in the several parts of the Commonwealth, during the period of seventy-five years from 1765 to 1840." "The censuses consulted in the preparation of this work are the Colonial census, ordered in 1764 and finished in 1765, and the six censuses of the United States, taken at intervals of ten years, from 1790 to 1840." The number of inhabitants in Massachusetts in 1765, from various calculations is estimated at 244,149, exclusive of 1,569 Indians. In 1790, according to the United States census published in 1791, the population was 378,787, which is adopted as the true number; in 1800 it was 422,845; in 1810, 472,040; in 1820, 523,287; in 1830, 610,408; and in 1840, 737,700.
The U. S. censuses of 1790, 1800, and 1820 were taken August 1st; and those of 1810, 1830, and 1840 were taken July 1st; so that the intervals between the second and third, and the fourth and fifth were two months less than ten years, while that between the third and fourth was two months more than ten years. These differences in the length of the intervals affect the numerical results, but so slightly, as not to be materially important in the comparative results, especially for so long a period as from 1790 to 1840. The least increase discovered in any period is in that embracing the time from 1810 to 1820; probably owing in some degree to the war then existing with Great Britain and the emigration of many citizens to the West. In the period from 1765 to 1790, the increase was greater than it has ever been.
The increase of Boston, in proportion to its inhabitants, from 1765 to 1790 was very much less than that of the country towns, while from 1790 to 1840 it was very much greater, thus showing the modern tendency to centralization. Besides the great amount of statistical matter of which the above is an exceedingly brief epitome, it contains a table showing the average number of inhabitants in each year, according to the U. S. censuses, together with the increase, on the supposition of a uniform rate of increase in each year, the same being carried on to 1850, at the rate of increase from 1830 to 1840. Much other valuable matter is contained in this publication; manifestly of great labor and of apparent accuracy. Such a work as this of Dr. Chickering was much needed to rectify the many errors which had arisen in the taking and computing the censuses. We only add, that could such a statistical view be taken of every state in the Union, many important facts would be discovered and many data be obtained, from which inferences might perhaps be drawn greatly interesting and useful.