In Austria, the price of rye was:

Per Metze. No. of Marriages.
In 1851,2.47 florins336,800
In 1852,2.11 florins316,800
In 1853,3.38 florins283,400
In 1854,4.36 florins258,000
In 1855,4.43 florins245,400 (Czörnig.)

On Sweden, see Wargentin in Malthus, II, ch. 2.

The decreased number of births in consequence of a bad harvest, and vice versa, appears of course only during the following calendar year. Thus, in 1847, as compared with the average of the years 1844 and 1845, there were fewer children born in England by 4 per 1,000, in Saxony by 7 per 1,000, in Lombardy by 59, in France by 63, in Prussia by 82, in Belgium by 122, in Holland by 159 per 1,000. (Horn, I, 239 ff.) In Germany, the conscription-years corresponding to the scarcity time, 1816-17, gave a minus of 25 per cent. in many places below the average. (Bernouilli, Populationistik, 219.) In the case of marriage, the relative increase or decrease is still more characteristic, so far as our purpose is concerned, than the absolute increase or decrease. Thus in Belgium, for instance, against 1,000 marriages dissolved by death, there were, in 1846, only 971 new ones contracted, and in 1847 only 747; while in 1850 there were 1,500. The falling off in Flanders alone was still greater. Thus, in 1847, there were only 447 marriages contracted for 1,000 dissolved. (Horn, I, 170 ff.) However, Berg, using Sweden as an illustration, rightly calls attention to the fact, that the variations in the number of marriages and births is determined in part by the number of adults, that is, of the number of births 20 and more years before. Compare Engel's Statist. Zeitschr., 1869, 7.

[240-3] Sometimes, a sudden increase in the frequency of marriages may have very accidental and transitory causes. Thus, for instance, in France in 1813, when the unmarried were so largely conscripted, the number of marriages rose to 387,000, whereas the average of the five previous years was 229,000. (Bernouilli, Populationistik, 103.)

[240-4] Thus, for instance, in nearly all countries affected by the movement of 1848, there were, during the last months of that year, an unusually large number of conceptions. (Horn., I, 241 seq.) According to Dieterici, Abh. der Berliner Akademie, 1855, 321 ff., there was one birth a year for the number of persons living.

Ten years' average.1849 alone.
In France,36.1935.79
In Tuscany,24.4222.82
In Saxony,24.5123.08
In Prussia,25.5023.62

The great majority of men at that time believed all they liked to believe.

[240-5] Marshall, Digest of all Accounts, I, 15. Porter, I, ch. I, 9.

[240-6] Wallace, in this respect, places industry far behind agriculture. (On the Numbers of mankind in ancient and modern Times.) The county of Lancashire had, in 1760, that is shortly before the introduction of the great machine industry, 297,000 inhabitants; in 1801, 672,000; in 1831, 1,336,000; in 1861, 2,490,000. Saxony has, in almost every place, a relatively large number of births in proportion as in any locality, commerce and industry preponderate over agriculture, and vice versa. See Engel, Bewegung der Bevölkerung im K. Sachsen, 1854. But this should not be generalized into a universal law. For instance, Prussia and Posen have an average number of births greater than that of the Rhine country and Westphalia. (v. Viebahn, Statistik des L. V, II, 222.)