t this
survey we are using the statistics of the years immediately before the
war.) But this state of things cannot last long, for the net increase in
such countries is invariably high, either by reason of a very high
birth-rate, as in Roumania, or because newcomers flock in to enjoy a
land of plenty. Another condition which leads to abnormally rapid
increase is found when a civilised nation conquers and administers a
backward country, introducing better methods of agriculture, and
especially irrigation and the reclamation of waste lands. The alien
Government also gives greater security, without raising the standard of
living among the natives, since the dominant race usually monopolises
the lucrative careers. In this way we are directly responsible for
increasing the population of Egypt from seven millions in 1883 to nine
and three-quarter millions in 1899, an augmentation which, in the
absence of immigration, illustrates the great natural fertility of the
human race in the rare circumstances when unchecked increase is
possible. Still more remarkable is the rise in the population of Java
from five millions in 1825 to twenty-eight and a half millions in the
first decade of this century. The cause of this increase is the
augmented supply of food combined with a very low standard of living, a
combination which is specially characteristic of Asia, where extreme
supersaturation exists in India and China. A third cause is production
of goods which can be exchanged for food grown abroad. This exchange, as
we have seen, is stimulated by the presence of capital seeking
employment. Our large towns are the creation of the capitalist, much
more than if he had populated their depressing streets with his own
children. Fourthly, a reduction in the standard of living of course
makes a larger population possible. The misery of the working class in
the generation after the Napoleonic Wars was a condition of the
prosperity of our export trade at this period; and conversely, the
prosperity of our export trade was necessary to the existence of the new
inhabitants. Capitalism is the cause of our dense population; and the
proletariat would infallibly cut their own throats by destroying it.

It is an important question whether a crowded population adds to the
security of a nation or not. Numbers are undoubtedly of great importance
in modern warfare. The French would have been less able to resist the
Germans without allies in 1914 than they we