X HE number of its inhabitants?
The following table Ihews the number of perfons imported for the eftablilhment of our colony in its infant ftate, and the cenfus of inhabitants at different periods, extradied from our hiftorians and public records, as particularly as I have had op- portunities and leifure to examine them.
Succeffive lines in the fame year fhew fuc- ceffive periods of time in that year. I have ftated the cenfus in two different columns, the whole inhabitants having been fometimes numbered, and fometimes the tjthes only. This term, with us, includes the free males above 1 6 years of age, and flaves above that age of both fexes. A further examination of our records would render this hiftory of our population much more fatisfadory and perfeft, by furnifhing a greater number of intermediate terms. Thefe, however, which are here ftated will enable us to calculate, with a Y confiderable degree of precifion, the rate at which we have increafed* During the infancy of the colony, while numbers were fmail, wars, importations, and other accidential circumftances render the pro- greffion fluftuating and irregular. By the year 1 654, however, it becomes tolerably uniform, importations having in a great meafure ceafed from the diflblution of the company, and the inhabitants become too numerous to be fenfibly afFefted by Indian wars. Beginning at that period, there- fore, we find that from thence to the year 1772, our tythes had increafed from 7209 to 153,000. The whole term being of I i 8 years, yields a duplication once in every 27^ years. The intermediate enumerations taken in 1700, 1748, and 1759, furnifh proofs of the uniformity of this progreffion. Should this rate of increafe continue, we fhall have between fix and feven millions of inhabitants with- in 95 years.