any alteration in the age, sex or marital condition of the population; by any refusal or postponement of marriage; or by any of the effects of 'urbanization' or physical deterioration of sections of the community. The statistical evidence points, in fact, unmistakably to the existence of a volitional regulation of the marriage state that is now ubiquitous throughout England and Wales, among, apparently, a large majority of the population. To verify this inference it seemed necessary to obtain direct individual evidence from a sufficiently large number of persons, taken haphazard from different parts of the country, and from different social grades. This the committee of the Fabian Society set itself to obtain.
The procedure adopted was to obtain a voluntary census from a sufficiently large number of married people who could be relied upon to give frank and truthful answers to a detailed interrogatory. For this information resort was had to between 600 and 700 persons, from whom the committee had grounds of hope that answers would be received. About half of these persons resided in the metropolitan area, the remainder being scattered sparsely over the rest of Great Britain. In social grade, they included a most varied selection of occupations, extending from the skilled artisan to the professional man and the small property owner; omitting, on the one hand, the great army of laborers, and, on the other (with few exceptions), the tiny fraction of the population who have incomes from investments exceeding £1,000 a year. They were, of course, selected without the slightest reference to the subject of the inquiry; so little, indeed, was known about them from this standpoint that more than 20 per cent, of them proved to be unmarried, and thus unable to bear testimony. They were invited to give the information desired without revealing their identity, the form being so arranged as to enable it to be filled up by nothing more easily recognizable than crosses and figures.[1] Altogether 634 forms were sent out. From these there have to be deducted, for one reason or another, 158—viz., 114 bachelors, 30 duplicates (wives of husbands making returns), five which failed to get delivered by post office, two refusals, five returned blank or incomprehensible, and two relating to marriages abroad. Of the 476 remaining, 174 did not reply. Whether these should be added to the number of those who candidly confessed to having taken steps to regulate the births in their families, or to those who had taken no such steps, or in what proportion they should be distributed between the two, the reader must judge for himself. Significant replies were received from 302 persons. But as 14 of the returns included particulars of two marriages, the total number of marriages of which particulars are recorded is 316. In six cases the papers contain references to second marriages of which insufficient particulars
- ↑ I append the questions asked. (See opposite page.)
