From the admirable statistical returns of the condition of the labouring poor in France, prepared for the _Bureau de l'Intérieure_, it appears that the number of widows in that country amounts to the enormous number of 1,738,000.[10] This, out of a population now of about 34,000,000, is as nearly as possible _one in twenty_ of the entire population! Population is advancing much more rapidly in Great Britain than France; for in the former country it is doubling in about 60 years, in the latter in 106. It is certain, therefore, that the proportion of widows must be greater in this country than in France, especially in the manufacturing districts, where early marriages, from the ready employment for young children, are so frequent; and early deaths, from the unhealthiness of employment or contagious disorders, are so common. But call the proportion the same: let it be taken at a twentieth part of the existing population. At this rate, the two millions of strangers who, during the last forty years, have been thrown into the four northern counties of Lancaster, York, Stafford, and Warwick, must contain at this moment _a hundred thousand widows_. The usual average of a family is two and a half children--call it two only. There will thus be found to be 200,000 children belonging to these 100,000 widows. It is hardly necessary to say, that the great majority, probably four-fifths of this immense body, must be in a state of destitution. We know in what state the fatherless and widows are in their affliction, and who has commanded us to visit them. On the most moderate calculation, 250,000, or an eighth of the whole population, must be in a state of poverty and privation. And in Scotland, where, during the same period of forty years, 350,000 strangers have been suddenly huddled together on the banks of the Clyde, the proportion may be presumed to be the same; or, in other words, _thirty thousand_ widows and orphans are constantly there in a state deserving of pity, and requiring support, hardly any of whom receive more from the parish funds than _a shilling a-week_, even for the maintenance of a whole family.