The population of Porto Rico is 65.5 per cent, or nearly two thirds, white, 30 per cent mulatto, and 4.5 per cent black. It is 98.9 per cent native and 1.1 per cent foreign born. During the period from 1899 to 1910 there was an increase in the total population of the Island of 17.3 per cent, which covered an increase of 25 per cent for the native whites, a decrease of 14.5 per cent for the foreign born whites, a decrease of 15.4 per cent for the blacks, and an increase of 10.1 per cent for the mulattoes. The decrease in the number of foreign born whites is due to the fact that in the census of 1899 this group included persons born in the United States, while in 1910 these were classified as natives. The decrease in the number of blacks is doubtless due to intermarriage with other classes, and as a result we have the children of such marriages classified as mulattoes. If the number of such marriages were sufficiently great, the births of blacks would be insufficient to offset the deaths, and the number of blacks would, in that case, necessarily decrease. On this assumption we might very well prophesy that within a few generations the black population in Porto Rico will absolutely disappear, and that we shall have an increased number of mulattoes who, in their turn, will tend to disappear, as they mingle in marriage with people of less colored blood, and in time the black race will be practically absorbed by the whites. Of the foreign countries represented, Spain, with 56.3 per cent of the total foreign born, leads the list. Cuba and the other West Indies have 20.5 per cent to their credit, France 5.8 per cent, Italy 3.1 per cent, England 2.9 per cent, Germany 1.9 per cent, Denmark 1.6 per cent, while no other single country contributes so much as one per cent to the foreign born population. The total number of foreign born in 1910 was 11,766. The rural population of 893,392 was divided among the races as follows: Whites 604,541, blacks 32,918, mulattoes 255,923. Thus we see that the great majority of the rural population is of the white race, due no doubt, to the fact that the colder climate of the highlands of the interior does not agree with the hereditary love which the colored race has for a warm climate. The population of Porto Rico comprises a mixture of bloods and races that complicates the social problems of the Island. The French, Italian, and Spanish elements have tended to mix with the descendants of the Indians originally found here, and to this has been added in many cases a mixture of the blood of the colored race, introduced as slaves into the Island. In some cases the races from the north of Europe have also mingled, so that to-day it is inaccurate to speak of the Porto Ricans as a people of one blood, and the characteristics of the people might be called a composite of the various race elements which have entered into the formation of the native population.