[Sidenote: The Race Proportions]
The diagram at the end of the book, taken from the Report of the
Commissioner-General of Immigration for 1905, will help us to fix in
mind the race proportions of the present immigration. The increase of
1905 over 1904 was 213,629. Almost one half of this was from
Austria-Hungary, and all of it was from four countries, the other three
being Russia, Italy, and the United Kingdom. There was a decrease from
Germany, Sweden, and Norway.
_II. The Inflow Since 1820_
[Sidenote: Immigration Totals since 1820]
We have been considering thus far the immigration of a single year. To
make the effect of this survey cumulative, let us include the totals of
immigration from the first.[4] The official records begin with 1820. It
is estimated that prior to that date the total number of alien arrivals
was 250,000. In 1820 there were 8,385 newcomers, less than sometimes
land at Ellis Island in a single day now, and they came chiefly from
three nations--Great Britain, Germany, and Sweden. The stream gradually
increased, but with many fluctuations, governed largely by the economic
conditions. The highest immigration prior to the potato famine in
Ireland in 1847 was in the year 1842, when the total for the first time
passed the 100,000 mark, being 104,565.
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