festations of organic defects which for the most part precede birth. The abuse of alcohol is not, however, universal amongst criminals at all events when any intellectual ability is required. It would not do to drink in our business said a criminal to Lambroso.

Dr. E. C. Wines says, the prevailing character of crime in America is hard to define. In the south and west, crimes of violence in the north and east, crimes of fraud are most common. Theft prevails everywhere, though not to so great an extent as in Europe. Crimes against property and crimes against the person are substantially in the ratio of three to one. Intemperance is a proximate cause of a very large proportion of the crime committed in America. Fully three-fourths of all the prisoners with whom I have personally conversed, in different parts of the country, have admitted that they were addicted to an excessive use of alcoholic liquors. If it had not been for the dram shop, I should never have been here" is the stereotyped wail that issues from every cell and swells in melancholy chorus through all the corridors of our prisons." He once sent a circular to the wardens of all the state prisons asking "what is your opinion as to the connection between strong drink and crime." The answers returned looked all one way. J. W. Pollard, of Vermont, did but echo the general sentiment though he put it more sharply than most when he said, "My opinion is, that if intoxicants were totally eradicated, the Vermont state prison would be large enough to hold all the criminals in the United States.

Mr. Ellis, after quoting a number of authorities to prove that alcoholism in either of the parents is one of the most fruitful causes of crime, because of the consequent degeneracy of their offspring, says, the relation of alcoholism to criminality is by no means so simple as is sometimes thought: alcoholism is an effect as well as a cause. It is part of a vicious circle. For a well conditioned person of wholesome heredity to become an inebriate, is not altogether an easy matter. It is facilitated by a predisposition, and alcoholism becomes thus a symptom as well as a cause of degeneration. The conclusions of Dr. Cruthers. "are that," (1) inebriety is itself evidence of more or less unsoundness: (2) in a large proportion of cases it is only a sign of slow and invidious brain diseases: (3) when crime is committed by inebriates, the probability of mental disease is very strong: (4) using spirits to produce intoxication for the purpose of committing crime, is evidence of the most dangerous form of reasoning mania. The crime and the inebriety are only symptoms of disease and degeneration, whose footprints can be traced back from age to age. "Dr. Ellis adds," the danger of alcoholism. from the present point view lies not in any mysterious prompting to crime which it gives, but in the manner in which the poison lets loose the individual's natural or morbid impulses whatever these may be.

The hereditary transmission of evil tendencies is regarded by many of those whose enquiries have been directed chiefly to the scientific aspect of the question as an important factor in the production of criminals. The evidence goes far to prove that hereditary taint in many cases renders it difficult if not impossible to resist the influence of evil and unwholesome environment.

Idleness, that is a dislike for work, is regarded by many as a fruitful cause of crime. Those who are possessed of means often become vicious and profligate if they do not engage in some kind of business sufficient to afford them occupation; and those who possess little or no means and are unwilling to work must cheat or steal to make a living. It is not poverty, however, so much as a love of idleness that causes them to be dishonest. Some anthropologists tell us

that many criminals are unable to work because of the condition of their muscles and of their nervous system. But they seem to mistake cause for effect. It is because they have not been trained to steady work, and because they have indulged their evil passions, that the muscular and nervous systems of criminals are in such an abnormal condition. A large proportion of criminals, when entering prison or penitentiary, claim to be mechanics, and are so set down; but in fact few of them have any other claim to be classed as inechanics than that they spent a few weeks or days in a work shop or factory at some time. A very large proportion call themselves laborers, which in many cases means that they never did any work they could avoid. Some good mechanics as well as professional men and others do too often become drunkards, and in some cases find their way to gaol, but comparatively few farmers or mechanics become felons. It has been remarked of those convicted of crime that nearly all were idle when arrested, and few, if any, had previously been steadily occupied in any kind of work.

Dr. E. C. Winnes says: A desire to live without work leads to crime here as it does in other countries, and this vicious indolence was much increased by the late civil war. The severe financial depression that has existed throughout the whole country since 1873, * * has contributed in no small degree to swell the volume of crimes, both of fraud and theft, and even of violence. Among educated men, crimes of fraud have greatly increased, and our prisens now contain more convicts of this class than ever before. Want of a trade is a permanent and potent occasion of crime. Three-fourths of our criminals make no pretence to having acquired a trade; and of the remainder more than a moiety have done so only in a very imperfect degree.

Of idleness, as of drunkenness, it may be said that it is sometimes difficult to decide whether it should be regarded as cause or as effect. It may certainly be traced in many cases to want of parental control and of proper home training. The boy who is allowed to do as he pleases until he has reached the age of fourteen or fifteen is not likely to acquire a taste for steady employment afterwards.

Even involuntary idleness is too often a cause of crime, and they who do any thing to render employment irregular, or unremunerative, incur a grave responsibility. Young presons when forced into idleness are exposed to many temptations, and in some cases become dissipated. Others resort to the use of strong liquors for comfort or oblivion, and sometimes acquire a habit of drinking. Those of dishonest tendencies are led, under pressure of want, to commit petty larcenies, and find it more difficult to restrain their evil propensities afterwards. Those to whom enforced idleness is most dangerous are not, however, those to whom it brings suffering and want. The Rev. Mr. Clay, of Preston, chaplain of the Prison in that district, made careful observation of the effects of such idleness in North Lancashire during the great strikes which were so frequent toward the middle of the century, and the statistics published by him prove conclusively that the increase in the prison population, which accompanied those strikes, came from the younger men who fell into habits of dissipation.

Ignorance was, for many years, supposed to be one of the chief causes of crime, because a large proportion of the prison population could not read or write, even imperfectly; and there are some who attribute the reduction in the number of criminals in Great Britain chiefly to the establishment of the present school system. Rev. M. McG. Dana, commissioned by the Governor of Minnesota to visit British prisons, in his report, published in 1889, states that in 1871 there were 11,712 convicts in the prisons of England and Wales, and in 1,885 only

8,790; although the population of the country had increased 3,300,000, and he

says:

"I asked John Bright, in an interview I had with him at Rochdale, whether this exceptional record was due to the excellent prison system. He replied that he thought not altogether, but rather to the schools now becoming so universal, to the Sunday schools whose moral influence is so great on the youth, and to the augmented and able preventive work which has visibly reduced the sources of crime."

Only those who have some idea of the profound depths of ignorance of all things religious as well as literary, in which many of the lower classes of England were sunk, can conceive what effect the establishment of schools, in very many of which religious instruction is given, in all of which the pupils are taught to know something of God and of His goodness, of themselves, and of their duties, must have had. The Rev. Mr. Clay, whose observations were nearly all made in Lancashire, says in one of his reports:

"Let me present a short summary of three years' observation-hard, naked statistics, which I will clothe in but little commentary. During the period I name the performance of my duties has brought me into contact with 1,733 men and boys, and 387 women and girls, altogether unable to read; with 1,301 men and boys, and 287 women and girls who knew not the name of the reigning soverign ; with 1,290 men and boys, and 293 women and girls, so incapable of receiving moral and religious instruction that to speak to them of virtue, vice, iniquity or holiness was to speak to them in an unknown tongue; and with 1,120 men and boys, and 257 women and girls, so destitute of the merest rudiments of Christian knowledge-so untaught in religious forms and practices, that they knew not the name of Him who died for their sins, nor could they utter a prayer to their Father in Heaven." In a report quoted by Mr. Hill, Recorder of Birmingham, the Rev. Mr. Clay stated, that-"Of 96 men tried for riot, etc., in the Chartist outbreak in the autumn of 1842, sixty were unable to read, and thirty-six were ignorant of the Saviour's name.'

Ignorance so dense never prevailed to any extent in this country, and of all who entered our gaols last year, those who could read and write were fully 75 per cent. But notwithstanding our school system, of which we are so proud, it is to be feared that many are growing up utterly ignorant of much that good citizens should know. It is alarming to find that of those who were sent to gaol, 25 per cent. could not even read and write; and much ignorance, no doubt, prevails amongst the majority of those who are described as possessed of those accomplishments. Such ignorance, literary and religious, as still exists in Ontario, may, in most cases, be fairly attributed to the want of proper parental control, the lack of proper home training, and evil home influences.

The inordinate eagerness to acquire wealth or to get money sufficient to satisfy the desires of the extravagent or the profligate, which prevails in this age is undoubtedly the cause of much crime. Mr. Rutherford Hayes, ex-President of the United States, in his address at the Congress of the National Prison Association, held this year at Cincinnati, spoke of it as a chief cause. On the top of the wheel of fortune, he said, and apparently held in high esteem, are men who quickly amassed large fortunes by means that are at best questionable, and, looking at these successful men, many of those at the bottom who are striving to reach the top, imagine that they may use means, which, if more dangerous, can scarcely be regarded as more dishonest. The desire to get money without hard work and without self-denial has been strong in all ages.

Poverty is not in itself a cause of crime as many very poor persons lead honest, virtuous lives, yet, especially in cities and towns, the poor are often compelled to find lodging in crowded lanes and courts and alleys in which the worthless, the drunken and the criminal dwell, and though the parents may escape the contamination of the foul moral atmosphere of such places, the children whom they cannot confine to their miserable abodes, who must seek amusement and recreation on the streets are unavoidably exposed to the corrupting influences by which they are constantly surrounded, and to temptations to which they too often yield. Squalid surroundings, orphanage misery, and the wretched home life or lack of home life in great cities, are undoubtedly fruitful sources of crime. It is a well established fact also that those who crowded into dwellings in which the air is always laden with poisonous exhalations, and especially those who work in the wretched rooms in which the family exist, suffer from nervous depression, which leads to the use of stimulants, and frequent use of stimulants, especially under such circumstances, leads almost inevitably to drunkenness.

Other causes which act directly or indirectly in causing crime are the exposure of portable wares at shops doors and on stands where they serve as strong temptations; the want of playgrounds for boys where they could indulge in innocent amusements under proper supervision; the love of dress amongst girls and their preference for employment in shops and factories, even when the wages paid are scarcely sufficient to provide food; the general tendency to luxury and extravagance and the desire "to keep up .appearances." Pawn shops and "marine" stores in which even children may dispose of stolen property, do much to foster crime.

The neglect of its duties by the State and by society in all its other forms of organization, is largely responsible for the prevalence of vice and crime. The State has not done its whole duty when it has enacted that those who commit crimes shall be punished, and has provided police by whom offenders and criminals may be arrested, tribunals before which they may be tried, and gaols in which the penalties imposed may be exacted. The public arrest of a child, his public appearance as a culprit in a police court, his imprisonment in a common gaol, where he must associate with criminals of all sorts, are usually so many stages in his progress from vice to crime. Such a mode of treatment not infrequently has a most injurious effect on children who have committed merely some law-made offence. All this system of dealing with criminals and offenders rests upon the exploded principle that crime can be prevented, and criminals kept in check only by deterrent agencies. Nor is it enough that the State provides in addition, a school system the benefits of which all who choose and who have the opportunities may share. Charitable associations make a great mistake if they suppose that when they provide food and clothing, and fuel and shelter for all who seem to be indigent, they do all that is necessary to supplement the work done by the State. The example of Great Britain proves, most conclusively, that much more can be done by the State and by associations to save those who are in danger, and to raise those who have fallen than has yet been attempted in this Province. What more can be done in this country where the work ought to be much easier should be done. How it can best be done is a question which demands the most serious consideration.

Several American writers and speakers contend that the increase of crime in the United States is largely due to immigration. Those of the criminal classes of Europe, who desire to elude arrest or to escape from police surveillance

for a time, in the hope that they may be forgotten, come to America, they say, and of those who have passed through the convict prisons and reformatories of Great Britain and Ireland, many are encouraged to emigrate who, when here, relapse into their evil habits. It is even alleged that the reduction in the number of British criminals is due largely to this systematic, steady emigration. It will be seen on reference to his evidence, that Mr. Round, a gentleman of great experience, is of opinion that a very large proportion of the criminals who infest New York, came from Europe, after they had there received their training in crime. The report of the State Board of Charities and Corrections of Minnesota for the year 1889, expresses a similar view, and publishes statistics in support of it, including a comparison of the nativity of State Prison convicts in eight States of the Union, by percentage. The following are the figures given for the States, whose institutions we have most carefully examined:

These figures seem to prove that the foreign born, and especially those from Great Britain and Ireland, furnish a percentage of criminals much larger than their percentage of the whole population. But to arrive at a fair conclusion, we must take into account that a much larger proportion of the immigrant population than of the native, have arrived at the age when crimes may be committed. It is inevitable, too, that of emigrants settling in cities, as English, Scotch and Irish largely do, the number liable to fall in to evil habits will be larger than of those who have comfortable homes and steady employment. Where emigrants settle chiefly on land, as the Germans and others do in the Western States, the official returns show a very different state of things. The Minnesota report, from which we, take those figures, states elsewhere that children of foreign-born