The Press.
London, England, 1853-08-06 00:00:00

littraturt.

Crime: its Amount, Causes, and Remedies. By
Frederic Hill. London : Murray.
Is this work Mr. Hill has compressed the
results of sixteen years' experience as an
inspector of prisons, during which time the
great question of the causes and prevention
of crime has, as he informs us, unceasingly
occupied his attention, quickened by the ne-
cessity of embodying his opinions in a series
of annual reports. The book is full of matter,
plainly written, and suggestive as well as
instructive. There is an occasional tendency
to digress, produced by the nature of the sub-
ject, and occasionally a superabundance of
details. But books in these days are written
and read in equal haste ; and a little repeti-
tion tends to impress on the reader's mind
what he might otherwise overlook.
Mr. 11111 commences with an assertion as
satisfactory as it is susceptible of proof—
namely, that the amount of crime in the
United Kingdom has of bite years very largely
decreased. Much evidence is given confirma-
tory of this view, from which we have not
space to extract. But some remarks which he
makes on this head are worth notice. First,
that, as the tendency of social improvement is
everywhere to establish a more vigorous and
effective police, the proportion of detected to
undetected offences annually becomes greater.
But all our statistics aro of necessity based
on the number, not of offences committed, but
of convictions ; whence it follows that the
apparent decrease of crime as statistically
demonstrated falls very far short of the real
decrease ascertainable from other sources of

information. Secondly, that of the gravest
class of offences—namely, murders— far the
. .

larger proportion are coinmitted by fo-reigners
and Irish immigrants, and comparatively few
by Englishmen. Third, that, in every locality
with which Mr. Hill is acquainted, the habi-
tual law-breakers, the criminal population,
as we may term them, are few in number,
and the great mass of the population is com-
paratively blameless. "As a great many hats
" are made by a single hatter, and a great
" many shoes by a single cobbler, so a great
" many thefts are committed by a single thief."
In one instance it was estimated that 20,000
separate breaches of law were the work of only
fifteen individuals ! This may seem to mili-
tate against the assumed efficiency of our
police ; but, as bearing on the question of
public morality, it furnishes a gratifying proof
of the generally peaceable demeanour of the
working class.
The causes of crime are enumerated as fol-
lows—and the enumeration of itself suggests
the remedy in each case :
(1.) " Bad training and ignorance." These
arise from a variety of circumstances. Orphan-
age, or desertion by natural protectors, is not
uncommon. Out of seventy prisoners, under
eighteen years of age, in Glasgow gaol, fifty
were found to have lost one or both of their
parents. Illegitimacy, inducing early neglect,
if not positive abandonment, is also a frequent
characteristic of the criminal class. The
children of women much employed in non-
domestic occupations, and thus unable to tend
them, are likewise easily led into bad courses.
Some are hereditary thieves, trained to their
business as to any other profession, and desti-
tute of acquired capacity to earn an honest
living. The great mass of prisoners, says Mr.
Hill, " are day-labourers, butchers, carters, and
" other persons engaged in employments be-
" speaking the lowest order of talent and
" knowledge." Skilled artisans and well-
trained husbandmen are rarely found among
the inmates of gaols :
Even the mere powers of reading and writing, without
reference to exercise in their intelligent use, are com-
paratively rare among criminals. Of more than 10,00
persons in Scotland (where education is more general than
in England) received into the prisons in one year while I
was inspector them, only 4,700, or less than one in three,
could read well; and less than 1,200, or one in thirteen,
could write well; and of the whole number only 311, or
one in fifty, had learnt more than mere reading and
writing. 2,400 of these prisoners could not read at all;
and m,400 could not write at all.
There are no authentic means of comparing these num-
bers with the portion of the people at large who are in a
similar state of ignorance ; but my general knowledge on