The Sun.
London, England, 1868-10-21 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, WEDNESDAY EVENING, OCTOBER 21, 1868.

CRIMES OF WOMEN.

The criminal statistics of England and Wales for the
year ending at Michaelmas, 1867, show that 3,867 women
were committed for trial charged with indictable offences,
and 15,549 men—one woman to every four men. In
England and Wales 139 persons were committed for
trial for murder in the year, and as many as 53,
considerably more than a third, were women. Seven
women were sentenced to death in the year -four servants,
a charwoman, a needlewoman, and a factory worker—all
for the murder of their offspring. No woman was executed
in the year ; the capital sentences were all commuted to
penal servitude. Eleven women were committed for trial
for attempts to murder, 55 for wounding with intent to
maim, 29 for manslaughter, 18 for arson, 112 for burglary
and breaking into shops, 36 for robbery, 2,731 for larceny,
287 of these last being servants ; 203 women were
committed for trial for fraud, 10 for perjury, 35 for keep-
ing disorderly houses. Women seem to have their luck
before the law ; 72 per cent. of the men apprehended for
indictable offences were committed for trial, but only 58
per cent. of the women ; 73 per cent. of the proceeded
against summarily were convicted, but only 61 per cent.
of the women. From the returns relating to the less
serious offences distinguishing between men and women
the convictions, of the 335,359 persons summarily con-
victed before magistrates in England and Wales in the
year, 55,163, nearly a sixth, were females ; 15,217 were
convicted of drunkenness, one woman for every four
men so convicted ; 10,930 of the summary convictions
of women were for assaults, 185 of them aggravated
assaults on women or children ; 7,172 were for stealing;
5,223 women were convicted as prostitutes, 26 as incorri-
gible rogues, 51 for cruelty to animals, 439 for unlawful
pledging, 158 for deserting or neglecting to support
children, 570 for using short weights or measures.
35,084 females were sent to county and borough
prisons in the year, many of them more than
once, and therefore counting more than once.
14,348 were there in that year not for the first time ;
2,565 had been there above ten times. The return shews,
in the case of females, 44'8 per cent. recommitments ; in
the case of males only 36'2 per cent., and the result was
that the female commitments were more than a fourth of
the whole number. 20,087 of the women in county and
borough prisons were under sentence of hard labour, but
one-fourth of these sentences were not carried into effect.
The daily average number of women in county and
borough gaols in the year was 3,746 ; in convict prisons,
1,031. 256 girls were committed to reformatory schools
and 321 to industrial schools; 307 women were under
detention in prisons for criminal lunatics. The number of
women out of prison returned by the police as belonging
to the criminal classes in England and Wales in 1867 is
47,393—a number 478 fewer than in the preceding
year ; 5,445 were known thieves, 655 receivers of stolen
goods, 5,753 suspected persons, 9,921 vagrants and tramps,
25,679 prostitutes. Any one who examines in detail the re-
turns for the great towns may doubt if this last number can
be received as sufficient. It was mentioned recently that
the returns do not imply that the prisons were filled chiefl'
from these " criminal classes." Of the whole number of
96,932 females apprehended for indictable offences, or pro-
ceeded against summarily, as many as 55,657 were not
known to the police as bad characters. The female popu-
lation of England and Wales, of all ages, was estimated at
about 11,032,000

IHE COYSEIiVATIVES AND THE BALLOT.

(FROM A CORRESPONDENT.)

ONE of the most remarkable signs of the times is
the disposition which the Conservative party are
shewing to support the Ballot. It is not in this case as
in others, that they adopt a reform which they find
they can no longer resist. It is not with this
measure, as it was with the abolition of the property
qualification, the admission of Jews into Parliament,
and, last and chiefest, Parliamentary Reform itself,
that Conservatives in office propose that which
in opposition they prevented. The Ballot is
a very long way from being an article of the
united Liberal creed. In fact, its advocates have
lately lamented a falling off rather than an advance
in the number of their adherents ; have mourned
that men like Mr. MILL and :Sir JOHN TRELAWNY,
whose Radicalism no one doubts, have either
always condemned the Ballot, or, having formerly
approved, have now abjured it. And yet, if we
mistake not, what the Ballot Society is losing
on one side it is gaining on the other.
There is Mr. CAYLEY, for instance, who is now
contesting the North Riding as an independent Con-
servative, and who has just told the electors that he
should be very glad to try the Ballot as an experi-
ment, because " anything is worth trying to get rid
of the curse of intimidation." Nor is he alone. A
correspondent of the Pall Mall Gazette, who is not,
we suspect, an entire stranger to Exeter, declares that
a Conservative candidate in a certain borough was
heard to say, " If we had the Ballot I should have
doubled my list in that street." This correspondent
suggests that while Mr. GLADSTONE is (as he is
reported) " considering " this question, it would be
a great stroke of policy if Mr. DISRAELI
were to announce his conversion to the measure as
necessary to preserve to the people the free use of
their ancient right of the suffrage. If we come
to reflect, there is nothing essentially Liberal or
Conservative in the Ballot. It is simply an expe-
dient for enabling Tories and Liberals alike to vote
according to their conscience, The fact that a Tory
votes secretly will not make his vote one whit the
less Tory. In truth, " Constitutional " candidates are
beginning to believe that it will have the contrary
effect. Hitherto the weapons with which the two
parties have fought have been intimidation on
the Tory side, bribery on the Liberal ; since the
landed class were for the most part Conservative,
the money-making class Liberal. But the Reform
Bill has made a vast change in the conduct of the
battle, because it has made a vast change in the com-
batants. The enfranchisement of artisans has placed
in the hands of the Liberals the weapon of intimida-
tion. The millowner, the ironmaster, the ship-
builder, the coalowner, mostly Liberals, are as
well able to " influence " their employ6s as the
landlords are to " influence " their tenants. This is
really a formidable matter. Not only does it give
the Liberal two weapons, while the Conservative has
only one—not only does it enable the first to bribe
and intimidate, while the second only intimidates,
unless he intends to enter into a competition of
purses, in which he is sure to be beaten—but it places
at the control of the first so many more votes sub-
ject to influence than there are at the control of the
second. Thus, even were they both confined to the
use of the same weapon, were they both to eschew
intimidation and trust to bribing, the Liberals
would have the advantage. What is to be done
under these distressing circumstances ? What is to be
done when a " Constitutional " candidate for a manu-
facturing town finds that a hundred electors in that
cotton mill and a hundred electors in this iron-
work have received very broad hints from the cotton
lord and the ironmaster how they are to vote ?
What can he do but cry out for protection ?
He does not like the Ballot ; Mr. CAYLEY says
he does not believe in it ; yet even he
is prepared to try it as a remedy for a
disease that seems almost incurable. It is,
perhaps, not fair to assume that the Liberal party
are feeling less anxious about this measure because
they no longer feel the same need of it. Whatever
the objections may be, we believe that the Ballot
will before long become a prominent subject. Should
it be actually adopted it will probably be found, like
many other measures, to be less noxious than its
opponents feared, less beneficial than its advocates
hoped.

neither girl was drunk, but one was pregnant ; the
jury bring in their verdict of " unsound mind ;" the
dead girls will be buried, we suppose, in consecrated
ground; the living girls are allowed to enjoy their
clothes and their four-penny-piece without a word
of censure ; and there this tragedy, which
reveals callousness and selfishness we u'd not
have believed possible, ends. At the same
time another inquest is held. A man and a woman
were heard quarrelling by the same canal. There
was a blow, a splash, a groan. The woman had dis-
appeared ; the man simply said, " Make haste and
get some help, for there is a woman in the water,"
and then walked away, without waiting to hear
if his victim had been saved, or had gone to
her last account. The canal is dragged,
with the usual result when a woman falls
into it. Her heavy clothing has dragged her
down, and she is added to the long list of fearful pro-
blems which coroners' juries solve so easily. She was
"found drowned, but how the deceased came into the
water there was not sufficient evidence to shew." Of
course not. It is " only a woman," as SWIFT said ;
and who can expect the police to trouble themselves
to get evidence when no reward is offered ?