Spirit of the age. [volume] (Woodstock, Vt.) 1845-1913, 1896-12-05
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REMARKABLE HEREDITY.
Professor Pellniann OF Bonn University
Shows How Crime Begets Crime.


shows How Crime Begets Crime.
The heretiitability of crime has
long been a problem that has exer-
cised the minds of sociologists and
criminologists of all countries. 1t Is
contended by some scientists that
when a child develops criminal pro-
clivities Tic fact is due motor ut
least not 50 lnuch-to an inherently
defective brain rs to the tainted at
mosDhere in which it is reared; that
conscience, tlsc moral sense-tO quote
the words OF DR.. II. S. Williams i'll
recent essay upon the subject-re-
fleets the individual environment
during the period of Elasticity, when
conscience is forming-that is, in
childhood and adolescence.
DR.. Williams contends that there
are good as we'll as bad tendencies in
rybody, and that in the great
majority OF cases criminals have
failed to better themselves simply
because they were human and could
not rise superior to the surroundings
amid which they were born and
brought up
There is IL good deal of logic i'll
this argument, which il that adopt.
ed by many thinkers who have
made a special study of this impor.
tant question. But there is equal
logic in the asseverations of others
who claim that habitual criminality
may be, and in many notable cases
is, form of moral degeneracy that
is inherited, like certain bodily dis
eases and drunkenness.
This latter contention has just re-
ceived striking confirmation from
Professor Pellmann of Bonn univer-
sity, Germany. Professor Pellmann
has made a profound study of drunk
enness, it's causes and effects. With
infinite labor and perseverance he
has taken bad cases of persons adj
dicted to inebriety in different parts
of his country and traced the habit
back through many generations I'M
til he has been able to present tabu-
lated biographies Of hundreds de-
scended from some original drunk
ard.
Professor Pellmann now comes
forward with the account of Ger
man Jane Cakebread in the person
of Frau Ada Jurke, who was born
in the year 174O, and who, It's to be
hoped, will forever hold her unen-
viable record as the transmitter of
depravity to more than 700 of her
descendants.
Frau Ada Jurke was 60 years of
age when she paid her debt to ma
ture," and for the last 40 years of
her inglorious life was drunkarl,
thief and a tramp, Her descendants
have numbered 1874, of whom 70!
have been traced by Professor Pell-
mann in local records from youth
to death.
Of the 1Oo he found that 1O6 were
born out of wedlock. There were
142 who were beggars, and Ga more
who lived from charity. Of the wo-
men ISL lived disreputable lives.
Seventy-siy members of the family
were convicts, of whom z were SEN
fenced for murder. The remainder
were more OF less addicted to excess
i've tippling.
Altogether the German savant es-
Inmates that Frau Ada Jurke and
her descendants have cost the state
that is, the taXpayers-nO less than
1925, 600, 600 for maintenance, etc.
This monumental instance of in
herent 6.A,,,."--;+s- ---~----i-1J-~-
strong argument in favor of those
who assert that, however uneXcep-
tionable the environment of a child
may be, and whatever advantages
of precept and example it may en-
joy, the faint of vice transmitted to
it through successive generations
will inevitably manifest itself at
some period CT other of its career
New York Herald.