Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1905-04-03

clever, hateful and hating others-a
criminal in little.
1.-THE street boy is naturally alert
and has received a very complete edu-
cation in the school of the street. The
street is not only his playground but
also his home. But beyond all this TIL.
street is his school. 1t is there that he
has learned all the simple maXims of
his code-that he who fights and runs
away may live to fight another day:
that the blunder of being caught with
the goods on is far worse than the
crime of stealing: that the blacklist of
fence possible is ito squeal on a pal
and SO on 49,
Mr.. Williams says that the Juvenile
Asylum of which he is president re-
ceives one Pc cent OF the entire juve-
nile immigration at the port of New
York. He explains this Interesting but
alarming fact by describing the great
tide of alien life which sweeps into the
port of New York and some of our
other ports OF entry. Men and women
who come he e to carve out a home and
a career i'm this new land find them
selves stranded at its very shores, shut
up in the slumS of the great city,
speaking foreign tongue, unframed in
the customs Of The land and often be-
come outcaStS and strangers in a
strange place. They are robbed Of tn ,
Old associations without finding the
room to make Il new home. They are.
as it were. divorced from their own
children. The child has none of the old
i
ships that he had in his fatherland. and
is largely sena' ated from the training;
to which he hal bean subjt cted. He is
turned out + lind Il new life in the
streets, with TIE result that the new
teaching is a teaching OF lad manners.
The number of juvenile delinquents
rises with The tide of immigration.
When immigration from Ireland was at
its height that country furnished the
largest quota oG asylum inmates. The
same thing happened with the Ger
mans. the Russian and Polish Jews
the Italians and the Syr;ans. Since
1898 the Russians show the largest per-
centage of admissions, this percentage
running frO,a 16 20 49, Before that
year children of Italian birth were the
most numerous. in 1896 reaching Il per
cent, or more than onc-fifth of the
whole number admitted. Now there
are practically none. This large pro-
portion of the foreign born (being about
one-third of al; the inmates for the
time the asylum has eXisted) does not
Show that there is any special crimi-
nality in the rewly arrived. but merely
that they are lonely strangers in an
unknown city.
Statistics are not generally interest
ing, but when they are concerned with
the vital facts of lie they sometimes
tell a story more windy than the most
practlsed writer can. 1t appears from
.he records OF the Juvenile Asylum
That the total of commitments to the
institution since its establishment is
S@,ll2. OF these 12,0S3 were committed
by magistrate 1920 were committed
by magistrate at the request of par
ents or friends and 1854. We're sur
rendered by parents or friends. These
figures appear TO indicate that, roughly
speaking, about one-third of these chill
dren We're tending toward life of
crime. about one-thi~d were intractable
or vicious, and considerably more than
one-third coul1 not be maintained or
cared for by their natural protectors.
Ihe ages at which most commitments
nave been made also furnish matter
worthy of consideration. These ages
We're eight years old and under, and
fourteen years cid and over. the re-
spective totals being 1863 and 6,SS2.
The smallest number Of commitments