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classes-indictable offences, criminal non-indictable offences, and other non-indictable offences. The first of these classes needs no explanation. The second class includes such offences as assaults, cruelty to children, malicious damage, offences under the Prevention of Crimes Acts, and certain offences, such as frequenting, under the Vagrancy Acts-theword "criminal" being used, not in a technical sense, but in order to distinguish the more serious of the non-indictable offences from those which cannot be regarded as "criminal" in the ordinary sense of the word. This last class of offences-described as "other non-indictable offences". roughly comprises all contraventions of municipal regulations established in the interests of the public safety, health or comfort, and not involving violence, cruelty, or gross dishonesty. It is generally admitted that the figures relating to the first of these three classes are the best index to the fluctuations of crime, and the figures for 1907 show that there has been an increase of crime. It is perhaps as well here to enter the customary caution as to the reliability of inferences drawn from statistics. It is obvious that statistics must always be considered in relation to the material with which they deal, and that they become less reliable as the material becomes more complex. But we cannot have it both ways: we cannot on the one hand appeal triumphantly to statistics when their results are in accordance with our wishes, and on the other hand seek to discredit them as mere figures when their results are disappointing. If we are justified in claiming a general improvement during the last half-century on their authority, we must equally admit that in 1907 there was a set-back. For the figures relating to indictable offences show that 98,822 indictable offences were reported to the police in 1907, as against 91,665 in 1906: the proportion of such offences to the population per

1 The number of persons in 1907 for trial, or tried, for (A) indictable offences was 61,381; (B) criminal non-indictable offences, 79,862; and (c) other nonindictable offences, 605,712; total of the three classes, 746,995.

100,000 being 283 in 1907, as against 275 in 1906. It is true, as is pointed out in the Introduction to the volume, that "as compared with the previous year, the total number of persons tried, of persons convicted, and of convicted persons imprisoned, have all appreciably decreased," but this decrease is restricted to minor offences. On the assumption that the figures relating to indictable offences are the best index to the volume of crime, crime increased during 1907.

We may now consider these figures more in detail, using the numbers of persons actually tried for indictable offences, at Courts of Record and at Courts of Summary Jurisdiction. The total number of persons so tried in 1907 was 61,381, as compared with 59,079 for 1906, and with 60,065 as the annual average for 1903-7. This increase of 2,302 over the figures for 1906 is mainly due to an increase in the number of persons tried for offences against property, which in 1907 was 57,809, as compared with 55,483 in 1906. It is pointed out in the Introduction that offences against property, mainly consisting of different forms of dishonesty, make up about sixteen-seventeenths of the total of crime and completely dominate its annual fluctuations. It is a curious fact that the number of offences against the person usually varies inversely with the number of offences against property. During the last twelve years the number of prisoners tried for offences against the person has varied only within narrow limits: it was 2,812 in 1896 and 2,596 in 1907. The number of persons tried for offences against property during the same period has varied roughly between 47,000 and 58, 100, the number in 1896 being 47,400 and in 1907, 57,809. The movements of the figures are, perhaps, hardly large enough to justify any attempt to discover a necessary relation between them, but there seems to be some ground for thinking that if there be a variation, it will tend to be inverse. Offences against the person are very often the result of a momentary outbreak of passion, whereas

offences against property as a rule are the outcome of some general defect in character. It is, perhaps, worth while in this connection to point out that most of the persons convicted of murder or manslaughter have no previous criminal history, while the professional thief has a long record behind him. Now, if we neglect for a moment the number of offences committed by the habitually dishonest man -a number which is probably fairly constant, save when misguided leniency lets loose an irreclaimable criminal either immediately on conviction or after a very short term of imprisonment-it is reasonable to suppose that the "marginal" offences against property are committed by persons who just fall below the level of a decent selfmaintaining existence. A general increase of prosperity will prevent a number of persons, who in a time of distress would have preyed on their neighbours, from committing offences against property, and the total of such offences in a year of prosperity will decrease. But is there any reason to think that a time of prosperity tends to increase a general control over the passions? It seems perfectly natural to expect the reverse- -a horse "full-fed at the manger" has more devil in him than a horse which barely gets enough to eat. So much for the material effect of a time of general well-being. Again, if we consider the effect which a raising of the moral standard might be expected to have on crimes against property and crimes against the person, we should rather expect to find a more direct effect on the former than on the latter. Education has a more immediate result in enabling a man to adopt and adhere to the "rational" view of property on which organised society depends, than in enabling him to control what all writers agree to call the "irrational" elements in his nature. The relation of the numbers of crimes against property and of crimes against the person therefore seems to depend on two main factors. On the one hand, there is the general

raising of the moral standard which, it is suggested, tends to reduce the number of crimes against property more rapidly than the number of crimes against the person. On the other hand, it is suggested that in any particular period the prevailing economic conditions affect the numbers of these two classes of crime in exactly opposite ways. If it is conceded, as seems reasonable, that changes in the economic conditions of any period have a more immediate effect on crime than does the necessarily slow rise of the moral standard, the conclusion seems just that the relation between crimes against property and crimes against the person tends to be one of inverse variation.

The number of persons tried for offences against the person in 1907 was 2,596, as against 2,704 in 1906, one of the principal decreases being that in the number of homicides and manslaughters. These fell from 205 to 166 -the lowest recorded figure. Turning to offences against property, we find that the number of prosecutions for burglary and housebreaking in 1907 was slightly less than in 1906-the figures being 3,132 for 1907, as compared with 3,174 for 1906. There were, however, more such crimes reported to the police than in 1906—the number being 11,470, an increase of 873 over the preceding year. This increase occurred mainly in the Metropolitan Police District, and in the Report issued by the Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis for the year 1907 it is stated that burglaries and housebreakings increased in his district by 605. This increase accounts for nearly three-quarters of the total increase for the whole country, and the Report proceeds to say that "it may be a coincidence, but it is certainly noticeable that the marked increase in burglaries and housebreakings was synchronous with the period during which a relatively large number of short sentences and orders binding over' prisoners were passed." These offences are the special province of the professional

criminal, and it seems clear that a "professional" has a longer run before he is caught, than does any other type of criminal. Thus, the proportion between the total number of housebreakings and burglaries committed, to the number of prosecutions for these offences in 1907 was roughly 11:3; while the proportion between the total number of indictable offences known to the police and the total number of prosecutions for them was roughly 5:3. It is therefore reasonable to suppose that if a lenient policy is adopted towards professional criminals, it will have the effect of increasing the number of crimes committed by the "professionals' themselves and those whom they instruct in the way of crime. At any rate, the figures show that indictable offences, including burglaries and housebreakings, in the metropolis, increased at a rate which was more than double that of the rest of the country: for the Metropolitan Police District, the increase, as compared with 1906, was from 19,819 to 22,401, an increase of 13 per cent., while for the remainder of England and Wales the increase was from 71,846 to 76,421, an increase of 6 per cent.

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It is to be hoped that the effect of the Prevention of Crimes Act, which comes into force on the 1st of this month, will be to reduce the number of professionals. The Act supplies a double remedy against habitual crime: it provides a means for dealing with the existing class of "habituals," and also a means for checking its growth. To restrict the activities of existing habituals, the Act gives power to the Court to declare an offender to be a habitual criminal, and such an offender may be sentenced to a term of preventive detention. not exceeding ten years, in addition to any punishment imposed for the particular offence of which he stands convicted. The effect of this should be to remove experts in crime for a more or less lengthy period from society. It is unfortunate that public sentiment, or rather sentimentality, in so far as it is, if at all, expressed by the House of Commons on this

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