Hawke's Bay Herald SATURDAY, JUNE 16, 1900. CRIME IN GREAT BRITAIN.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXXV, Issue 11563, 16 June 1900, Page 2

Hawke's Bay Herald SATURDAY, JUNE 16, 1900. CRIME IN GREAT BRITAIN.

Th. influence of education as a factor in reduoing crime is shown by a British Blue Book just issued. But statistics do not tell all the story. With the spread of civilisation, greater facilities of communication, the telegraph, which can flash its lightning messages quioker than any oriminal oan travel, the amount of undetected crime has been largely reduced. Statistics, of course, take no account of this, but deal solely with cases bronght to trial. The Blue Book takes us to the end of 1898, in which year the number of persons brought before the superior criminal oourts was 11,454. This figure is slightly higher than* the total for the two previous years, but for a long series of years the number of persons tried at quarter sessions and assizes has gone on steadily diminishing. In 1878 the number was 16,305, in 1888 13,684, and now it has fallen to 11.454; and though theße show a slight increase on those for 1896 and 1897, there is no reason to believe that any definite increase has set in. Taking everything into consideration— the inorease of the population, the increase of the police forces, and the greater efflcienoy in the means of investigating crime— we may conclude" that the decrease of orime ia even greater than the figures Bhow; and finally, if we take into account the fact that habitual oriminals are for the most part imprisoned for short periods we must hold that the number of oriminals has diminished in an even greater ratio than the number of crimeß. There are also some maps, showing the geographical distribution of crime. From them it appears that the least crimina county in England is Cornwall, Pembroke „coming next. The most criminal counties are Monmouth, Glamorgan, and London ; and as in 1893, Monmouth is the wor3t by a long interval. Lancashire and Northumberland are fourth and fifth, Warwickshire dropping back from this place, which was occupied in 1893. The Weßt Riding of Yorkshire offers a striking exception to the rule that the most populous counties are the worst, in spite of its enormous urban population it stands in the same class with Wilts and Dorset. As regards drunkenness the northern counties make a bad show. Northumberland is much the worst, Durham the second, while Glamorgan comes third. London and Lancashire have hardly half the proportion of case 3of drunkenness that is found in Northumberland. The contrast between England and Scotland in the distribution of drunkenness is very marked. Then, while in England the proportion per 100,000 of the population is 698, in Scotland it is 1018 ; and while the figure for Newcastle, the highest for any town in England, is 1795, that for Glasgow amounts to 2960.