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Page 47
[33] Cf. _Tarde Philosophie Penale_, p. 467.
In proportion as the probability of being punished is augmented, the
severity of punishment can be safely diminished. This is one of the
paramount advantages to be derived from a highly efficient police
system. The barbarity of punishments in the Middle Ages is always
attributed by historians to the barbarous ideas of those rude times.
But this is only partially true; one important consideration is
overlooked. In the Middle Ages it was extremely difficult to catch the
criminal; in fact, it is only within the present century that an
organised system for effecting the capture of criminals has come into
existence. The result of the nebulous police system of past times was
that very few offenders were brought to justice at all, and society,
in order to prevent lawlessness from completely getting the upper
hand, was obliged to make a terrible example of all offenders coming
within its grasp. As soon, however, as it became less difficult to
arrest and convict lawless persons, the old severities of the criminal
code immediately began to fall into abeyance. Sentences were
shortened, punishments were mitigated, the death penalty was abolished
for almost all crimes except murder. But even now, the moment society
sees any form of crime showing a tendency to evade the vigilance of
the law, a cry is immediately raised for sterner measures of
repression against the perpetrators of that particular form of crime.
The Flogging Bill recently passed by Parliament is a case in point.
These instances afford a fairly accurate insight into the action of
society with regard to the punishment of crime. It punishes severely
when the criminal is seldom caught; it punishes more lightly when he
is often caught; and its punishments will become more mitigated still,
as soon as the probability of capture is made more complete. A
comparatively light sentence is in most cases a very effective
deterrent, when it is made almost a certainty, and all alterations in
the future in criminal administration should be in the direction of
making punishment more certain rather than more severe. Such efforts
are sure to be rewarded by a decrease in the amount of crime.
CHAPTER VII.
THE CRIMINAL IN BODY AND MIND.
Has the criminal any bodily and mental characteristics which
differentiate him from the ordinary man? Does he differ from his
fellows in height and weight? Does he possess a peculiar conformation
of skull and brain? Is he anomalous in face and feature, in intellect,
in will, in feeling? Is he, in short, an individual separated from the
rest of humanity by any set or combination of qualities which clearly
mark him off as an abnormal being? As these matters are at present
exciting considerable attention, let us now look at the criminal from
a purely biological point of view.
A good deal of diversity of opinion exists among competent authorities
respecting the stature of criminals. Lombroso says that Italian
criminals are above the average height; Knecht says German criminals
do not differ in this respect from other men; Marro says the stature
of criminals is variable; Thomson and Wilson say that criminals are
inferior in point of stature to the average man. Whatever may be the
case on the Continent, there can be little doubt that as far as the
United Kingdom is concerned, the height of the criminal class is lower
than that of the ordinary citizen. In Scotland the average height of
the ordinary population is (559) 67.30 inches; the average height of
the criminal population, as given by Dr. Bruce Thomson, is (324) 66.95
inches. According to Dr. Beddoe, the average height of the London
artizan population is (318) 66.72 inches; the average height of the
London criminal (300) 54.70 inches; the average height of Liverpool
criminals, according to Danson, is (1117) 66.39 inches. Danson's
figures point to the fact that there is hardly any difference in
height between the criminal classes of Liverpool and the artizan
population of London It has, however, to be borne in mind that the
population of the North of England, being largely of Scandinavian
descent, is taller than the population of the South of England. The
height of Liverpool criminals should be compared with the average
height of the Scotch, to whom they are more nearly allied by race. If
this is done, it will be seen that they fall considerably short of the
normal stature.
The difference between the height of the criminal population and that
of the most favoured classes is more remarkable still. According to
Dr. Roberts' tables, the average height of the latter is 69.06 inches;
the London criminal is only 64.70 inches. There is thus a difference
of from four to five inches between the most highly favoured classes
and the London criminal class. The difference between the criminal
class and the merely well-to-do is not quite so great. Selecting Mr.
Galton's Health Exhibition measurements as a test of the stature of
the well-to-do classes, the results come out as follows:--Health
Exhibition measurements, 67.9 inches; London criminals, 64.70 inches.
The criminal is thus between two and three inches inferior in height
to the well-to-do portion of the community. In fact, the height of the
London criminal is very nearly the same as that of the East-End Jew.
According to Mr. Jacobs, in a paper communicated to the Journal of the
Anthropological Institute, the average stature of the East-End Jew is
64.3 inches; his co-religionist in the West-End is 67.5 inches. We may
accordingly take it as the outcome of these measurements that the
criminal population of Great Britain is inferior in point of stature
to the ordinary population.
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