POPULAR MISCELLANY. 



713 



ITniversitv of the State of New York. Eeport 

 of the Secretary of the Regents, 1893. Pp. 324. 

 3.5 cents. Report of Extension Department, 1393. 

 Pp. 134. 1.5 cents. 



Van Hise, C. R Correlation Papers. Archean 

 and Algonkian. U. S. Geological Survey. Pp. 

 549. 



Welles, Charles S., M. D. Practical Dietetics 

 and Outline of Medicine. New York: F. V. 

 Duane. Pp. 79 



Willis, Oliver R. Practical Flora for Schools 

 and Colleges. American Book Company. Pp. 

 349. $1.50. 



Winlock, W. C. Progress of Astronomy for 

 1891 and 1892. Smithsonian Institution. Pp. 96. 



POPULAR MISCELLANY. 



Social Factors of Crime. Discussing tlie 

 subject of criminology in one of the circulars 

 of the Bureau of Education, Mr. Arthur Mac- 

 Donald speaks of crime as seeming to be, to 

 a certain extent, Nature's experiment on hu- 

 manity. If a nerve of a normal organism is 

 cut, the organs in which irregularities are 

 produced are those which the nerve controls. 

 In this way the office of a nerve in the nor- 

 mal state may be discovered. The criminal 

 might be spoken of as the severed nerve of 

 society, and the study of him as a practical 

 way (though indirect) of studying normal 

 man. The relation of criminology to society 

 and to sociological questions is already inti- 

 mate, and may in the future become closer. 

 Just what crime is at present depends more 

 upon time, location, race, country, national- 

 ity, and even the state in which one resides. 

 But notwithstanding the extreme relativity 

 of the idea of crime, there are some things in 

 our social life that are questionable. A young 

 girl of independence, but near poverty, tries to 

 earn her own living at three dollars a week, 

 and if, having natural desires for a few 

 comforts and some taste for her personal 

 appearance, she finally, through pressure, 

 oversteps the bound, society, which permits 

 this condition of things, immediately ostra- 

 cises her. It borders on criminality that a 

 widow works fifteen hours a day in a room 

 in which she lives, making trousers at ten 

 cents a pair, out of which she and her fam- 

 ily must live, until they gradually run down 

 toward death from want of sufficient nutri- 

 tion, fresh air, and any comfort. It is crim- 

 inally questionable to leave stoves in cars 

 so that, if the passenger is not seriously in- 

 jured but only hedged in, he will have the 

 additional chance of burning to death. It 



has been a general truth, and in some cases 

 is one still, that a certain number of persons 

 must perish by fire before private individuals 

 will furnish fire escapes to protect their own 

 patrons. It is a fact that more than five 

 thousand people are killed yearly in the 

 United States at railroad grade crossings, 

 most of whose lives could have been saved 

 had the road or the railroad passed either 

 one over the other. The excuse of the ex- 

 pense is pleaded for the lack of the improve- 

 ments ; or, practically, it is admitted that 

 the extra money required to introduce them 

 is of more consequence than the five thou- 

 sand human lives. And yet, strange as it 

 may seem, if a brutal murderer is to lose his 

 life and there is the least doubt that the 

 crime was premeditated, a large part of the 

 community is often aroused into moral ex- 

 citement or indignation, while the murdered, 

 innocent railroad passenger excites little 

 more than a murmur. There is no sul^ject 

 on which the public conscience is more ten- 

 der than the treatment of the criminal. Psy- 

 chologically, the explanation of this is simple, 

 for the public have been educated gradually 

 to feel the suSering and misfortunes of the 

 criminal things it is easier to realize, since 

 the thought is confined generally to one per- 

 sonality at a time. If the public could all 

 be eyewitnesses to a few of our most brutal 

 railroad accidents, the consciousness gained 

 might be developed into conscientiousness in 

 the division of their sympathies. The feel- 

 ing spoken of is a sincere though sometimes 

 morbid expression of unselfish humanitari- 

 anism. 



The Arctic Sea. In his address before 

 the British Association on the Polar Basin, 

 Mr. Henry Seebohm described the Arctic 

 Sea, which lies at the bottom of the polar 

 basin, as fringed with a belt of bare coun- 

 try, sometimes steep and rocky, descending 

 in more or less abrupt cliffs and piles of preci- 

 pices to the sea, but more often sloping gently 

 down in mud banks and sand hills. These 

 latter represent the accumulated spoils of 

 countless ages of annual floods, which tear 

 up the banks of the rivers and deposit shoals 

 of detritus at their mouths, compelling them 

 to make deltas in their efforts to force a 

 passage to the sea. In Norway this belt of 

 bare country is called the Fjeld, in Russia it 



