THE RELATIONS OF WOMEN TO CRIME. 343 



as M. de JMarsangy useless for scientific purposes. Fortunately, this 

 style of scientific writing belongs to the French school of both senti- 

 ment and morals. 



The mental reflex result of physical strength, as expressed in the 

 criminal act, is more clearly shown in crimes against property at- 

 tended with violence. Distinguishing it from the other orders of 

 crime malicious ofienses against property, and oflTenses without vio- 

 lence we have the motive in the first-mentioned class narrowed to 

 the desire of possession, but so associated with the consciousness of 

 personal strength that it is employed as an agent of the crime. Bel- 

 ligerency, revenge, and other emotions which tend to crime, are 

 absorbed in the order of malicious ofi'enses, and thus the field is left 

 clear, iu the class under analysis, for the full play of the physical 

 factor. Omitting ages under sixteen years, as being too nearly equal 

 physically in the sexes, and basing our proportion on the number of 

 criminals of both sexes from that age to twenty-one years, the pro- 

 portion is 1 woman to 18 men, while for the ten years following it is 

 1 to 20.' This is twice the proportion between the sexes for crimes 

 against persons, and seven times that for crimes against property 

 without violence, for corresponding ages. When we contrast this 

 with the fact that the mean proportion between the sexes for all 

 crimes against property is 1 to 4, and for crimes against the person 

 it is 1 to 6, we may form an idea of the enormous influence of physi- 

 cal strength as a restraint to woman's criminal tendencies. "We have, 

 however, to modify this somewhat, by giving more or less value to 

 woman's tendency to avoid those crimes which require publicity in 

 both the planning and perpetration, and which is implied in violent 

 crimes against property ; but even giving this ti'ait due weight, the 

 physical factor as exhibited in this order of crime is the one which, 

 more than any other, defines its character. While woman's deficient 

 physical strength, compared to man's, acts so powerfully as an obsta- 

 cle in the division of crime just considered, it is highly probable that 

 in other offenses it also acts in the same manner, varying in amount, 

 as this quality is necessary to the successful perpetration of the crime. 

 In those crimes in which this factor does not enter, we at once notice 

 that the ratios of the sexes approximate. In adultery, for instance, 

 the proportion of the sexes is about the same.'' In infanticide, 

 I have already remarked on the ease with which women enter upon 

 a criminal course, when this conforms to the direction of purely 

 sexual qualities ; and, undoubtedly, intensity is added by the absence 

 of physical strength as a requisite to the perpetration of the crime. 

 In crimes against the currency, the same near equality in the number 

 of the sexes involved may be noticed, and the fact that the propor- 

 tions for the most active period of adult life and for childhood and 

 old age are about the same renders it highly probable that this 



' Neiaon, he. cit. * De Marsangy, loc. cil. 



