Human Physiology. 55 



By a strange folly of criminal legislation, short sentences are 

 continually inflicted, and therefore the worst criminals are 

 often at large ; and known criminals, with no visible means 

 of support, who must therefore be living on the community, 

 are allowed to go on for years in their depredations. The 

 guilt-gardens are pruned and cultivated, instead of being 

 thoroughly uprooted and destroyed. When the people and 

 their parliament say there shall be honesty, and there shall not 

 be crime, some way will be found to make the popular will 

 effectual 



CHAPTER IX. 



VICE AND IMMORALITY. 



Crime and Vice Exceptional Statistics of Illegitimacy Morals of England, 

 Scotland, and Sweden Immorality of the Lower Orders Mortality 

 of Illegitimate Children The Gang System South Wales Rural 

 Morals Statute Fairs and Hirings Middle and Upper Classes 

 Unequal Numbers of the Sexes Preference for Unmarried Wet- 

 Nurses Children Born to Vice A Sensual Literature A Lower 

 Deep. 



THE crime of any country, it will be said, is exceptional. We 

 are not to judge a community by its worst members, or a 

 country by its outlaws. It will not) however, be disputed, 

 that there is a wide-spread dishonesty in this country, ready 

 for circumstances to ripen into crime. It may also be said 

 that the instances and statistics of vice and immorality I 

 propose to give in this chapter are exceptional. Let it be 

 admitted ; still the facts exist, and must be considered. We 

 lessen no evil by shutting our eyes. A noble lady has said of 

 English society: "The received maxim of certain circles is 



