Popular Science Monthly 



is more, they follow the natural lines of least 

 resistance. Unable to overcome tempta- 

 tion, they readily go 

 to any extremes 

 which their narrow 

 and stunted think- 

 ing may dictate. 

 The "high-graders" 

 and "borderline 

 cases" may deceive 

 one — deceive so well 

 that only the experi- 

 enced, after repeated 

 and varied testing 

 and examination, can 

 discover their de- 

 fects. This "almost- 

 normal" type, with 

 his superficial rea- 

 soning and cunning 

 planfulness, consti- 

 tutes the most dan- 

 gerous class imagin- 

 able. At his door 

 can be laid some of 

 the most hideous 

 crimes ever perpe- 

 trated. 



Once feeble- 

 minded, always 

 feeble-minded. Edu- 

 cation may improve, 

 watchful care and 

 studied training may 

 render a defective 

 social and law-abid- 



The Equilibrium Test 

 To the trained observer much can be learned from 

 noting a person's powers of equilibrium when in some 

 such position as that here shown. Tremor of the 

 hands, eyelids, face muscles — also marked swaying 

 of the entire body — may suggest the presence of organic 

 incipient or advanced stages 



Picture Puzzle Test 

 This is a highly-colored picture mounted on a wooden frame out 

 of which ten square spaces have been cut. The subject selects 

 from among fifty small square designs those ten which would 

 seem the most logical insertions to complete the picture. Here 

 the subject is inserting a child's bonnet in its proper space 



527 



ing, but when once criminal tendencies 

 make themselves manifest, segregation is 

 the only course. We 

 need more institu- 

 tions where such un- 

 fortunates can be 

 cared for and pro- 

 tected, developed 

 mentally and manu- 

 ally to whatever de- 

 gree may be possible, 

 and given employ- 

 ment and a mode 

 of living best suited 

 to make them useful 

 and happy. 



The insane were 

 once normal and are 

 now mentally sick. 

 This in itself means 

 irresponsibility. The 

 proper treatment 

 here is even more 

 obvious. What good 

 is a prison sentence ? 

 Surely it does not 

 reform. We are be- 

 ginning to see that 

 the jail is no place 

 for an irresponsible 

 person. The padded 

 cell is giving place 

 to the hospital. But 

 the change is all too 

 slow. Only too often 

 one suffering from 

 paresis ("softening of the brain") is 

 arrested, sentenced and jailed; the 

 underlying cause of his misconduct 

 is wholly undetected ; perhaps he is 

 looked upon as a drunkard because 

 of his strange antics. Yet paresis is 

 an incurable mental disease that al- 

 ways leads to dementia. So, many 

 mild insanities pass through the 

 courts unrecognized. 



A Laboratory Where Criminals 

 Are Studied 



The work of the Psychopathic 

 Laboratory proved a number of 

 things. Of the cases chosen from 

 the daily police "line-up," and the 

 cases examined at the request of 

 Police Lieutenants, Magistrates, 

 judges of other courts, Department 

 of Correction, and the Parole Com- 

 mission, about 50 per cent of the 

 first 450 prisoners studied were 



