CLIMATE AND CRIME.
Man's existence depends upon physical surroundings; these surroundings
have exercised an immense influence in modifying his organism, in
shaping his social development, in moulding his character. To enumerate
all the external factors operating upon individual and social life is
outside our present purpose, but they may be briefly summed up as
climate, moisture, soil, the configuration of the earth's surface, and
the nature of its products. These natural phenomena, either singly or
in varying degrees of combination, have unquestionably played a most
prominent part in making the different races of mankind what they at
present are. We have only to look at the low type of life exhibited by
the primitive inhabitants of certain inhospitable regions of the globe
to see how profoundly the physical structure of man is affected by his
natural surroundings. Even a comparatively slight difference of
environment is not without effect upon the population subjected to its
influence. According to M. de Quatrefages, the bodily structure of the
English race has been distinctly modified by residence in the United
States of America. It is not more than two and a half centuries since
Englishmen began to emigrate in any considerable numbers to the
American Continent, but in that comparatively short period the
Anglo-American has ceased to resemble his ancestors in physical
appearance. Alterations have taken place in the skin, the hair, the
neck, and the head; the lower jaw has become bigger; the bones of the
arms and legs have lengthened, and the American of to-day requires a
different kind of glove from the Englishman. Structural changes of a
similar character have taken place in the negroes transplanted to
America. M. Elisée Reclus considers that in a century and a half they
have traversed a good quarter of the distance which separates them from
the whites. Another important point, as showing the influence of
habitat upon race, is the fact that the modifications of human
structure resulting from residence in America are in the direction of
assimilating the European type to that of the red man.[11] In short, it
may be taken as a well-established principle that external nature
destroys all organisms that cannot adapt themselves to its action, and
physiologically modifies all organisms that can.
[11] The various types of Jews also afford a striking instance of
the effect of natural surroundings on bodily structure.
The social condition of mankind is also profoundly affected by climatic
and other external circumstances. The intense cold of the Arctic and
Antarctic regions is fatal to anything approaching a developed form of
civilisation. Intense heat, on the other hand, although not
incompatible with a certain degree of progress, is unfavourable to its
permanence;[12] the extinct societies of the tropics, such as Cambodia,
Mexico and Peru, affording instances of the operation of this law. It
is impossible for man to get beyond the nomad state in the vast deserts
of Northern Africa; and the extreme moisture of the atmosphere in other
portions of the same continent puts an effectual check on anything like
social advance. In some parts of the world social development has been
hindered by external circumstances of another character, such as the
want of wood, the scarcity of animals, the absence of edible fruits. In
fact, it is only within a comparatively temperate zone that human
society has been able permanently to assume highly complex forms and to
build itself up on an extensive scale. In this zone, climate, while
favouring man up to a certain point, has at the same time compelled him
to eat bread in the sweat of his brow. It has compelled him to enter
into conflict with natural obstacles, the result of which has been to
call forth his powers of industry, of energy, of self-reliance, and to
sharpen his intellectual faculties generally. In addition to exercising
and strengthening these personal attributes, the climatic influences of
what has been called the zone of civilisation have brought man's social
characteristics more fully and elaborately into play. The nature of
these influences has forced him to cooperate more or less closely with
his fellows; while each step in the path of cooperation has involved
him in another of a more complex kind. The growth of social cooperation
is not necessarily accompanied by a corresponding development of the
moral sentiments; increased cooperation in some cases involving a
distinct ethical loss. In many directions, however, highly organised
societies tend to evolve loftier types of morality; and it is in
harmony with the facts to say that the highest moral types are not to
be found where nature does most or where it does least in the way of
providing food and shelter for man.
[12] Ratzel. _Völkerkunde_, i. 20.
It is also interesting to observe the effect which climate, through the
agency of religion, has had upon human conduct. One of the main factors
in the origin of religion is the feeling of dependence upon nature so
strongly manifested in all primitive forms of faith. The outcome of
this feeling of dependence was to exalt the forces of nature into
divinities, and man's conception of these divinities, shaped as it was
by the attitude of nature around him, had an incalculable influence on
his life and actions. The remains of this influence are still visible
in the aesthetic effects which the forces and operations of nature
produce on civilised man; in all other respects it has to a large
extent passed away.[13]
[13] Darwin says that in elaborating his theory of Natural
Selection he attributed too little to external surroundings.
_Life and Letters_.
We have now touched upon most of the ways in which external
surroundings have had a hand in shaping the course of human life in the
past; it will be our next business to inquire whether these
surroundings have any effect upon human conduct at the present day, and
especially upon those manifestations of conduct which are known as
crimes. That they still have an effect is an opinion which has long
been entertained.
Going back to the ancient Greeks, we find Hippocrates holding that all
regions liable to violent changes of climate produced men of fierce,
impetuous and stubborn disposition. "In approaching southern
countries," says Montesquieu, "one would believe that morality was
being left behind; more ardent passions multiply crimes; each tries to
gain from others all the advantages which can minister to these
passions." Buckle believes that the interruption of work caused by
instability of climate leads to instability of character. In analysing
the contents of French statistics, Quetelet,[14] while admitting that
other causes may neutralise the action of climate, proceeds to say that
the "number of crimes against property relatively to the number of
crimes against the person increases considerably as we advance towards
the north." Another eminent student of French criminal statistics, M.
Tarde, comes to very much the same conclusions as Quetelet; he admits
that a high temperature does exercise an indirect influence on the
criminal passions. But the most exhaustive investigations in this
problem have been undertaken in Italy, by Signor Enrico Ferri. After a
thorough examination of French judicial statistics for a series of
years, Ferri arrives at the conclusion that a maximum of crimes against
the person is reached in the hot months, while, on the other hand,
crimes against property come to a climax in the winter.[15]
[14] _Physique Sociale_, ii. 282.
[15] _Zeitschrift für Strafrechtswissenschaft_, ii., 486.
In testing these opinions respecting the influence of climate upon
crime, we are obliged, to some extent, to have recourse to
international statistics. But these statistics, as has already been
pointed out, owing to the diversity of customs, laws, criminal
procedure, and so on, do not easily admit of comparison. So much is
this the case that we shall not make the attempt as far as these
statistics have reference to crimes against property. In this field no
satisfactory result can, at present be obtained. The same remark holds
good in relation to all offences against the person, with the exception
of homicide. This, undoubtedly, in an important exception; and it
arises from the fact that there is a greater consensus of opinion among
civilised communities respecting the gravity of homicide than exists
with regard to any other form of crime. Murder in all its degrees is a
crime which immediately causes a profound commotion; it is easy to
recognise; it is more likely than any other offence to come to the ears
of the authorities. For these reasons this crime lends itself most
readily to international comparison; nevertheless, differences of
judicial procedure, legal nomenclature, and different methods of
classification stand in the way of making the comparison absolutely
accurate. These differences, however, are not so great as to render
comparison impossible or worthless; on the contrary, the results of
such a comparison are of exceptional value, and go a long way to
determine the question of the effect of climate upon crimes of blood.
Assuming, then, with these reservations, that such a comparison can be
instituted, let us see to what extent murder, in the widest sense of
the word, including wilful murder, manslaughter, and infanticide,
prevails in the various countries of Europe. In ordinary circumstances
this task would be a laborious one, entailing a minute and careful
examination of the criminal statistics and procedure of many nations.
Fortunately, it has recently been accomplished by Dr. Bosco in an
admirable monograph communicated in the first instance to the Journal
of the International Statistical Institute, but now published in a
separate form. Bosco's figures have all been taken from official
sources, and may, therefore, be accepted as accurate; but, before
tabulating-them, it may be useful to make an extract from the
explanatory note by which they are accompanied. "As the composition of
the population, with respect to age, varies in different countries, and
as it has to be remembered that all the population under ten years of
age has no share, at least under normal conditions, in the crime of
murder, it has seemed to me a more exact method to calculate the
proportion of murders to the inhabitants who are over ten years of age,
than to include the total population. For those States where a census
has been recently taken, such, for instance, as France and Germany, the
results of that census have been used; that is to say, the French
census of May, 1886, and the German census of December, 1885. For the
other States the population has been calculated (adding the excess of
births over deaths to the results of the last census) to the end of the
intermediate year for each period of years to which the information
relates; that is to say, to the end of 1883 for Belgium, and to the end
of 1884 for Austria, Hungary, Spain, England, Scotland and Ireland. As
the information respecting Italy refers to 1887 only, the population
has been estimated up to the end of that year. The division of the
population according to age (above and below ten) has been obtained by
means of proportional calculations based on the results of the census
for each State. In the case of France and Germany, however, it has been
taken directly from the census returns."[16]
Homicides of all kinds in the following European States:--
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Tried. Convicted.
Population Annual Per Annual Per
Countries. over ten. Years. average 100,000 average 100,000
inhabitants. inhabitants.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Italy 23,408,277 1887 3,606 15.40 2,805 11.98
Austria 17,199,237 1883-6 689 4.01 499 2.90
France 31,044,370 1882-6 847 2.73 580 1.87
Belgium 4,377,813 1881-5 132 3.02 101 2.31
England 19,898,053 1882-6 318 1.60 151 0.76
Ireland 3,854,588 1882-6 129 3.35 54 1.40
Scotland 2,841,941 1882-6 60 2.11 21 0.74
Spain 13,300,839 1883-6 1,584 11.91 1,085 8.18
Hungary 10,821,558 1882-6 625 5.78
Holland 3,172,464 1882-6 35 1.10 28 0.88
Germany 35,278,742 1882-6 567 1.61 476 1.35
---------------------------------------------------------------------
[16] _Gli omicidii in alcuni stati d'Europa. Appunti di statistica
comparata del Dr A. Bosco_, 1889.
What is the import of these statistics? We perceive at once that
Italy, Spain and Hungary head the list in the proportion of murders to
the population. In Italy, out of every 100,000 persons over ten years
of age, eleven in round numbers are annually convicted of murder in
one or other of its forms; in Spain eight are convicted of the same
offence, and in Hungary five are convicted. These three countries are
conspicuously ahead of all the others to which our table refers.
Austria and Belgium follow at a long distance with two convictions in
round numbers to every 100,000 inhabitants over ten. France, Ireland
and Germany come next with one conviction and a considerable fraction
to every 100,000 persons over ten; England, Scotland and Holland stand
at the bottom of the list with between seven and eight persons
convicted of murder to every one million of inhabitants over ten.
In order to understand the full meaning of these figures we must take
one more stop and compare the numbers convicted with the numbers
tried. In some countries very few convictions may take place in
proportion to the number accused, while in other countries the
proportion may be very considerable. In other words, in order to
arrive at an approximate estimate of the amount of murders perpetrated
in a country, we must consider how many cases of murder have been
tried in the course of the year. It very seldom happens that a person
is tried for this offence when no murder has been committed; and it
may, therefore, be assumed that the crime has taken place when a man
haw to stand his trial for it. Estimating then the prevalence of
murder in the various countries by trials, rather than convictions,
it will be found that Germany, with a much larger percentage of
convictions than England, has just as few cases of murder for trial.
And the reason the number of convictions, as between the two nations,
differs, arises from the fact that a prisoner's chance of acquittal in
England is a hundred per cent. greater than it is in Germany. It is
not, therefore, accurate to assume that a greater number of murders
are committed in Germany than in England because a greater number
of persons are annually convicted of this crime; all that these
convictions absolutely prove is, that the machinery of the criminal
law is more effective in the one country than in the other. To take
another instance, more persons are annually tried for murder in
Ireland than in France; but more cases of conviction are recorded in
France than in Ireland. These contrasts show that, while the French
are less addicted to this grave offence than the Irish, they are more
anxious to secure its detection, and that a greater body of public
opinion is on the side of law in France than in Ireland. All these
instances (and more could easily be added to them) are intended to
call attention to the importance of looking at the number of persons
tried, as well as the percentage of persons convicted, if we desire to
form an accurate estimate of the comparative prevalence of crime.
While thus showing that the number of trials for murder is the best
test of the prevalence of this offence, it is not meant that the test
is in all respects indisputable. At most it is merely approximate. One
obstacle in the way of its entire accuracy consists in the circumstance
that the proportion of persons tried, as compared with the amount of
crime committed, is in no two countries precisely the same. In France,
for instance, more murders are perpetrated, for which no one is
ultimately tried, than in Italy or in England; that is to say, a
murderer runs more risk of being placed in the dock in this country
than in France. But the difference between the two countries is again
to a great extent adjusted by the fact that once a man is placed in
the dock in France he has far less chance of being acquitted than if
he were tried according to English law. On the whole, therefore, it
may be assumed that the international statistics of trials, corrected
when necessary by the international statistics of convictions, present
a tolerably accurate idea of the extent to which the crime of murder
prevails among the nationalities of Europe. In any case these figures
will go some way towards helping us to see whether climatic conditions
have any influence upon the amount of crime. This we shall now inquire
into.
On looking at the isotherms for the year it will be observed that the
average temperature of Italy and Spain is ten degrees higher than
the average temperature of England. On the other hand, the average
temperature of Hungary is very much the same as the average temperature
of this country; but Hungary is at the same time exposed to much
greater extremes of climate than England. In winter it is nearly ten
degrees colder than England, while in summer it is as hot as Spain.
The advocates of the direct effect of climate upon crime contend that
account must be taken not merely of the degree of temperature, but
also of the variations of temperature to which a region is exposed.
According to this theory one of the principal reasons the crime of
murder is, at least, fourfold higher in Hungary than in England, is to
be found in the violent oscillations of temperature in Hungary as
compared with England. In Italy murders are, at least, ten times as
numerous as in England; in Spain they are seven times as numerous; the
chief cause of this condition of things is said to be the serious
difference of temperature. In the United States of America there are
more crimes of blood in the South than in the North; the main
explanation of this difference is said to be that the climate of the
South is much hotter than the climate of the North.
In opposition to this theory of the intimate relation between
temperature and crime, it may be urged that the greater prevalence of
crimes of blood in hot latitudes is a mere coincidence and not a
causal connection. This is the view taken by Dr. Mischler in Baron von
Holtzendorff's "Handbuch des Gefängnisswesens." He says the real
reason crimes of blood are more common in the South of Europe than in
the North is to be attributed to the more backward state of
civilisation in the South, and to the wild and mountainous character
of the country. To the latter part of this argument it is easy to
reply that Scotland is quite as mountainous as Italy, and yet its
inhabitants are far less addicted to crimes against the person. But it
is more civilised, for, as M. Tarde ingeniously contends, the bent of
civilisation at present is to travel northward. Admitting for a moment
that Scotland is more civilised than Spain or Italy, all savage
tribes, on the other hand, are confessedly less advanced in the arts
of life than these two peninsulas. But, for all that, many of these
savage peoples are much less criminal. "I have lived," says Mr.
Russell Wallace, "with communities of savages in South America and in
the East who have no laws or law courts, but the public opinion of the
village freely expressed. Each man scrupulously respects the rights of
his fellows, and any infraction of these rights rarely or never takes
place." Mr. Herbert Spencer also quotes innumerable instances of the
kindness, mildness, honesty, and respect for person and property of
uncivilised peoples. M. de Quatrefages, in summing up the ethical
characteristics of the various races of mankind, comes to the
conclusion that from a moral point of view the white man is hardly any
better than the black. Civilisation so far has unfortunately generated
almost as many vices as it has virtues, and he is a bold man who will
say that its growth has diminished the amount of crime. It is very
difficult then to accept the view that the frequency of murder in
Spain and Italy is entirely due to a lack of civilisation.
Nor can it be said to be entirely due to economic distress. A
condition of social misery has undoubtedly something to do with the
production of crime. In countries where there is much wealth side by
side with much misery, as in France and England, adverse social
circumstances drive a certain portion of the community into criminal
courses. But where this great inequality of social conditions does not
exist--where all are poor as in Ireland or Italy--poverty alone is not
a weighty factor in ordinary crime. In Ireland, for example, there in
almost as much poverty as exists in Italy, and if the amount of crime
were determined by economic circumstances alone, Ireland ought to have
as black a record as her southern sister. Instead of that she is on
the whole as free from crime as the most prosperous countries of
Europe. In the face of these facts it is impossible to say that the
high rate of crime in Italy and Spain is to be wholly accounted for by
the pressure of economic adversity.
Will not difference of race suffice to account for it? Is it not the
case that some races are inherently more prone to crime than others?
In India, for instance, where the great mass of the population is
singularly law-abiding, a portion of the aboriginal inhabitants have
from time immemorial lived by plunder and crime. "When a man tells
you," says an official report, quoted by Sir John Strachey, "that he
is a Badhak, or a Kanjar, or a Sonoria, he tells you what few
Europeans ever thoroughly realise, that he, an offender against the
law, has been so from the beginning and will be so to the end; that
reform is impossible, for it is his trade, his caste--I may almost say
his religion--to commit crime." It is not poverty which makes many of
these predatory races criminals. Speaking of the Mina tribe inhabiting
one of the frontier districts of the Punjab, Sir John Strachey says:
"Their sole occupation is, and always has been, plunder in the native
States and in distant parts of British India; they give no trouble at
home, and, judging from criminal statistics, it would be supposed that
they were an honest community. They live amid abundance, in
substantial houses with numerous cattle, fine clothes and jewels, and
fleet camels to carry off their plunder." Special laws have been made
for dealing with these tribes; a register of their numbers is kept;
they can be compelled to live within certain local limits, but in
spite of these coercive measures crime is not suppressed, and "a long
time must elapse before we see the end of the criminal tribes of
India."
Coming back to European peoples, it is worthy of note that both
Hungary and Finland are inhabited by the same race. These two
countries are separated by about fifteen degrees of latitude, but in
the matter of murder the people of Finland are much more nearly allied
to the Hungarians than to their immediate neighbours, the Swedes and
Norwegians. The Finns commit about twice as many murders in proportion
to the population as the Teutons of Scandinavia, but only about half
as many as the Hungarians; and it is not improbable to suppose that
while the effect of race makes them more murderous than the
Scandinavians, the effect of climate makes them less murderous than
the inhabitants of Hungary.
Before bringing forward any additional material on one side or the
other, let us pause for a moment to consider the results which have
just been obtained as to the effect of race as compared with climate
upon crime. In India we have found an Aryan and a non-Aryan population
living together under the same climatic influences, and very much the
same social conditions, and we have seen that the Aborigines are more
criminally disposed than the Aryan invaders. Again we have a Mongolian
race living in the far North of Europe, and we find that they show a
larger percentage of homicidal crime than the Teutonic inhabitants
who live in the same latitudes. In Hungary, where the Mongoloid type
is once more met with, the same facts are substantially reproduced;
this type is more homicidal than the Austrian Teutons living under a
similar climate. While these facts point to the conclusion that race
has apparently some influence on the amount of crime, they fail to
show that race characteristics alone are sufficient to explain the
differences in criminality between the same peoples when settled in
different quarters of the globe. The Mongoloid type in Finland is
less criminal than the same type in Hungary, and the Teutonic type
in Scandinavia is less murderously disposed than the same type in
the empire of Austria. It has also been pointed out that the
Anglo-American of the Northern States is more law abiding than his
brother by race in the South, while both are more murderous than the
inhabitants of the United Kingdom; where extremes of climate are not
so great.
With these facts before us we shall now institute another comparison
between two widely separated branches of the Anglo-Saxon race, namely,
the colonists of Australia and the people of the motherland. Of the
Australian colonists it is not incorrect to say that they are, on the
whole, the pick of the home population. It is perfectly true that a
certain proportion of the ne'er-do-wells have emigrated to Australia,
and some of them, no doubt, help to swell the normal criminal
population of the colonies. But, on the other hand, Australia has this
advantage, that the average colonist who seeks a home beyond our
shores is generally a superior man to the average citizen who remains
at home; he is more steady, more enterprising, more industrious. In
this way the balance is adjusted in favour of the colonies. It is a
great deal more than redressed if the superior, social, and economic
conditions, under which the colonists live, are also placed in the
scale. In his "Problems of Greater Britain," Sir Charles Dilke has
shown, with admirable clearness, what immense advantages are enjoyed
by the working population of Australia as compared with the same class
at home; so much is this the case that the Australian colonies have
been not inaptly called the paradise of the working man. Here then is
an excellent opportunity for comparing the effects of climate upon
crime. In Australia we have a people of the same race as ourselves,
better off economically, living under essentially the same laws and
governed in practically the same spirit. Almost the only difference
between the inhabitants of the United Kingdom and the communities of
Australia is a difference of climate. Does this difference manifest
itself in the statistics of crime? In order to test the matter we
shall exclude the colony of New South Wales from our calculations. For
its size New South Wales is the richest community in the world, and
its riches are well distributed among all classes of the population.
But it was at one time a penal settlement, and it is possible that the
criminal statistics of the colony are still inflated by that remote
cause. The sister colony of Victoria stands upon a different footing
and is free from that disturbing factor; we shall therefore select
that colony as a normal type of the Australian group. In Part V.I.I.
of the Statistical Register of the colony of Victoria for 1887, there
is an excellent summary of the position of the colony with respect to
crime. The admirable manner in which these judicial statistics are
arranged, reflects the highest credit on the colonial authorities; for
fulness of information and clearness of arrangement they are not
surpassed by any similar statistics in the world. As homicide is the
crime on which we have hitherto based our international comparisons,
we shall, for the present, confine our attention to the Victorian
statistics of this offence.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Countries|Population|Years.| Tried | Convicted
| over Ten.| | Annual Per | Annual Per
| | |Average 100,000 |Average 100,000
| | | Inhabitants.| Inhabitants.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Victoria | 581,838|1882-6| 22 3.2 | 14 2.5
United
Kingdom |26,594,582|1882-6| 505 2.35 | 226 .96
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Before proceeding to analysis the contents of this table, it will be
as well to explain the method on which it has been constructed, and
the sources from which it is derived. The population of Victoria, over
ten years of age, has been calculated according to the Victorian
census for 1881, as contained in Part II. of the Victorian Statistical
Register. In order to make the Victorian table harmonise in all
particulars with Dr. Bosco's table for England, Scotland, and Ireland,
the excess of births over deaths has been calculated up to the end of
1884. The United Kingdom, it will be seen, has been selected as the
measure of comparison with the colony of Victoria. This selection has
been made on the ground that the colony of Victoria is not composed of
the inhabitants of any one of the three kingdoms, but contains a
mixture of them all. It will also be observed that the homicidal crime
of each of the three kingdoms differs from the other, but this is a
consideration which we shall not further comment upon at present.
After these preliminary explanations we are now in a position to
examine the contents of our statistical table in its bearing upon
crimes of blood. It will now be possible to see what light the criminal
statistics of Victoria, as compared with the criminal statistics of the
United Kingdom, throw upon these crimes; and the disturbing factor of
race being eliminated, what is the influence of climate pure and simple
upon them. According to the isotherms for the year the Victorians live
in an atmosphere between eight and ten degrees hotter than our own.
Side by side with this additional heat, there is, as compared with
the United Kingdom, an additional amount of crime. In the colony of
Victoria, in proportion to every 100,000 inhabitants over ten years of
age, there are nearly one-third more murders annually than in the
United Kingdom. On what ground is this considerable increase of
homicide to be accounted for, except on the ground of climate? The
higher percentage is not caused by difference of race; it is not
caused by worse economic conditions--these conditions are much
superior to our own--the meaning of the figures is not obscured by any
material differences of legal procedure or legal nomenclature. It
cannot be urged that the Victorian population are the dregs of the
home population; the very opposite is the fact. The bad characters who
emigrate are the only disturbing element; but, after all, these men
are not so numerous, and the evil effects of their presence is
counterbalanced by the superiority of the average colonist to the
average citizen who remains at home. It may be said that there is
greater difficulty in detecting crime in a new colony than in an old
and settled country. As applied to some colonies it is possible this
objection may be sound, but, as applied to Victoria, it will not hold
good. In Victoria the police are much more effective than they are at
home, and a criminal has much less chance of going unpunished there
than he has in England. In Victoria in the year 1887, out of a total
of 40,693 cases reported to the police, 34,473 were brought up for
trial. In England, on the other hand, out of a total of 42,391
indictable offences reported to the police in 1886-7, only 19,045
persons were apprehended. The Victorian figures include offences of
all kinds, petty as well as indictable, whereas the English figures
deal with indictable offences only. But admitting this, and admitting
that it is more difficult to arrest indictable offenders, this
difficulty is not so great as to explain away the vast difference in
the numbers apprehended in Victoria as compared with the numbers
apprehended in England. Only one conclusion can be drawn from these
figures, and it is that the Victorian constabulary are more efficient
than our own, and that it is a more dangerous thing for a person to
break the law in the young colony of Victoria than in the old
community at home.
It seems to me that the points of comparison between the United
Kingdom and Victoria, in so far as they have any bearing upon crime,
have now been exhausted; on almost every one of these points Victoria
stands in a more favourable position than ourselves. The colony has,
on the whole, a better kind of citizen; it has superior social and
economic conditions; it has a far more effective system of police. On
what possible ground, then, is it, except the ground of climate, that
the Victorians are more addicted to homicide than the people of the
United Kingdom? I admit it would be rash to assert that climate is the
cause if our own and the Victorian statistics were the only documents
to which we could appeal; it would be rash to draw such a sweeping
conclusion from so isolated a basis. But when we know that the
Victorian statistics are only one set of documents among many, and
that all these sets of documents point to the operation of the same
law, the case assumes an entirely different complexion. The results of
the Victorian statistics harmonise with the conclusions already
reached from a comparison of the criminal statistics of Europe and
America. These conclusions in turn are powerfully reinforced by the
experience of Australia. In fact, the whole body of evidence, from
whatever quarter it is collected, points with remarkable unanimity to
the conviction that, as far as European peoples and their offshoots
are concerned, climate alone is no inconsiderable factor in
determining the course of human conduct.
Yet the evil influence of climate, mischievous as it is at present, is
not to be looked upon and acquiesced in as an irrevocable fatality. At
first sight it would seem as if the human race could not possibly
escape the malevolent action of cosmical influences over which it has
little or no control. The rise and fall of temperature, its rage and
intensity, is one of these influences, and yet its pernicious offsets
are capable of being held to a large extent in check. As far as bodily
comfort is concerned, it is marvellous to consider the innumerable
methods and devices the progressive races of mankind have invented to
protect themselves against the hostility of the elements by which they
are surrounded. In fact, an important part of the history of the race
consists in the ceaseless efforts it has been making to improve upon
and perfect these methods and devices. We have only to compare the
rude hut of the savage with the modern dwelling of the civilised man
in order to see to what extent we can shield ourselves from the
elemental forces in the midst of which we have to live. We have only
to mark the difference between the miserable and scanty garments of
the natives of Terra del Fuego and the attire of the Englishman of
to-day to see what can be done by man in the way of rescuing himself
from the inclemencies of Nature. If these conquests can be achieved
where our physical existence is in peril, there can be little reason
to doubt that advances of a similar nature can be made in the moral
order as soon as man comes to feel equally conscious of their
necessity. As a matter of fact, in some quarters of the world these
advances have already in some measure been made. In the vast peninsula
of India the structure of society is so constituted that the evil
effect of climate in producing crimes of blood has been marvellously
neutralised. It hardly admits of dispute that the caste system on
which Indian society is based is, on the whole, one of the most
wonderful instruments for the prevention of crimes of violence the
world has ever seen. The average temperature of the Indian peninsula
is about thirty degrees higher than the average temperature of the
British Isles, and if there were no counteracting forces at work,
crimes of violence in India should be much more numerous than they are
with us. But the counteracting forces acting upon Indian society are
of such immense potency that the malign influences of climate are very
nearly annihilated as far as the crimes we are now discussing are
concerned; and India stands to-day in the proud position of being more
free from crimes against the person than the most highly civilised
countries of Europe. In proof of this fact we have only to look at the
official documents annually issued respecting the condition of British
India. According to the returns contained in the Statistical Abstract
relating to British India and the Parliamentary paper exhibiting its
moral and material progress, the number of murders reported to the
police of India is smaller than the number reported in any European
State. The Indian Government issue no statistics, so far as I am
aware, of the numbers tried; it is, therefore, impossible to institute
any comparison between Europe and India upon this important point. But
when we come to the number convicted it is again found that India
presents a lower percentage of convictions for murder than is to be
met with among any other people. It may, however, be urged that the
statistical records respecting Indian crime are not so carefully kept
as the statistics of a like character relating to England and the
Continent. Sir John Strachey assures us that this is not the case; he
says that these statistics are as carefully collected and tabulated in
India as they are at home, and we may accept them as worthy of the
utmost confidence. The following table, which I have prepared from the
official documents already mentioned, may, therefore, be taken as
giving an accurate account of the condition of India between 1882-6,
as far as the most serious of all crimes is concerned. In order to
facilitate comparison I have drawn it up as far as possible on the
same lines as the other tables in this chapter.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
|Population |Years.| Cases of Homicide.
| over Ten. | | Reported. Convicted.
| -----------------------------------------
| | |Annual |Per |Annual |Per
| | |Average.|100,000 |Average.|100,000
| | | |Inhabitants.| |Inhabitants.
India|148,543,223|1882-6| 1,930 | 1.31 | 690 | .46
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According to this table, the remarkable fact is established that the
number of cases of homicide in India committed by persons over ten
years of age and reported to the police is smaller per 100,000
inhabitants than the number of cases of the same nature brought up for
trial in England. In order to appreciate the full importance of this
difference it has to be remembered that in England a great number of
cases of homicide are reported to the police, for which no one is
apprehended or brought to trial. In the case of the notorious
Whitechapel murders which horrified the country a year or two ago no
one was ever brought to trial, hardly any one was arrested or
seriously suspected. These crimes and many others like them materially
augment the number of homicides reported to the police, but they never
figure among the cases annually brought for trial before assizes. As a
matter of fact, no one is ever tried in more than one half of the
cases of homicide reported to the police in the course of the year. In
the year 1888, for instance, 403 cases of homicide were reported to
the police in England and Wales; but in connection with all these
cases only 196 persons were committed for trial. In short, double the
number of homicides are committed as compared with the number of
persons tried; and if a comparison is established between India and
England on the basis of homicides reported to the police, the outcome
of such a comparison will be to show that there are annually more than
twice as many murders committed per one hundred thousand inhabitants
over the age of ten in England than there are in India.
An objection may be taken to these figures on the ground that the
crime of infanticide is much more prevalent to India than it is in
England, and that the perpetrators of this crime are much less
frequently brought to justice in the former country than with us. That
objection is to some extent valid; at the same time it is well to
remember that infanticide in India is an offence of a very special and
peculiar character; the motives from which it springs are not what is
usually understood as criminal; these motives arise from religious
usage and immemorial custom; in short, it is English law and not the
Indian conscience which makes infanticide a crime. Of course, the
practice of infanticide is a proof that the Hindu mind has not the
same high conception of the value of infant life as one finds in the
western world, and in that respect India stands on an inferior moral
level to ourselves. But with the exception of infanticide (and it is
necessary to except it for the reasons I have just alleged) India has
not half as many homicides annually as England.[17]
[17] For the high percentage of infanticide in England see the
evidence given before the House of Lords last July (1890) by
Judges Day and Wills.
To what cause is this vast difference in favour of India to be
attributed? It is hardly probable that the difference is produced to
any appreciable extent, if at all, by the nature of the food used by
the people of India. If it were correct that a vegetable diet, such as
is almost exclusively used by the inhabitants of India, had a salutary
effect on the conduct of the population, we should witness the results
of it, not only in the Indian peninsula, but also in other quarters of
the world. The nature of the food consumed by the Italians bears a
very close resemblance in its essential constituents to the dietary of
the inhabitants of India; in both cases it is almost entirely composed
of vegetable products. If vegetable, as contrasted with animal food,
exercised a beneficial influence on human conduct; if it tended, for
example, to restrain the passions, to minimise the brute instincts,
some indisputable proof of this would be certain to show itself in the
criminal statistics of Italy. As a matter of fact, no such proof
exists. On the contrary, Italy is, of all countries within the pale of
civilisation, the one most notorious for crimes of blood. In the face
of this truth, it is impossible to believe that a vegetable diet has
anything to do either with producing or preventing crime, and the
contention that the wonderful immunity of India from offences against
the person is owing to the food used by the inhabitants must be looked
upon as without foundation.
The peculiar structure of society is unquestionably the most satisfactory
explanation of the high position occupied by the inhabitants of India
with respect to crime. The social edifice which a people builds for
itself is among all civilised communities a highly complex product, and
consists of a great agglomeration of diverse materials. These materials
are partly drawn from the primitive characteristics of the race; they
are partly borrowings from other and contiguous races; they are to a
considerable extent derived from natural surroundings of all kinds;
and in all circumstances they are supplemented by the genius of
individuals. In short, all social structures, when looked at minutely,
are found to be composed of two main ingredients--race and environment;
but these two ingredients are so indissolubly interfused that it is
impossible to say how much is to be attributed to the one, and how much
to the other, in the building up of a society. But if, it is impossible
to estimate the value of the several elements composing the fabric
of society, it is easy to ascertain the dominating idea on which all
forms of society are based. That dominating idea, if it may for the
moment be called such, is the instinct of self-preservation, and it
exercises just as great a power in determining the formation and play
of the social organism as it exercises in determining the attitude of
the individual to the world around him. In working out the idea of
self-preservation into practical forms, the social system of most
peoples has hitherto been built up with a view to protection against
external enemies in the shape of hostile tribes and nations; the
internal enemies of the commonwealth--the thieves, the housebreakers,
the disturbers of public order, the shedders of blood, the perpetrators
of violence--have been treated as only worthy of secondary consideration.
Such are the lines on which social structure has, in most cases,
proceeded, with the result that while external security was for long
periods assured, internal security remained as imperfect and defective
as ever.
The structure of society in India is, however, an exception to the
general rule. External security, or, in other words, the desire for
political freedom has, to a great extent, become extinct wherever the
principles of Brahmanism have succeeded in taking root.
These principles have been operating upon the Indian mind for thousands
of years; their effect in the sphere of politics excited the wonder of
the ancient Greeks, who tell us that the Indian peasant might be seen
tilling his field in peace between hostile armies preparing for battle.
A similar spectacle has been seen on the plains of India in modern
times. But Brahmanism, while extinguishing the principle of liberty in
all its branches, and exposing its adherents to the mercy of every
conqueror, has succeeded, through the caste system, in bringing
internal order, security, and peace to a high pitch of excellence. This
end, the caste system, like most other religious institutions, did not
and does not have directly in view; but the human race often takes
circuitous routes to attain its ends, and while apparently aiming at
one object, is in reality securing another. The permanent forces
operating in society often possess a very different character from
those on the surface, and when the complicated network in which they
are always wrapped up is stripped from off them, we find that they are
some fundamental human instincts at work in disguise.
These observations are applicable to the caste system. This system,
when divested of its externals, besides being an attempt to satisfy
the mystic and emotional elements in the Indian heart, also represents
the genius of the race engaged in the task of self-preservation. The
manner in which caste exercises this function in thus described by Sir
William Hunter in His volume on the Indian Empire. "Caste or guild,"
he says, "exercises a surveillance over each of its members from the
close of childhood until death. If a man behaves well, he will rise to
an honoured place in his caste; and the desire for such local
distinctions exercises an important influence in the life of a Hindu.
But the caste has its punishments as well as its rewards. Those
punishments consist of fine and excommunication. The fine usually
takes the form of a compulsory feast to the male members of the caste.
This is the ordinary means of purification, or of making amends for
breaches of the caste code. Excommunication inflicts three penalties:
First, an interdict against eating with the fellow members of the
caste; second, an interdict against marriage within the caste. This
practically amounts to debarring the delinquent and his family from
respectable marriages of any sort; third, cutting off the delinquent
from the general community by forbidding him the use of the village
barber and washerman, and of the priestly adviser. Except in very
serious cases, excommunication is withdrawn upon the submission of the
offender, and his payment of a fine. Anglo-Indian law does not enforce
caste decrees. But caste punishments exercise an efficacious restraint
upon unworthy members of the community, precisely as caste rewards
supply a powerful motive of action to good ones. A member who cannot
be controlled by this mixed discipline of punishment and reward is
eventually expelled; and, as a rule, 'an out-caste' is really a bad
man. Imprisonment in jail carries with it that penalty, but may be
condoned after release by heavy expiations."
Those remarks of Sir William Hunter afford an insight into the
coercive power exercised by the caste system on the Indian population.
Without that system it is probable that the criminal statistics of
India would present as high a proportion of crimes of violence and
blood as now exists among the peoples of Southern Europe. But with
that system in active operation, the evil influence of climate is
completely neutralised and India at the present moment enjoys a
remarkable immunity from violent crime. With the example of India
before us we are justified in coming to the conclusion that homicide
and crimes of a kindred nature need not necessarily be the malign
products of climate. Whatever climate has to do with fostering these
offences may be obviated by a better form of social organisation. It
would be ridiculous to dream of basing western society upon Indian
models; but at the same time India teaches us a lesson on the
construction of the social fabric which it would be well to learn. The
tendency of western civilisation at the present time is to herd vast
masses of men into huge industrial centres. It is useless discussing
the abstract question whether this is a good thing or a bad; we must
reconcile ourselves to the fact that it is a process forced upon
communities by the necessities of modern industrialism; and we must
accordingly make the best of it. In our efforts to make the best of
present tendencies, and to render them as innocuous as possible to
social welfare, there is one point at least where India is able to
teach us an instructive lesson. In India a man seldom becomes, what he
too often is, in all our large cities, a mere lonely, isolated unit,
left entirely to the mercy of his own impulses, constrained by no
social circle of any description, and unsustained by the pressure of
any public opinion for which he has the least regard. In India he is
always a member of some fraternity within the community; in that
fraternity or caste he feels at home; he is never isolated; he belongs
to a circle which is not too big for his individuality to be lost; he
is known; he has a reputation and a status to maintain; his life
within the caste is shaped for him by caste usages and traditions, and
for these he is taught to entertain the deepest reverence. Caste is in
many of its aspects a state in miniature within the state; in this
capacity it performs a variety of admirable functions of which the
state itself is and must always remain incapable.
Before the era of great cities the township in the West used to
exorcise some of the functions at present discharged in India by the
system of caste. But the township in the old sense of the word, with
its settled population and the common eye upon all its members, has
to a large extent disappeared. The influence of the family is at the
same time being constantly weakened by the migratory habits modern
industrialism entails on the population; in a word, the old
constraining force, which used to hold society together, are almost
gone, and nothing effective has sprung up to replace them.
In these circumstances what is to be done? It is useless attempting to
restore the past. That never has been accomplished successfully; all
attempts in that direction look as if they were opposed to the nature
of things. It is among the living and vigorous forces of the present
that we must look for help. I shall content myself by mentioning one
of these forces, namely Trade Societies. It seems a pity that these
societies should confine their operations merely to the limited object
of forcing up wages. That object is, of course, a perfectly laudable
and legitimate one, but it is surely not the supreme and only end for
which a Trade Society should exist. A Trade Society would do well to
teach its members how to spend as well as how to earn. What, indeed,
is the use of higher wages to a certain section of the members of
Trades-Unions? The increased pay, instead of being a blessing, becomes
a curse; it leads to drunkenness, to wife-beating, to disorder in the
public streets, to assaults on the police, to crimes of violence and
blood. It is a melancholy fact that the moment wages begin to rise,
the statistics of crime almost immediately follow suit, and at no
period are there more offences of all kinds against the person than
when material prosperity is at its height.
It lies well within the functions of such Trades-Unions as possess an
enlightened regard for the welfare of their members, to introduce a
code of regulations which would tend to minimise some of the evils
which have just been mentioned. It would immeasurably raise the status
of the Union, if certain disciplinary measures could be adopted
against members convicted of offences against the law. In the
professions of law and medicine it is the custom at the present time
to expel members who are proved guilty of serious offences of this
description, and unquestionably the dread of expulsion exercises a
most salutary influence on the conduct of all persons belonging to
these professions. It would be possible for Trade organisations to
accomplish much without resorting to this rigorous treatment; and the
real object for which such societies exist--the well-being of the
members--would be attained much more effectively than is the case at
present. Wages are but the means to an end; the end is individual,
domestic and social welfare, and it is only a half measure to supply
the means unless something is also done to secure the end.