Respecting the two per cent. of offenders which remain to be accounted for, it will not be far from the mark to say that destitution is the immediate cause of their wrong-doing.  These offenders are composed of homeless boys, of old men unable to work, of habitual drunkards who cannot got a steady job, or keep it when they get it, of vagrants who divide their time between begging and petty theft, and of workmen on the tramp, who have become terribly reduced, and will rather steal than enter a workhouse.  The percentage of these offenders varies in different parts of the country.  In the north of England, for instance, there are comparatively few homeless boys who find their way before the magistrates on charges of theft; in London, on the other hand, the number is considerable, and ranges according to the season of the year, or the state of trade, to between 1 and 3 per cent. of the criminal population.  Why does London enjoy such an evil pre-eminence in this matter?  In my opinion it often arises from the fact that house-accommodation is so expensive in the metropolis.  In London, it is a habit with many parents, owing to the want of room at home, to make growing lads shift for themselves at a very early age.  These boys earn just enough to enable them to secure a bare existence; out of their scanty wages it is impossible to hire a room for themselves; they have to be contented with the common lodging-house.  In such places these boys have to associate with all sorts of broken-down, worthless characters, and in numbers of instances they come by degrees to adopt the habits and modes of life of the class among which their lot is cast.  At the very time parental control is most required it is almost entirely withdrawn; the lad is left to his own devices; and, in too many cases, descends into the ranks of crime.  The first step in his downward career begins with the loss of employment; this sometimes happens through no fault of his own, and is simply the result of a temporary slackness of trade; but in most instances a job is lost for want of punctuality or some other boyish irregularity which can only be properly corrected at home.  To lose work is to be deprived of the means of subsistence; the only openings left are the workhouse or crime.  It is the latter alternative which is generally chosen, and thus, the lad is launched on the troubled sea of crime.

It must not be understood that all London boys drift into crime after the manner I have just described.  In some instances these unfortunates have lived all their life in criminal neighbourhoods, and merely follow the footsteps of the people around them.  What, for instance, is to be expected from children living in streets such as Mr. Charles Booth describes in his work on “Life and Labour in East London?” One of these streets, which he calls St. Hubert Street, swarms with children, and in hardly any case does the family occupy more than one room.  The general character of the street is thus depicted.  “An