On the assumption that poverty is the principal source of crime we ought to have a much larger prison population in the depth of winter than at any other period of the year.  The prison statistics for December, January, and February—­the three most inclement months, the three months when expenses are greatest and work scarcest—­should be the highest in the whole year.  As a matter of fact, it is during these three months that there are fewest people in prison.  According to an excellent return, issued for the first time by the Prison Commissioners in their thirteenth report, it appears that there was a considerably smaller number of prisoners in the local prisons of England and Wales in the winter months—­December, January and February, 1889-90—­than at any other season of the year.[22] And this is not an isolated fact.  A glance at the criminal returns for a series of years will at once show that crime is highest in summer and autumn—­a time when occupation of all kinds, and especially occupation for the poorest members of the community, is most easily obtained—­and lowest in winter and spring, when economic conditions are most adverse.[23]

    [22] See Appendix, iii.

[23] Scotch statistics are in harmony with English.  For the year ended March, 1890, the number of ordinary prisoners in custody in Scotland was lowest in December, January and February.  It was highest in July, August, September.  Crime was also highest when pauperism was lowest.  See 12th Report of Scottish Prison Commissioners.

All these facts, instead of pointing to poverty as the main cause of crime, point the other way.  It is a curious sign of the times that this statement should meet with so much incredulity.  It has been reserved for this generation to propagate the absurdity that the want of money is the root of all evil; all the wisest teachers of mankind have hitherto been disposed to think differently, and criminal statistics are far from demonstrating that they are wrong.  In the laudable efforts which are now being made, and which ought to be made to heighten the material well-being of the community, it is a mistake to assume, as is too often done, that mere material prosperity, even if spread over the whole population, will ever succeed in banishing crime.  A mere increase of material prosperity generates as many evils as it destroys; it may diminish offences against property, but it augments offences against the person, and multiplies drunkenness to an alarming extent.  While it is an undoubted fact that material wretchedness has a debasing effect both morally and physically, it is also equally true that the same results are sometimes found to flow from an increase of economic well-being.  An interesting proof of this is to be found in the recent investigations of M. Chopinet, a French military surgeon, respecting the stature of the population in the central Pyrenees.  M. Chopinet, after a careful examination of the conscript registers from 1873 to