[1] Sander and Richter, Die Beziehungen zwischen Geistesstorung una Verbrechen. See also Lombroso, L’Uomo Delinquente, vol. ii., part 3, ch. 1, for many facts and figures concerning criminal insanity.

[2] Journal of Mental Science, October 1889. This case may be compared with that of Maria KÖster, given in the Appendix D, vi.

[3] Dr. H. Sutherland, West Riding Asylum Reports, vol. vi.

[4] Quoted by Despine, Psychologie Naturelle.

[5] Appendix by Dr. Paul Lindau to German translation of Lombroso, Der Verbrecher.

[6] See Introduction by W. C. Hazlitt to Wainewright’s Essays and Criticisms, 1880.

[7] Lombroso and some other authorities prefer the term “born criminal,” or “congenital criminal” (reo-nato). The term “instinctive criminal” seems to be safer, as it is not always possible to estimate the congenital element.

[8] Scenes from a Silent World. By a Prison Visitor. 1889.

[9] H. Joly, Le Crime, 1888, p. 269.

[10] Whoever wishes to study the modern professional criminal and his methods should consult Inspector Byrnes’ Professional Criminals of America. It is not a scientific work, and has no reference to anthropologic methods, but it contains a very large and valuable series of photographs of contemporary criminals of note, with a sketch of the career of each.

[11] The classification of criminals adopted in this chapter corresponds substantially with that of Professor Enrico Ferri, by him recognised as provisional. It is also, I find, almost identical with Dr. Colajanni’s.

[12] Seneca also advocated, in a similar way, the removal without vengeance of noxious members of the social body: “At corrigi nequeunt, nihilque in illis lene aut spei bona capax est?—Tollantur e coetu mortalium facturi pejora quÆ contingunt et quo uno modo possunt, desinant esse mali; sed hoc sine odio. Nam quis membra sua tunc odit cum abscidit? Non est illa ira, sed misera curatio. Rabidos effigimus canes, et trucem atque immansuetum bovem occidimus, et morbidibus pecoribus, ne gregem polluant, ferrum dimittimus. Nec ira sed ratio est, a sanis inutilia secernere.”—De Ira, lib. i., cap. 15.

[13] This is the term now generally used to signify the science of the criminal. It is, however, open to objection. “Criminal Psychology” has been suggested, but is somewhat narrow. Professor Liszt has proposed “Criminal Biology,” and at the last International Congress of Criminal Anthropology, Topinard suggested “Criminology.” “Criminal Anthropology,” however, is so widely used that I have not ventured to introduce any substitute. The reader must remember that criminal anthropology, although related to general anthropology, is not merely a branch of that science.

[14] For a brief summary of its proceedings, see Appendix B.

[15] See Appendix C.

[16] It is worthy of note, as Lombroso remarks, that the first investigator of the criminal in England on modern scientific lines should be a clergyman—the Rev. W. D. Morrison. See his “Reflections on the Theory of Criminality” in the Journal of Mental Science, April 1889.

[17] This, and most of the other opinions of Professor Benedikt quoted in this section, are from Kraniometrie und Kephalometrie, Vienna, 1889.

[18] The evolutionary tendency of the skull among the higher vertebrates seems to be from the asymmetrical to the symmetrical, while the tendency of the brain is from the symmetrical to the asymmetrical. See M. O. Fraenkel: “Etwas Über SchÄdel-Asymmetrie und Stirnnaht,” Neurologisches Centralblatt, August 1, 1888.

[19] Archivio di Psichiatria. 1888. Fasc. VI.

[20] For an admirable statement of the present condition of the question see an article by Professor Fallot of Marseilles, “Le Cerveau des Criminels,” in the Archives de l’Anthropologie Criminelle, 15th May 1889. Lombroso’s treatment of this question is extremely brief, and not always accurate.

[21] “Lectures on Physiognomical Diagnosis of Disease.” Medical Times, 1862.

[22] “Contributions À l’Étude de quelques VariÉtÉs Morphologiques de l’Oreille Humaine.” Revue d’Anthropologie, 15th April, 1886.

[23] Dr. F. Warner, “Form of Ear as a Sign of Defective Development.” Lancet, 15th Feb. 1890.

[24] Schwalbe, who distinguishes five principal forms of the Darwinian tubercle, regards it as normal, and believes that with a little practice it might be discovered in nearly all ears. This may well be, but in its distinctly marked form it can scarcely be called normal.

[25] See his paper, “Lo Scheletro e la forma del naso nei criminali, nei pazzi, negli epilettici e nei cretini,” in the Archivio di Psichiatria for 1888. Fasc. I.—Professor HÉger, in a communication to the SociÉtÉ d’Anthropologie of Brussels, remarks that he is able to confirm many of Dr. Ottolenghi’s conclusions with reference to the nasal aperture in the cranium, by examination of the skulls of Belgian murderers.

[26] Almost as well marked as this tendency to fair hair among Italian sexual offenders—which possibly may be a question of race—is the predominance of blue eyes. Ottolenghi, who considers it as one of the most constant characters of the class, gives the following figures:—

Bichromatism (irregular colouring) of the iris is also found with unusual frequency in this class of offenders.

[27] Ottolenghi, “La canizie, la calvizie e le rughe nei criminali.” Archivio di Psichiatria, 1889, Fasc. I.

[28] The surgeon of Leeds prison, in his answers to my Questions, records his opinion that the red-haired are “relatively more prevalent” among prisoners than among the ordinary population. This opinion stands alone, nor is it supported by any figures.

[29] “Des Anomalies des organes gÉnitaux chez les idiots et les Épileptiques.” ProgrÈs Medical, No. 7, 1888.

[30] Ottolenghi, “Nuove Ricerche sui rei contro il buon costume.” Archivio di Psichiatria, 1888. Fasc. VI.

[31] Ottolenghi, “II Ricambio Materiale nei Delinquenti-nati.” Archivio di Psichiatria, 1886. Fasc. IV.

[32] American Medico-Legal Journal, June 1888.

[33] The Jukes: A Study in Crime, Pauperism, Disease, and Heredity. By R. L. Dugdale. Putnam’s, New York, 1877. It may be as well to mention that when Continental writers refer to the “Yucke,” or “Yuke,” family, they mean the “Jukes.”

[34] The cost being, at a very moderate estimate, 47,000 dollars for a single family during 75 years. The total cost Dugdale estimates at a million and a quarter dollars during this period, without taking into consideration the entailment of pauperism and crime on succeeding generations. The hereditary blindness of one man cost the town 23 years of out-door relief for two people, and a town burial.

[35] For the sake of comparison with the non-criminal population, it may be mentioned that among 2739 soldiers of the Italian infantry Baroffio found only 41 tattooed—that is, 1.50 per cent.

[36] This cause doubtless plays the chief part in keeping up the practice of tattooing among the wealthy and well-to-do. A London professor of the art, when asked by a representative of the Pall Mall Gazette to what class of society his customers chiefly belonged, replied: “Mostly officers in the army, but civilians too. I have tattooed many noblemen, and also several ladies. The latter go in chiefly for ornamentation on the wrist or calf, or have a garter worked on just below the knee.” “On what part of the body are most of your clients tattooed?” “Mostly on the chest or arm; but some are almost completely covered, patterns being worked on their legs and back as well. They do not care to have patterns where they would be seen in everyday life.”

[37] “Among savage women (with the exception of the Kabyles and the Arabs) the custom,” remarks Lombroso, “is very infrequent. It scarcely ever goes beyond the arms or cheeks. Still less can one say that it has been adopted by the honest women of Europe, even of the poorest class, except in some rare valleys of Venetia where the peasant women trace a cross on their arms. Parent-Duchatelet found that prostitutes of the lowest order tattooed their arms, shoulders, armpits, or pubis with the initials or name of their lover, if young, or their tribade, if old, changing these signs, even thirty times (with the aid of acetic acid), according as their caprices changed. Among the prostitutes of Verona, as I have learnt from a police official, some instances of tattooing have been noted (hearts, initials, etc.), but only among those who had already been in prison.”

[38] “Il tatuaggio nel Manicomio d’ Ancona,” Cronaca del Manicomio d’ Ancona, Nov. 1888.

[39] West Riding Asylum Reports, vol. vi.

[40] “Il Mancinismo anatomico nei criminali,” Archivio di Psichiatria, 1889. Fasc. VI.

[41] At Tahiti and Viti the sexual organs were sometimes tattooed. Among 142 tattooed criminals, Lombroso found 5 with designs on the penis; Lacassagne’s very extensive researches show a smaller proportion (11 out of 1,333).

[42] The dependence of disvulnerability on insensibility is well shown in Delboeuf’s experiment: he made two equal and symmetrical wounds on the right and left shoulders of a hypnotised subject, and suggested insensibility on the right side. That side healed much more rapidly.

[43] Journal Anthropological Institute, Nov. 1889.

[44] Bulletin de la SociÉtÉ d’Anthropologie of Brussels, 1885.

[45] “L’occhio dei delinquenti,” Archivio di Psichiatria, 1886. Fasc. VI.

[46] Charles Oliver, “The Eye of the Adult Imbecile.” Transactions of the American Ophthalmological Society, 1887.

[47] Archivio di Psichiatria, Fasc. III.-IV., 1889.

[48] For the sake of comparison, Gradenigo gives the result of examination of 69 men and women belonging to the ordinary population, chiefly the lower class. Of these 44.6 per cent. of the men, and 22 per cent. of the women, showed diminished hearing.

[49] “L’Olfatto nei Criminali,” Archivio di Psichiatria, 1888. Fasc. V.

[50] Archivio di Psichiatria, 1889, Fasc. III.-IV.

[51] Studio sul tabacco nei pazzi e nei criminali.

[52] Revue Scientifique, 1889.

[53] See Mosso’s own account of the plethysmograph in his attractively written monograph, La Peur, Ch. V.

[54] Physical and Intellectual Training of Criminals, p. 53.

[55] Leaves from a Prison Diary, p. 119.

[56] Archivio di Psichiatria, 1889, Fasc. III.-IV.

[57] Numerous examples of the moral insensibility of criminals may be found in Dr. Corre’s book, Les Criminels (1889), p. 157; et seq.

[58] Kitts’ Serious Crime in an Indian Province, 1889, pp. 14, 15.

[59] “The Maoris of New Zealand.” Journal Anthropological Institute, Nov. 1889.

[60] “Cesare Lombroso’s Werk in seinem VerhÄltniss fÜr Gegenwart und Zukunft der gerichtlichen Psychopathologie.” Friedreich’s Blatter, NÜrnberg, 1888.

[61] History of Crime in England, vol. ii. p. 255, et seq.

[62] The Bible in Spain, Chap. xl.

[63] In Russian and French Prisons, pp. 335, 336. See also Mr. Davitt’s book. Salillas gives a vivid picture of the fearful extent to which sexual perversity rules in Spanish prisons, especially in the prisons for women. The governor of one prison recently used all his influence to put an end to this state of things. The women compelled him to resign.

[64] Recollections of the Dead-House, Chap. v.

[65] H. Mayhew, Criminal Prisons of London, 1862, p. 188.

[66] Report of British Special Commissioner, 1887.

[67] Kitts, Serious Crime in an Indian Province, p. 83.

[68] “La Criminalita nella provincia di Napoli.” L’Anomalo, Feb. 1889.

[69] Jottings from Jail, pp. 2-4.

[70] Leaves from a Prison Diary, p. 108.

[71] Lombroso, “Palimsesti del Carcere,” in Archivio di Psichiatria during 1888-89; Horsley, Jottings from Jail, pp. 20-23; Davitt, Leaves from a Prison Diary, pp. 104-115.

[72] See, for instance, Dr. Aubrey’s recent work, La Contagion du Meutre, pp. 68-91, and some remarks by Mr. Davitt, Prison Diary, p. 85.

[73] Essays and Criticisms. By J. G. Wainewright. Now first collected, with some account of the author, by W. C. Hazlitt. London: Reeves & Turner, 1880.

[74]

[75] ParallÈlement, 1889.

[76] History of Crime in England, 1876, 2nd series, p. 509.

[77] La CriminalitÉ ComparÉe, 1886, p. 27.

[78] Thus, for example, the squamoso-frontal articulation is found in less than 2 per cent. of European skulls, whilst it is found in 20 per cent. negroes (Ecker) and 16.9 per cent. Australian skulls (Virchow). Again, the spheno-pterygoid foramen is found in 4.8 per cent. European skulls and in 20 per cent. American Indians, 30 per cent. Africans, 32 per cent. Asiatics, and 50 per cent. Australians. So also wormian bones are more common among the lower races.

[79] A remarkable instance of this simulated atavism is the uniformity with which (according to Lacassagne, Archives de l’Anthropologie Criminelle, 1886) rapes are effected by methods common among lower races, and even animals. This is not atavism, but the criminal, being a man of primitive organisation, will naturally exercise the brutality and lack of consideration which belong to a lower race.

[80] It may be noted that Rossi found the same precocity in the abuse of alcohol, in the form of wine—i.e., 11 when children, without knowing the precise age; 2 at five years, 3 at eight, 1 at nine, 6 at ten; and so on. And sexual precocity was even more notable.

[81] E. J. Kitts, Serious Crime in an Indian Province, 1889, pp. 8, 85.

[82] Mr. Horsley has compiled from the Judicial Statistics the following table of individuals committed more than ten times, with proportion to total of recommittals:—

[83] While maternity has this beneficial influence, precocious and random sexual relationships have an equally grave influence in the opposite direction. This is clearly shown in the valuable details given by Marro.

[84] La CriminalitÉ ComparÉe, 1886, pp. 51-53.

[85] “Criminologie,” Revue d’Anthropologie, Sept. 1888.

[86] “L’Anthropologie Criminelle,” Revue d’Anthropologie, 1887.

[87] Loc. cit., p. 686.

[88] All the evidence which has so far been accumulated with regard to the connection between criminality and epilepsy will be found in considerable detail in the second volume of Lombroso’s great work, L’Uomo Delinquente (1889). To announce any definite conclusions would still be premature.

[89] See Ireland’s Idiocy, and Langdon Down’s Mental Affections of Childhood and Youth. The latter contains many valuable facts and suggestions in this connection.

[90] In Russian and French Prisons, p. 359.

[91] Leaves from a Prison Diary. Lecture I.

[92] Here and in the following lines I am quoting from Mr. Charles Cook of Hyde Park Hall, London, whom Mr. Spurgeon has called “the Howard of the present day.” Mr. Cook deserves all honour for his visits (primarily with a religious object) to some of the worst prisons of the world—visits for which he has paid the old penalty of “gaol fever.” With reference to Ceuta, I should add that Mr. Cook’s impressions are not altogether confirmed by competent Spanish prison reformers. Ceuta, which dates from the seventeenth century, is a kind of criminal Gheel, its chief peculiarity being the close relationship between the free and the convict population. It is, as Salillas, from whose Vida penal en EspaÑa I take the following remarks concerning it, observes, a convict city. There is not strictly any isolation as in the other prisons of the Peninsula or the Balearic Isles; nor is it an extraneous focus of moral infection, as at Saragossa or Valladolid; nor a merely economic supplement, like that of Alcala and some others; nor, in short, a centre of inaction or of artificial life. The convicts are an integral part of the population, sharing in the economic, social, urban, military, administrative, industrial, and agricultural order of its life, and fulfilling a great variety of functions. They obtain and carry the materials for constructing the fortifications and buildings, make and repair the roads, erect forts and houses, work in timber and in iron, cultivate the field. They are painters, photographers, shoemakers, tailors, servants fulfilling confidential domestic duties; they are clerks, even professors lecturing on arts, sciences, and philosophy. Between the free and the convict population, Salillas says, there is more than affinity; there is a kind of organic dependence. Convicts enter the houses without hindrance; no one regards them with dread, or fears to meet them. Who is the coachman who is driving? A convict. Who is the lad serving at table? A convict. And the cook who prepared the meal? A convict. And who takes care of the children? A convict. And all the chief families, having servants belonging to the prison, do they not fear robbery, rape, murder, poisoning? No. This custom, founded in necessity, has its credit in experience. An eyewitness, Juan Relosillas (Catorca Meses en Ceuta, 1886), says—“Everyone calls them ‘good prisoners’; they are so, faithful, sober, hard-working, respectful, and intelligent.”

[93] The impartial Moorish method of administering justice may be gathered from the following example mentioned by Mr. Cook. One Mogador Jew recently brought another before their Governor to recover a sum equal to about 6¼d. Both were thrown into prison, from which they were released on paying the following little bill:—

It frequently happens that the prisoner is unable to settle his bill, and is compelled, therefore, to remain a prisoner.

[94] Jottings from Jail (1887), pp. 186, 190. Judge Willert (Das Postulat der Abschaffung des Straffmasses mit der dagegen Erhobenen Einwendung), as quoted by Garofalo, uses the same simile to show the absurdity of this system.

[95] Leaves from a Prison Diary, pp. 173, 174.

[96] In Russian and French Prisons (1887), pp. 263-283.

[97] “Le Monde des Prisons,” Archives de l’Anthropologie Criminelle, 1888.

[98] Sketches from Shady Places, by Thor. Fredur (1879), pp. 206-7.

[99] EnquÊte Parlementaire, tome v., pp. 345, 381, 542, quoted by Joly.

[100] Adolphe Prins, CriminalitÉ et RÉpression, 1885.

[101] Le Criminologie (1888), p. 220.

[102]

[103]

[104] American Prisons, by the Rev. F. H. Wines, the able secretary of the National Prison Association. A great amount of valuable information is compressed into this little pamphlet. Mr. Wines has endeavoured to ascertain if the variation in usual length of sentence in different states has any relation with amount of crime in that state. He was not able to find any connection. “Apparently, the length of jail sentences pronounced by the court has no effect either to increase or to diminish crime.” If this is so, there arises, as he remarks, the question, “What useful purpose do our jails subserve?”

[105] “Remarks on Crime and Criminals,” Journal of Mental Science, July 1888.

[106] It is unnecessary to consider here the relation of solitary confinement to insanity. This is still somewhat of a vexed question. The difficulty lies in the fact that the prisoner is frequently already predisposed to insanity. Everything depends on how the isolation is carried out. There is no question that cellular confinement, if sufficiently prolonged, leads to insanity. There is a very extensive literature dealing with this subject.

[107] H. D. Wey, Physical and Industrial Training of Criminals, p. 55, New York, 1888.

[108] See Dr. Wey’s Physical and Industrial Training of Criminals, a valuable little work, in which all the details of this and similar experiences are given with care and fulness.

[109] Sufficient attention does not appear to have been given to music in prisons. It is a civilising influence to which the criminal is often very sensitive. An able administrator at the convict prison at Toulon long since recognised this with happy results.

[110] For some further information concerning Elmira, see Appendix E.

[111] It is perhaps worth noting that the highly intelligent and eclectic administration of Japan have adopted a very similar system, described in an interesting letter by Mr. H. Norman, the travelling commissioner of the Pall Mall Gazette, under the title of “An Ideal Prison” (Pall Mall Gazette, 18th October 1888):—“Two days previously I had visited the house of the most famous maker in Japan of the exquisite cloisonnÉ ware—the enamel in inlaid metal work upon copper—who rivals in everlasting materials the brush of Turner with his pigments and the pencil of Alma Tadema with his strips of metal. And I had stood for an hour behind him and his pupils, marvelling that the human eye could become so accurate and the human hand so steady and the human heart so patient. Yet I give my word that here in the prison at Ishikawa sat not six but sixty men, common thieves and burglars and peacebreakers, who knew no more about cloisonnÉ before they were sentenced than a Hindoo knows about skates, doing just the same thing—cutting by eye-measurement only the tiny strips of copper to make the outline of a bird’s beak or the shading of his wing or the articulations of his toe, sticking these upon the rounded surface of the copper vase, filling up the interstices with pigment, coat upon coat, and firing and filing and polishing it until the finished work was so true and so delicate and so beautiful that nothing except an occasional greater dignity and breadth of design marked the art of the freeman from that of the convict. C’etait À ne pas y croire—one simply stood and refused to believe one’s eyes. Fancy the attempt to teach such a thing at Pentonville or Dartmoor or Sing-Sing! When our criminal reaches his prison home in Tokyo he is taught to do that at which the limit of his natural faculties is reached. If he can make cloisonnÉ, well and good; if not, perhaps he can carve wood or make pottery; if not these, then he can make fans or umbrellas or basket work; if he is not up to any of these, then he can make paper or set type or cast brass or do carpentering; if the limit is still too high for him, down he goes to the rice-mill, and see-saws all day long upon a balanced beam, first raising the stone-weighted end and then letting it down with a great flop into a mortar of rice. But if he cannot even accomplish this poor task regularly, he is given a hammer and left to break stones under a shed with the twenty-nine other men out of 2000 who could not learn anything else.” And in regard to punishment Mr. Norman observes:—“On leaving the dormitories we passed a small, isolated square erection, beaked and gabled like a little temple. The door was solemnly unlocked and flung back, and I was motioned to enter. It was the punishment cell, another spotless wooden box, well ventilated, but perfectly dark, and with walls so thick as to render it practically silent. ‘How many prisoners have been in it during the last month?’ I asked. The director summoned the chief warder and repeated my question to him. ‘H’tori mo gozaimasan—none whatever,’ was the reply. ‘What other punishments have you?’ ‘None whatever.’ ‘No flogging?’ When this question was translated the director and the little group of officials all laughed together at the bare idea. I could not help wondering whether there was another prison in the world with no method of punishment for 2000 criminals except one dark cell, and that not used for a month. And the recollection of the filthy and suffocating sty used as a punishment cell in the city prison of San Francisco came upon me like a nausea.”

[112] Wuttke, Der deutsche Volksaberglaube der Gegenwart, § 188 ff.; and Ulrich Jahn, “Ueber den Zauber mit Menschenblut und anderen Theilen des Menschlichen KÖrpers,” in Zeitschrift fÜr Ethnologie, 1888, Heft ii., p. 130.

[113] The popular excitement over “Jack the Ripper,” and the Crown Prince Rudolph of Austria, may be specially mentioned as having produced a large number of crimes. They are, however, by no means isolated examples.

[114] It does not appear to be quite the same abroad. Some of those who are most convinced in their efforts to magnify the scientific and medico-legal elements in scientific procedure are lawyers; while medical men show no wish to encroach unduly on the legal aspects. This came out very clearly at the last International Congress of Criminal Anthropology.

[115] “Responsibility and Disease,” Lancet, 28th July 1888.

[116] In New South Wales, Tasmania, and Western Australia, the colonies to which criminals were transported, there is more criminality than in the other Australian colonies. This hereditary criminality would have swelled the sum of British crime.

[117] Thus Dr. Carriel, in a recent Report of the Central Hospital for the Insane of the State of Illinois, shows that whereas only 19 per cent. of the population are foreigners, 41 per cent. of the insanity was among foreigners.

[118] Pall Mall Gazette, 4th Nov. 1889.

[119] MacÉ, La Service de la SÛretÉ À Paris.

[120] In Bavaria, for instance, it has been shown that every increase of six kreutzer in the price of corn meant one theft more per 100,000 inhabitants.

[121] CriminalitÉ et Repression, p. 17.