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Middlesex, averaged forty-three a year. In the seven succeeding years of war they were reduced to fifteen a year. In the seven years following the peace of 1763, the annual average was twenty-six. In the seven years of peace from 1770 to 1776, inclusive, the annual average was thirty-eight. From 1776 to 1783, seven years of war with America, France, Spain, and Holland, the annual average was thirtynine. From 1783 to 1790, seven years of peace, the annual average was fifty-four. From 1793 to 1805, the numbers have progressively diminished; in the seven years from 1799 to 1805, the annual average was not twelve. This last period, with the exception of one intervening year of peace, was spent in war; but during that year of peace, although the militia was disbanded, some part of the army, and a great portion of the navy reduced, the number of capital convicts did not increase. The annual number of murderers from 1771 to 1805, has remained nearly the same, but was considerably more on an average in the twenty preceding years; from 1750 to 1770. A most important change has taken place respecting the crimes of burglary and highway-robbery; which in their aggravated character, so as to deserve capital punishment, have nearly disappeared within the county of Middlesex.

The Northern counties possess a decided moral advantage in respect to their small number of offenders and paupers, when compared with the rest of England. This observation applies, not only to the counties within the northern circuit, but likewise so far as relates to paupers generally, to all the more northern counties, the counties of Lincoln, Nottingham, Derby, and Rutland, the most northern counties in the Midland circuit; and those of Staffordshire and Shropshire, the most northern in the Oxford circuit; are in this respect in the same comparatively favorable situation as the counties within the

northern circuit; when compared with the more southern counties of England, excepting only the three south-counties of Middlesex, Monmouth, and Cornwall.

This diminution of crime in England within the last twenty years will appear to be more remarkable when we consider the increased wealth and population of that country during this period. Murders are comparatively rare; they being the effect of violently inflamed passions in England, and not of systematic trade as in Italy. Highway robberies are not only positively less numerous and less atrocious now than formerly, but likewise relatively so, considering the present greater temptations offered on the public roads from the greater number of passengers and the greater quantity of wealth in continual motion from place to place all over the United Kingdom. The same remark applies to the diminished number of burglaries notwithstanding the increase of dwellinghouses, and consequently of temptations to the burglar; crimes importing barbarity therefore are greatly diminished in England positively, and still more so relatively. The Metropolis and its neighborhood of course are most prolific in crime in all fully peopled communities; and yet the number of annual executions in London has been very much lessened on an average, within the last seventy years; the number executed in seven years, from 1749 to 1755, was 306; from 1784 to 1790, 379; from 1791 to 1797, 144; from 1798 to 1804, 103; the last seven years of the series giving not much more than one fourth of the number executed in the first seven years. There can be but two adequate causes assigned for this great diminution of crime in England during the last twenty years; namely, 1st. the meliorated condition of the lower classes; and, 2dly, the very generally increased diffusion of religious and moral instruction over that country during this period; by the multiplication of

Sunday schools, and week-day seminaries for the education of the poor; in the establishment and growth of which all the different sects and denominations of christianity in England, nationally established and dissenting, have most laudably concurred and cooperated.

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The greater comparative criminality of the people in Ireland has been already noticed in considering the national effects of popery; and can arise only from the want of civilization and instruction among the lower orders of the Irish. For the causes of the comparatively sparse iniquity of the Scottish, see the Prefatory Remarks," of Dr. Currie to his edition of the works of Burns; in 4 vols. 8vo. London, 1802. This profoundly philosophical and most elegant writer attributes the purer morals of the Scottish peasantry chiefly to the system of parochial education established in Scotland since the year 1646. The whole account of the Scottish peasantry by Dr. Currie is well worthy the perusal and the study of every class of readers; from the statesman and the philosopher, down to the mechanic and the field-laborer. The observations of Dr. Currie are fully verified by the facts contained in "An Address delivered by the Right Hon. C. Hope, the Lord Justice Clerk, at the conclusion of the circuit at Glasgow," on Friday, 29th April, 1808. The Lord Justice Clerk congratulates the gentlemen sheriffs, lord provost, and gentlemen of the magistracy of the city of Glasgow, on the comparatively small number of criminals in custody for trial, in proportion to the immense population of that district of Scotland. He says that a few days before he left home to travel the then circuit, was transmitted to him officially by the British Secretary of State for the home department, a printed list of all the commitments and prosecutions for criminal offences in England and Wales for the years 1805, 1806, 1807; -making an annual average of four thousand five hun

dred; which, setting aside the two rebellions, of 1715 and 1745, is nearly equal to the whole number of persons committed for criminal offences in Scotland since the Union of the two crowns; that is to say, the number of criminals in England and Wales in one year exceeds that of the criminals in Scotland during an entire century.

Taking the population of Scotland to be one sixth of that of England and Wales, this account gives the proportion of only one criminal in Scotland for seventeen criminals annually committed in England and Wales.'

The Lord Justice Clerk in examining the causes of this freedom from crime in Scotland, says, that although in the city and district of Glasgow commerce and manufactures of all kinds have long been introduced and pushed to an extent unequalled in the United Kingdom, except in the metropolis; yet no proportional increase of crime has followed the footsteps of augmented wealth and population. One quartersessions at Manchester in England sends more criminals to transportation than are sent from all Scotland in a whole year. The causes of the good order and morality of the Scottish people are to be found in their institutions for the education of youth, and for the maintenance of religion. At the parochial schools of Scotland all, even the children of the meanest peasant and the lowest mechanic, may, and most of them do receive a virtuous education from their earliest youth. And every Scottish clergyman must by the indispensable provisions of the law, reside within his own parish, and discharge the duties of his sacred function in person. Hence in proportion to clerical fidelity is necessarily created a parental affection in a minister towards his flock; a respectful attachment in the people to their minister; and a consequent beneficial and wakeful inspection of the religion and morals of all classes of the community.

For further details on the improved condition of

the people in Britain during the last century, see "Hints," pp. 58-72.

There are also many other sources of wealth and strength to Britain, only a very few of which the limits of this Inquiry will allow us to touch. The mines of tin, copper, iron, &c. and the fisheries of the British empire, add greatly to her productive industry and wealth; but for want of sufficient documents their precise amount of value cannot now be stated. Yet one circumstance which confers upon Britain wide and ample sources of national wealth and prosperity, and in which she far surpasses all the other nations of Europe, must not pass entirely without notice; namely, the full supply of subterranean fuel within her own territorial boundaries; which at once enables her to administer to the comfort of her people, and to carry on her system of manufactures to an extent and with a success unparalleled in the history of the world. On the continent of Europe wood is chiefly used for fuel, to the great inconvenience and detriment of its inhabitants; who are by this as well as other circumstances, prevented from establishing and keeping up large manufacturies; owing to the difficulty of conveying this kind of fuel to any given spot, after the neighboring forests have been once cleared away. There are indeed coal-mines in abundance in the department of Jemappes, formerly Hainault; and the coal-trade has of late years been carried on to a considerable extent by its inhabitants in supplying much of the low countries of Holland, and some parts of France. A canal runs from Jemappes through Condé and Valenciennes into Flanders, and there branches out to the principal towns on the coast. Jemappes has also a communication with the Rhine by which it sends coals into Holland.

In Britain wood for fuel cannot be furnished in any great quantities; its adequate supply being altogether impracticable, owing to the comparatively

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