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BLACKWOOD'S
BLACKWOOD'S1
 
EDINBURGH MAGAZINE.
No. CCCXLIII. MAY, 1844. VOL. LV.
Transcriber's notes: Minor typos have been corrected. Table of contents has been generated for HTMLversion. Footnotes have been moved to the end of the articles.
Contents
IMPRISONMENT AND TRANSPORTATION, NO. 1. THE INCREASE OF CRIME533RHINE AND RHINELANDERS546THE MONSTER-MISERY OF LITERATURE. BY A MOUSE BORN OF THEMOUNTAIN556MARSTON; OR, THE MEMOIRS OF A STATESMAN. PART XI.561INDIAN AFFAIRS--GWALIOR579THE FREETHINKER593THE SNOW. BY DELTA617LOVE IN THE WILDERNESS620IRELAND--THE LANDLORD AND TENANT QUESTION638
MAP OF AFRICA
IMPRISONMENT AND TRANSPORTATION.
[Pg 533]
NO. 1.THE INCREASE OF CRIME.
Among the many causes of anxiety which the present state of society in the British empire must occasion toevery thoughtful or reflecting mind—one of the most extraordinary and alarming is, the
 constant and uninterrupted increase of crime
. The Liberals shut their eyes to this, because it affords a sad illustration of theeffect of their favourite theories, which for a quarter of a century have been, under the direction of hisMajesty's Ministry or his Majesty's Opposition, in almost ceaseless operation. The selfish and inconsiderate(and they form the vast majority of men) give themselves no sort of trouble about the matter: they care notthough their neighbours are murdered or robbed, plundered or swindled, so as they escape unscathedthemselves; and without either thinking on the subject, or suggesting one remedy for its evils, interfere only,with stentorian lungs, to resist any project to arrest them having the remotest tendency to terminate in anassessment. Their principle is to take of civilisation only its fruits, and steadily to withstand the concomitantevils; and the simple way by which they think this is to be effectedis quietly, and without saying a word, toreap the benefit of manufacturing industry in the doubling or tripling of their incomes; but to roar out likemadmen if the smallest per centage is proposed to be laid on them, to arrest or mitigate the evils which thatindustry brings in its train. Government meanwhile, albeit fully aware of the danger, is not sufficiently strongto do any thing to avert it; its own majority is paralysed by the inherent selfishness of mankind; and nothingEDINBURGH MAGAZINE.2
 
but some great and stunning public calamity can, it is universally felt, awaken the country to a sense of theevils growing out of its greatness, but threatening in the end to endanger its existence. Thus nothing is done,or at least nothing effectual is done, to avert the dangers: every one shuts his eyes to them, or opens them onlyto take measures to avert an assessment; and meanwhile crime advances with the steps of a giant, sweepingwhole classes of society into its vortex, and threatening to spread corruption and vice, in an incredible manner,through the densest and most dangerous classes of the community.Authentic and irrefragable evidence of the magnitude of this danger exists in the statistical tables of committals which have now, for a very considerable time, been prepared in all parts of the British empire.Since the year 1805, when regular tables of commitments first began to be kept in England, commitmentshave increased
 sixfold 
: they have swelled
 from five to thirty-one thousand 
. During the same period[Pg 534]population has advanced about sixty per cent: in other words, detected crime has advanced FOUR TIMES ASFAST AS THE NUMBERS OF THE PEOPLE. Unwilling as we are to load our pages with statisticaltableswhich, attractive to the thinking few, are repulsive to the unthinking manywe must yet request ourreaders to cast their eyes to the bottom of the pages, where these appalling truths are demonstrated by theparliamentary returns. In Scotland and Ireland the returns of commitments have not been kept, until within thelast twenty years, with such accuracy as can be relied on; but they exhibit an increase still more alarming.Ireland, as might be expected, exhibits a growth of crime which has fully kept pace with that of Englandduring the same period: but Scotland exhibits a change which fairly outstrips all the others in the race of iniquity. In 1803, Lord Advocate Hope said in Parliament, that more crime was tried at one Quarter Sessionsat Manchester than over all Scotland in a whole year; and the proceedings of the criminal courts to the northof the Tweed, at that period, amply demonstrated the truth of his assertion. In the year 1805, eighty-ninecriminals were brought before the whole tribunals, supreme and inferior, in Scotland; but in the year 1842, thecommittals for serious offences were nearly four thousandin other words, serious crime, in less than fortyyears, had augmented in Scotland above THIRTY-SIX FOLD. During the same period population hasadvanced about fifty per cent, viz. from 1,800,000 to 2,660,000; so that in moral, staid, and religious Scotland,serious crime, during the last forty years, has risen TWENTY-FIVE TIMES as fast as the number of thepeople.[1]Overlooked as this prodigious change has been, as all things are which arise gradually in this country, it hasyet attracted, as well it might, the astonishment of writers on the Continent. Nine yeas ago, M. Moreauobserved, speaking of the increase of crime in Scotland"In the year 1805, the criminal commitments inScotland were eighty-nine: they are now 2864that is, they have increased in thirty years thirty-fold. It wouldappear that Scotland, in becoming a manufacturing state, has in a great degree lost the virtue and simplicity of character by which she was formerly distinguished."[2]What renders this prodigious increase of crime in so short a period,[Pg 535] in all parts of the British Empire,in a peculiar manner extraordinary and alarming, is, that it has taken place at the very time when unheard-of efforts were made, in every part of the country, for the moral and religious instruction of the people. We arevery far indeed from saying that enough has been done in this way: no one is better aware that the vast debt,which the prosperous wealth of Britain owes in this respect to its suffering indigence, is still in great partundischarged, and that till it is taken up and put on a proper footing
 by the state
, it never can be completelyliquidated;still, more has been done to discharge it during the last thirty years, than in the whole previouscenturies which have elapsed since the Reformation. The churches of England and Scotland, during thatperiod, have improved to an astonishing degree in vigour and efficiency: new life, a warmer spirit, a holierambition, has been breathed into the Establishment; the dissenters of all denominations have vied with them inzeal and effort; churches and chapels have been built and opened in every direction; and though they have byno means, in the manufacturing districts, kept pace with the increase of population, yet they have advancedwith a rapidity hitherto unheard of in British history. The laity of all denominations have made extraordinaryefforts to promote the cause of education. In this great and good work, persons of all descriptions have,though from very different motives, laboured together; but much remains to be done. We well know how The Project = Gutenberg eBook of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 55 No. 343, May, 1844 by VariousTHE INCREASE OF CRIME.3

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