whoever, for the time being, happens to have a voice in controlling
the action of the police. In these circumstances it is obviously
impossible to draw any accurate comparison between the lighter kinds
of offences in one country and the same class of offences in another.

In the case of the more serious offences against person and property,
the initiative of putting the law in motion rests chiefly with the
injured individual. The action of the individual in this respect
depends to a large extent on the customs of the country. In some
countries the injured person, instead of putting the law in motion
against an offender, takes the matter in his own hands, and
administers the wild justice of revenge. Great differences of opinion
also exist among different nations as to the gravity of certain
offences. Among some peoples there is a far greater reluctance than
there is among others to appeal to the law. Murder is perhaps the only
crime on which there exists a fair consensus of opinion among
civilised communities; and even with regard to this offence it is
impossible to overcome all the judicial and statistical difficulties
which stand in the way of an international comparison.

In spite, however, of the fact that the amount of crime committed in
civilised countries cannot be subjected to exact comparison, there are
various points on which the international statistics of crime are able
to render valuable service. It is important, for instance, to see in
what relation crime in different communities stands to age, sex,
climate, temperature, race, education, religion, occupation, home and
social surroundings. If we find, for example, an abnormal development
of crime taking place in a given country at a certain period of life,
or in certain social circumstances, and if we do not discover the same
abnormal development taking place in other countries at a similar