[10] Cf. E. Ferri. I _Nuovi Orizzonti del Diritto e della Procedura
Penale_.




CHAPTER II.

CLIMATE AND CRIME.


Man's existence depends upon physical surroundings; these surroundings
have exercised an immense influence in modifying his organism, in
shaping his social development, in moulding his character. To enumerate
all the external factors operating upon individual and social life is
outside our present purpose, but they may be briefly summed up as
climate, moisture, soil, the configuration of the earth's surface, and
the nature of its products. These natural phenomena, either singly or
in varying degrees of combination, have unquestionably played a most
prominent part in making the different races of mankind what they at
present are. We have only to look at the low type of life exhibited by
the primitive inhabitants of certain inhospitable regions of the globe
to see how profoundly the physical structure of man is affected by his
natural surroundings. Even a comparatively slight difference of
environment is not without effect upon the population subjected to its
influence. According to M. de Quatrefages, the bodily structure of the
English race has been distinctly modified by residence in the United
States of America. It is not more than two and a half centuries since
Englishmen began to emigrate in any considerable numbers to the
American Continent, but in that comparatively short period the