CHAPTER III.

THE SEASONS AND CRIME.


Let us now approach the question of temperature and crime from another
point of view. International statistics indicate pretty clearly that
warm regions exercise an injurious effect on the conduct of European
peoples. Does the information furnished by these statistics stand
alone, or is it supported by the result of investigations conducted in
a different field? To this vital question it will be our endeavour to
supply an answer. In the annual reports of the Prison Commissioners
there is an instructive diagram showing the mean number of prisoners
in the local prisons of England and Wales on the first Tuesday of each
month. This diagram has been published for a considerable number of
years, and if we take any period of six years it is remarkable to
observe the unfailing regularity with which crime begins to decrease
as soon as the summer is over and the temperature begins to fall. From
the month of October till the month of February in the following year,
the prison population continues almost steadily to diminish; from the
month of February till the month of October, the same population,
allowing for pauses in its progress and occasional deflections in its
course, mounts upwards with the rising temperature. According to the
last sextennial diagram of the Prison Commissioners, which embraces
the six years ended March, 1884, the mean number of prisoners in the
local prisons of England and Wales was, on the first Tuesday in