was mainly received a few years ago. The percentage of illiteracy among
the immigrants from Western Europe is very low. Thus, in 1907 among the
French it was only 4 per cent; among the Germans, 4 per cent; Irish, 3
per cent; English, 2 per cent; and Scandinavians, less than 1 per cent.
Connected more or less with this fact of illiteracy is the number in our
population who cannot speak English. In 1900 the number of persons in
the United States above the age of ten years who could not speak English
was reported by the census to be 1,463,000, but it is probable, owing to
the recent large immigration, that the number is at least twice that at
the present time.

(4) Crime and Poverty. It is said that crime is apt to accompany
migration. However, down to 1904 our immigrants have not shown any
exaggerated tendency to crime. The special prison census of 1904 showed
that 23.7 per cent of the male white prisoners were foreign born, while
23 per cent of the general male white population above the age of
fifteen years were foreign born. This shows a tendency to crime among
the foreign born not greatly out of proportion to their numbers in the
population. The same census, however, showed that 29.8 per cent of all
white male prisoners committed during 1904 were born of foreign parents,
while this element constituted only 18.8 per cent of the general white
male population. Thus, among the children of the foreign born there
appears to be an exaggerated tendency to crime, while not among the
foreign born themselves. The probable explanation of this is that the
children of the foreign born are often reared in our large cities, and
particularly in the slum districts of those cities. Thus the high
criminality of the children of the foreign born is perhaps largely a
product of urban life, but it may be suggested also that the children of
the foreign born lack adequate parental control in their new American
environment. Certain elements among our immigrants, however, seem