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    \ Z " I ' ve been / ' they , '" and sure I ought to know , " And , singuj " " enou gh , despite the ancient satire on travellers' tales , these persons ften obtain credence without any examination into their powers of observ ation . For many years , on the report of illiterate captains' clerks or drunken supercargoes , it remained an ethnological fact that there were hole races in this world without any notion of the existence of a God ; and on authority not much more respectable , we have been— -. , indeed , stiU , by some—expected to believe that the three or four hundred millions of men who huddle behind the Great Wall form in reality a civilized community . . -

    ,, „ .... For our part , whilst we accept this work as a fair summary and intelligent view of existing statements on Chinese matters , we are inclined to believe that we know little of the xeal condition of the Celestial Empire—even settin" aside that mysterious revolution , that social conflict , the sounds of which ° come to us like the roar of voices and clatter of furniture when a « row' takes p lace in the next house , and we know neither the causes nor the heroes thereof . After all , we are reduced , in most important particulars to depend on the imperturbable assertions of the same men , whose falsehoods convulse with hter

    thundering style and bombastical Europe laug every time 5 a specimen , referring to current business , gets into circulation . What credence can be given to imperial statistics and reports even in Europe , * our own correspondents' from every capital in Europe—from St . Petersburg to Paris—are every day employed in informing us . Suppose we were to write a description of France from documents signed Billaultor Barochel This illustration will enable us to appreciate the value of information to be got from published statements in China , where all literature is official ( that is , mendacious ) , and where , indeed , the tendency of every iJit i /» iiii i 3 ti i £

    mail IS tO Ulilg ) uuust' , u . ihj . miauj ' . u «* -. » - > . <_ A *»» " ^^ ... » j , , * w .. y * " ~ we were not allowed to enter it , would give , by its own reports , wrong impressions to strangers . What must be the case with a country of lies ? We have mentioned three or four hundred millions as the population of China ; hut there are really no grounds whatever to go upon for ascertaining the truth . The probability is , considering that we have reports of vast desert tracts , ranges of mountains , provinces overrun by savages and jungle , huge lakes and interminable marshes , that , when we get better knowledge , we ° shall find that the population has been grossly exaggerated . Everything we are told about China wears indeed a suspicious aspect , when

    once we are taken away from the coast- A ferocious rabble , ignorant and prejudiced , with many of the instincts of the lower animals , soon makes way for a polished and refined race of philosophers and gentlemen ; just as in the history of this braggadocio empire , the further you go back , the completer and more grand does the narrative become ; so that a hundred thousand years ago ^ more or less , we find ourselves introduced to the private thoughts and actions of most estimable and entertaining gentlemen , but when we come to the period corresponding to our . dark ages , all is doubt and confusion , disorder or bloodshed .

    A Frenchman used , not long ago , to wander about Paris , exciting the imagination of our excitable neighbours by most wonderful predictions . The Chinese , according to him , were a terrible race , actuated by terrible intentions . They were destined to destroy all industry in all other parts of the world . They were so cunning , so clever , so inventive , that when once they set about it , they would produce everything wanted by everybody everywhere so much more cheaply than anything could be produced by anybody anywhere , that we should have nothing to do but to turn our fields into garks , shut up our factories , and make bonfires of our instruments of labour , hina would supply us inexorably with all desiderata , corn and meat , clothes and houses—even with news—much more quickly and at lower rates than we could possibly do ourselves . The artists , who now draw hideous

    caricatures on earthen plates , as soon as they chose would beat Raphael and Correggio in genius , and Horace Vernet in rapidity . Nobody would care for any art but Chinese art . We should all be reduced , therefore , to the awful necessity of living on our rents without doing a stitch of work , and the arbiter of the world would be ' the great Panjander himself with a little button on the top . ' The existence of this theory , which found disciples and created uneasiness for a moment among some men of intellect ( who would have probably been driven mad by the frightful narration of the man whose head was turned , and who , therefore , chewed his p igtail till ho died ) , illustrates the unwholesome character of the beliefs about China prevalent in France ,

    Phantoms that have neither back nor breast are apt to rise from confused # nd incomplete knowledge , just as miasma rise from all decayed and disorganised matter . Are we much bettor informed in England ? Have we not been grav-ely told to abstain from this war , because the Chinese are a people differently constituted from oui'solves , not accessible to the same influences , nor amenable to the same laws , who poison from patriotic motives , may be mowed down by grape-shot , and dashed to pieces by battalions at a time , without being in the slightest degree alarmed or convinced of their inferiority , who are victorious when they run away , invincible because they don't know how to resist , and , in fact , liko the nightmares that attack us during indigestion , will be enabled to torment us terribly whilst we never shall succeed in getting at them P Wo may depend upon it that Chinamen , when they come to bo known , will prove , after having received a lew lessons , as tractable as any other Aaiatic nation .

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    MR . HILL'S SUGGESTIONS FOR THE REPRESSION OF CRIME . Suggestions for the liqjrreaaion qf Crime . Contained in Charges dolivorod to Grand Juries of Birmingham , supported by Additional Fact a and Arguments , By Mathcw Davenport Hill . J . W . Parker and Son . An old Swedish proverb says that ho is a groat man who knows the right thing at the right time . In tin ' s sense of the word , the Brothers Hill are among England ' s greatest men . When the trade . and commerce of this country had extended to a degree never dreamt of before , and facility of communication became the great desideratum , Rowland Hill came forth . with hie penny-post scheme , and curried it victoriously amidst the fore .

    have made law-breaking their regular vocation . Here is Mr . Hill ' s leadingidea . He will , above all things , permanently dispose of convicts who pursue crime as a business ; of that body of men who , not led astray by casual temptation or by temporary indulgence of the passions , but by long-continued , determined offences against society , have shown their incapability of living as free human beings among the rest of men . The class is much more numerous than is commonly believed ; for the Recorder of Birmingham estimates them in England and Wales alone to be a hundred thousand . This computation is based on known facts , and it shows at once how small a portion of the criminals are actually brought to account . For example , the number of forged notes presented at the Bank of England , and the number of convictions for the forgery of bank-notes between the years ISoS and

    bodings of officials and the exultations of the country . Another and even more important question—a question touching society in most of its vital interests—is mooted , and a second Hill clearly brings together all the materials for an effectual mode of repressing crime . Who will deny that this social malady , called crime , is the great enemy to be fought ? It undermines and destroys not only the ' criminal' but the innocent . Yet society , though its own life is at stake , does not prevent , but simply punishes , crime after it has been committed : hides the sword after the wound is inflicted . This is the question discussedby our author throughout the collected works of many long years . Mr . Davenport Hill does not lose himself in vain speculations , still less in despondent acquiescence ; but he gives us practical suggestions based on long experience . He will prevent crime by preventing the growth of a criminal class of men , who

    1837 proves the proportion of convictions compared with that of offences as only 1 to lfi-i . Yet hanging failed to check the crime that Ms been checked by improved regulations , and even by the improved paper and finer engraving of the note . The criminal class , taken as a body , is far below the average intellect of every honest class , both in natural and acquired endowments . This is a very significant fact not yet sufficiently appreciated in all its bearings . Once fully establish that the law-breaker is not only a bad man but also a very stupid and ignorant man , and it becomes our duty _ to lay hold of him , for his own sake as well as for ours . The great question then remaining will be , how to detect these men so as to prevent their misdoings , and check them in teaching others whom we leave at their mercythe children of the streets . Mr . Hill proposes to detain the known criminal as you would detain a lunatic or put a plague patient in quarantine .

    When by the evidence of two or more credible witnesses a jury has been satisfied that there is good ground for believing , and that the witnesses do actually believe , that- the accused party is addicted to robbery or theft , so as to deserve the appellation , of robber or thief , he shall be called * upon in defence to prove himself in possession of means of subsistence lawfully obtained . On the failure of such proof let him be adjudged a reputed thief , and put under high recognizances to be of good conduct for some limited period ; or in default of responsible bail , let him suffer imprisonment for the same term . , At the first view this seems harsh , yet it is only the strictest justice . As things are , there is a nation in a nation ; a tribe of malefactors , organised and ever ready to wage war against the surrounding community of . peaceable workers . It is but self-defence if the workers seize their enemies for a term , and annihilate their powers to do ill until they have made their mind up either to become workers also , or else suffer the penalty of beings alien to the laws of men and of nature . The retribution is as fair as anything in this world .

    Mr . M . D . Hill has , as he himself states , not concocted this plan amid the excitement created by the daily increase of crime , and the difficulties into which it has plunged society ; on the contrary , it is a maturely considered proposal , on a subject which for . years has engaged no small portion of his thoughts . He first proposed it in 1850 , when it found great and unexpected resistance from the press , to which resistance the Recorder replied in his charge to the Birmingham Grand Jury , October , 18 ol , in the following

    terms : — " My theory is founded on the well-known fuct ( which I pause for a moment to stata has never been controverted ) that each individual of the class of professional marauders is well known , both personally and by character , to the police nnd to hia neighbours , and could be pointed out with perfect ease . From this fact I drew tho consequence that society ( having such moans of knowledge within its roach ; wua not only justified , but bound to use it for the geueral protection . " It would be difficult to contradict this ; and thus the chief opposition Mr . Hill encountered during these latter years was not so much against his plan in general as against the details of execution . Yet in tljia now volume he acts liko a man who is perfectly sure of his case ; for not only his own arguments , but those of his adversaries in the public press , arc freely and candidly statedand brought before the public in their own words .

    , Moreover , this system of preventing crime is not the only now idea Mr , Hill advocates . As long as thirty years ago he began to comment on tho daily injustice committed by the state in withholding from prisoners tho pecuniary moans for producing evidence in their defence , an injustice already remedied in tho legislature of many continental states—Belgium and Tuscany for example . There are some painflul facts cited as a consequence of this glaring wrong committed on prisoners who happen to bo poor . Another subject , likewise very important , though unfortunately little attracting public attention , is the uue / jiad treatment of prisoners . Mr . M . D . Hill justly observes : —

    Lot tho criminal who , whatever his ofl ' onceg may bo , hae tho merit of personal deconcy , havo tho bonoflt of such merit , To produce artificially an equality in abasement is neither wise nor juat . Such equality , moreover , is eminently deceptive , and in truth ia inequality of tho worst kind . Take the case of a young woman who has not boon able to resist tho temptation of purloining some uovotod article of droaa from tho shop of a huborUaahor . Is it oquul treatment to subjocst her to tho discipline which bofits a drunken harridan , brought for the tenth or fiftieth time back to prison in tho stupor of intoxication , covered with tho mud and 111 th colloctod upon her porson and her clothoa in hor disgusting orgioa ? If ypu cut off the luiir of tho young shoplifter , and if yon compel her to wear the same drone with hor loathsome ««« owpriaoner , have you mulcted equal pain by this equality of treatment ' ^ riu'iuy not ; in tho latter caao you have relieved tho prisoner from a portion of tuo revolting

    Untitled Article

    Jote 6 , 1857 . ] THE LEADE' R . L-jfeJL-

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), June 6, 1857, page 547, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2196/page/19/