7 and 8. Feeble character.
9. Suffering from persistent bad memory.
10. Twice imprisoned for theft; daughter of drunken loafer.
11. Normal.
12. Mentally defective and suffering from heart disease. Thus, out of twelve only two were normal individuals. Yet the ten were free to go as they liked, and to bring up defective children.
"It is well known," said Dr. Potts, "that a large number of the inmates of penitentiaries are feeble-minded women."
We see, then, that a great many poor imbeciles are regularly sent to prison as criminals. On that point allow me to put in the evidence of Sir Robert Anderson, late of Scotland Yard. Speaking of the feeble-minded, Sir Robert said (I quote again from the London Press):
My deliberate, conviction is that our present prison methods and prison discipline are absolutely brutal to these poor persons. People say the law of Moses is brutal, but it is not so brutal as the present criminal system of England.
No one who has not been behind the scenes can understand in any measure the misery and cruelty of it. It is "seven days' hard labour," "a month's hard labour," time after time for these poor creatures, who ought to be dealt with like children. In prison they spend their miserable lives. Out of gaol they add to the number of their own species, and commit offences which send them back once more.
Our magistrates simply send them for another month or six months. But it is not the magistrates' fault. It is the fault of the law. And this goes on in what promises to be the most intellectually conceited age since God made man upon earth. Surely we might have some pity for these poor creatures! If we have no pity for them we should have regard for the public.