From Chicago comes record of a similar showing. In one month the number of petitions filed for delinquent children in the Juvenile Court of Cook County was 54 per cent greater than those during the same month in 1916. The figures for four months are as follows:

The filing of a petition means in practically every case that the child appears in court. Hence, the table may be taken as substantially the same as that for cases appearing in court.

The annual report of the Children's Court of New York City shows that 14,519 children came before the court last year, an increase of 2,094 over the previous year. It was stated that toward the end of 1917 there was a perceptible increase due to the scarcity of food and fuel and the difficulty of making proper provision for some children.

None of these figures, of course, have been correlated with the growth of the communities in child population, nor do the facts show the nature of the offense committed. Some of the increase may doubtless be attributable to dependency.

This increase in New York has been offset to a large degree by greater vigilance on the part of probation officers, thinks the New York State Probation Commission. Probation was used with success for all sorts of offenses from truancy and malicious mischief to grand larceny and burglary. The system has proved its usefulness, the commission thinks, both for juvenile delinquents and adult criminals, although the methods used by the officers are different in different cases. While a total of 6,820 children under sixteen were dealt with on probation during the year, more than twice as many adults were so dealt with. Seventy-six per cent of all cases placed on probation completed their probation with improvement, 13 per cent were returned to court, and 5 per cent were lost from oversight.

The probation system was used in the higher courts of all but nine of the counties of the state last year and in all but six of the fifty-eight cities. It is also being used increasingly by the village judges and justices of the peace of the towns. Thirty-four counties now employ regular salaried county probation officers who are authorized by law to serve in any court in their counties. There are 202 salaried probation officers serving throughout the state in addition to many unsalaried volunteers.

The commission believes there is a direct connection between the recent marked decrease in the population of the correctional institutions of the state, especially the reformatories and state prisons, and the steady increase in the use of probation. The population of the state prisons was almost 1,000 less in 1917 than it was in 1916. An even greater decrease in the population was shown in the reformatories. Better industrial conditions have partly contributed to this.From The Survey, May 4, 1918.

REVIEWS AND CRITICISMS

REPORT OF THE SUPERINTENDENT OF STATE PRISONS OF NEW YORK FOR THE YEAR ENDING JUNE 30, 1916. Pp. 445.

Owing to a change in the fiscal year, this report covers only nine months. The cost of maintaining the four prisons at Sing Sing, Auburn, Clinton, and Great Meadows for this period was $813,853.91. At Sing Sing the average expenditure per inmate per day was 56.32 cents, or $154.25 per year. At Great Meadows the average expenditure per inmate per day was 54.09 cents, of which 31.92 cents were for "ordinary support." At Clinton the average expenditure per day was 53.53 cents. At Auburn the average expenditure was 52.68, of which 28.02 cents were for ordinary support. The daily average population of these four prisons for the period covered was 5,422; the number on parole on June 30, 1916, was 2,406. The corresponding figures for the year 1907 were 3,456 daily average and 337 on parole, a notable increase in prison population and an especially notable increase in the number on parole.

At the Clinton prison a tuberculosis hospital is being built. At Clinton and Auburn the insanitary bucket system still prevails. Improved arrangements for the segregation of the different classes of prisoners, and much better provision for feeble-minded delinquents in New York are required. The medical report from Sing Sing includes the statement that the average number of men applying for treatment is less by 24 men per day, since the inmates have been allowed a large increase in outdoor privileges.

The utilization of the labor of prisoners as a partial payment from them for the expense which they cost the state and as a means of improving their health and character and general fitness for normal participation in the life of society, has been carried to a considerable length in the prisons of New York. However, this industrialization evidently might be much more whole-heartedly and progressively managed. There is a certain amount of agitation to do away with some of the less profitable and less educative indoor factory work and to substitute for it labor in the open air, either by much more extensive employment of prison labor for road work or by the acquisition of additional farm lands. Farming appears to be the most profitable of the New York prison industries. It is also recommended by the Superintendent of Prisons that as a substitute for cash payments to prisoners, reductions of sentence be offered as a reward for faithful labor. The net profits of the prison industries at Sing Sing for the nine months covered by this report were $44,180.17; total net sales of products from this prison amounted to $239,477.36. At Auburn the industries show a net loss of $8,860.97 for this period, although for the preceding nine months they had shown a profit of $14,006.20. The falling off is attributed to the increased cost of materials and to the falling off in orders for the products of that particular prison.

Prison industries at Clinton earned a net profit of $42,917.95 during the nine months.

School attendance at the New York prisons appears to be in general voluntary; however, a considerable proportion of inmates avail themselves of this privilege. A better library equipment, both of supplementary material for the school work and for general circulation would be desirable. Of 1,582 inmates at Sing Sing, 21 had had a college education, and 19 an academic education; only 615 were married, and but 539 claimed to be abstainers from alcoholic beverages. At Clinton 62 out of 1,443 had had college or high school education. The church affiliations claimed by the prisoners were as follows: Great

Sing

Twelve per cent of the men admitted at Auburn showed a positive Wasserman blood test and 13 per cent of those admitted were illiterate, 27 per cent of those admitted at Clinton were illiterate and at Great Meadows 181 out of 989 were illiterate.

In addition to the reports of the four prisons mentioned, this volume contains the report of the Auburn prison for women and the Valentine State Farm for women, the Matteawan State Hospital for the Criminal Insane, the Dannemora State Hospital, and the State Board of Parole. The Matteawan State Hospital appears to be in a shamefully crowded condition. The report recommends that this condition be relieved by ceasing to send paretics and others who commit minor disorderly acts that are mere symptoms of their disease and who do not reveal such dangerous tendencies as to require their commitment to an institution like that at Matteawan. Of the 103 admitted to this institution during the nine months covered by this report, 54 were natives of the U. S. and 49 were foreign born.

Illinois State University.

E. C. HAYES.

PERFORMANCE NORMS FOR THIRTEEN TESTS. New York State Board of Charities. Department of State and Alien Poor. The Bureau of Analysis and Investigation. Eugenics and Social Welfare Bulletin No. VIII. Pp. 142.

The thirteen tests here reported are part of a larger group (see Bulletin No. V) developed by the bureau to supplement the BinetSimon Measuring Scale for Intelligence.

Several of the tests appear altogether new. In particular, attention may be directed to two drawing tests in which the child is required to illustrate by a drawing a specific scene in a story, which has just been read to it. Significant differences were found in this test between the results for children of different ages.

The total list of thirteen tests is as follows: The Knox cube test, a three-number cancellation test, a recall of objects tests, a grouping of objects test (a test of the power of association), a learning test (making use of a peg design), a story reproduction test, a syllogisms test, two drawing tests (mentioned above), a balancing nickel test (simple motor co-ordination), a motor co-ordination test involving use of peg board, a combined motor co-ordination and intelligence test using a nest of hollow boxes, an intelligence test involving a boat and three men to be got across a river (analogous to fox, goose, and corn puzzle).

All thirteen tests were tried on school groups and asylum groups. Significant differences were found between the reactions of normals and subnormals. Age norms for each test were established. The report should prove a valuable and interesting contribution to all concerned with the problem of intelligence rating.

Northwestern University.

EDWARD C. TOLMAN.

MENTAL EXAMINATION. New York State Board of Charities. Department of State and Alien Poor. The Bureau of Analysis and Investigation. Eugenics and Social Welfare Bulletin No. XI. Pp. 73.

The results of seven different investigations are presented.

(1) An examination of 2,142 orphan asylum children indicated less than 7 per cent feeble-minded, nearly one-half mentally retarded, and 2 per cent mentally advanced.

(2) An examination of 607 delinquent girls in the New York Training School for Girls proved that the great majority were of moron or border-line intelligence. It was found, however, that it was the brighter rather than the duller girls who gave the most trouble in the institution.

(3) The 194 inmates of a women's reformatory-The Western House of Refuge for Women, Albion, N. Y.-were found to consist of 17 per cent normal, 48.4 per cent subnormal, and 34.5 per cent feeble-minded individuals.

(4) As a result of examining "special classes" in various different communities the bureau recommends a handicraft class or "Craftsman School" for the backward boys of an industrial community and a Farm School for those of an agricultural community.

(5) From an examination of certain pupils in the Thomas Indian School, Iroquois, N. Y., it appeared that some Indians are as good or better than the average white child in intelligence. They have very distinctive abilities, however. This makes it seem inadvisable to try to cast them into the same educational mould as the whites.

(6) A mental re-examination of 37 asylum children ten months after the first examination indicated that the normals were more likely to raise their basal ages than were the subnormals, while the retarded or feeble-minded subjects were more likely to retain the same basal ages or to lower them.

(7) A report on a special class of eleven defective children in the City of Utica contains some interesting individual diagnoses. All of the children were feeble-minded and some had decided criminalistic tendencies.

Northwestern University.

EDWARD C. TOLMAN.

THE TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL REPORT OF THE STATE COMMISSION OF PRISONS OF NEW YORK FOR 1916. Pp. 587.

There were 13,537 men and 1,805 women in the New York prisons, reformatories, county penitentiaries, county jails and institutions of the city of New York June 30, 1916, according to the recently published report of the New York State Commission of Prisons for the biennium 1914-1916.

There were 5,369 men and 117 women in the state prisons; 75 women in the State Farm for Women; 1,316 men and 537 women in the reformatories; 2,395 men and 83 women in the county penitentiaries; 1,257 men and 911 women in the New York City institutions.

The number of prisoners in the institutions at the close of the fiscal year 1916 was 1,829 less than at the close of the previous year.

"The state prisons and the State Farm for Women," reads the report, "show a slight increase in population, while the reformatories, penitentiaries, county jails and New York City institutions show a decrease. Various causes are ascribed for the decrease. There have been fewer arrests in New York City and fewer immigrants have reached our shores; opportunities for employment have been great; probation is having its effect; and in no-license counties arrests generally are few."

The report contains a detailed description of every prison, reformatory, penitentiary, jail and lockup with terms of commitments, offenses, cost of maintenance, industries and policies of administration and recommendations for improvements.

Sing Sing, Auburn and Clinton prisons are pronounced insanitary, medieval and barbarous. Great Meadow is said to be the only modern prison in the state.