| Degrees of | | | | | | | | | | | |Instruction.|1839.| 1840.|1841.|1842.|1843.|1844.|1845.|1846.|1847.|1848.| +------------+-----+------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+ |Unable to | | | | | | | | | | | |read or | | | | | | | | | | | |write, |33.53| 33.32|33.21|32.35|31.00|29.77|30.61|30.66|31.39|31.93| | | | | | | | | | | | | |Imperfectly,|53.48| 55.57|56.67|58.32|57.60|59.28|58.34|59.51|58.59|56.38| | | | | | | | | | | | | |Well, |10.07| 8.29| 7.40| 6.77| 8.02| 8.12| 8.38| 7.71| 7.79| 9.83| | | | | | | | | | | | | |Superior, | 0.32| 0.37| 0.45| 0.22| 0.47| 0.42| 0.37| 0.34| 0.28| 0.27| | | | | | | | | | | | | |Not | | | | | | | | | | | |ascertained,| 2.60| 2.45| 2.27| 2.34| 2.91| 2.41| 2.30| 1.78| 1.60| 1.59| --_Parliamentary Returns for England_, 1848, p. 12. The great increase here is in the criminals who have received an _imperfect education_, which class has increased as much as that of the totally uneducated has diminished. Unhappily, imperfect education is precisely the species of instruction which alone, in the present days of cheapened production and diminishing wages, the great body of the poor are able to give to their children. Mr Pearson, M.P., who has paid great attention to this subject, and whose high official situation in the city of London gives him such ample means of being acquainted with the practical working of the criminal law, has given the following valuable information in a public speech, which every one acquainted with the subject must know to be thoroughly well founded:--