In comparing Tables C and G it is seen that the street workers and the non-street workers were committed for practically the same offenses, and that their distribution according to offense does not vary widely. It is significant that a much smaller proportion of the street workers were committed to the institution under the age of ten years, than of the non-street workers, indicating that street occupations (which are not usually entered upon before the age of ten years), if followed for a year or two, contribute largely to the promotion of delinquency. From a comparison of Tables D and F it will be observed that the prevalence of delinquency among the street workers cannot be explained on the ground of orphanage, as only 28 per cent were fatherless and 21 per cent motherless, while of the non-street workers 30 per cent were fatherless and 25 per cent were motherless. This indicates (1) that street work in the great majority of cases is not made necessary by orphanage, and (2) that street work causes delinquency in spite of good home conditions so far as the presence of both parents contributes to the making of a good home. Furthermore, it will be noted in Table E that nearly half of the children for whom figures on income could be obtained earned less than fifty cents per day--a small return on the heavy investment in the risk of health and character. The difference in behavior at the institution between the street workers and the others is shown in Table H to be almost negligible, the latter making a slightly better showing. An English writer says: "There is no difficulty in understanding how street trading and newspaper selling lead to gambling. We are told by those who are best able to judge, that of the young thieves and prostitutes in the city of Manchester, 47 per cent had begun as street hawkers. For the younger boys and girls such an occupation, especially at night, turns the streets into nurseries of crime. The newspaper sellers are not exposed to quite the same dangers, but they are nearly all gamblers. They gamble on anything and everything, from the horse races reported hour by hour in the papers they sell, to the numbers on the passing cabs, and they end by gambling with their lives."[139] CHAPTER VIII THE STRUGGLE FOR REGULATION IN THE UNITED STATES