Cumano, Verano, Guglielmotti, Harry, Curti, Milani, Brenner, Mari, Zucca, Bechis, Bouley, Tacco, Berruto and Sand, and Camicia, Vinci, and Leoni (these last three women), all attacked their victims single-handed and in public. In the case of Chalanton, the woman he had rescued by marriage from a low life, not content with betraying her benefactor, covered him in public with abuse and persecuted him with anonymous accusations. His demand for a separation was unsuccessful and at last, finding himself, in spite of his integrity, involved in a scandalous action, in which his wife figured as a go-between, and tormented by public curiosity and the implacable questionings of reporters, he murdered the cause of all his misfortunes. Another murderer, Del Prete, was prompted to kill his victim, an old woman with a reputation for witchcraft, because he believed she had caused the illness of his mother, to whom he was greatly attached. The motive for the crime is generally a serious one and in most cases immediately precedes it. Bouley committed his crime only a few hours after receiving the news which prompted it; Bounin, Bechis, and Verano, only a few minutes; Milani, twenty-four hours, Zucca eight hours; Curti, a few days. Thus the crime is seldom premeditated, or if so, for only a short space of time, never for months or years. =FIG. 21 BRIGAND CASERIO (see page 119)= Homicide forms 91% of the criminality of this group of offenders. There is a certain proportion also of infanticide, owing to the prevailing prejudice which condemns immorality more harshly when the results are evident. Arson and theft form only 2%. Such cases are however possible. A young girl, whom my father had under observation in prison, seeing her family in dire poverty, committed arson in order to get the insurance money. In another case a woman of refinement, education, and of gentle disposition, who had fallen from prosperity into extreme want, stole in order to pay her son's school-fees. When arrested, she refused to give her name so that the lad should not be dishonoured, and her identity might never have been discovered had she not been recognised by a lawyer in court. She died of a broken heart a few days after her trial. PART II CRIME, ITS ORIGIN, CAUSE, AND CURE CHAPTER I _ORIGIN AND CAUSES OF CRIME_ In order to determine the origin of actions which we call criminal, we shall be forced to hark back to a very remote period in the history of the human race. In all the epochs of which records exist, we find traces of criminal actions. In fact, if we study minutely the customs of savage peoples, past and present, we find that many acts that are now considered criminal by civilised nations were legitimate in former times, and are to-day reputed such among primitive races.