It may be said also that in comparison with the United States the criminal statistics are very much in favor of Ireland. For example, during the year 1906 there were only four murders in Ireland to eleven in the District of Columbia, and only eleven assaults with dangerous weapons in Ireland to fifty-three in the District of Columbia. During the year 1907 there were eight murders in Ireland and eighteen in the District of Columbia and only seventeen assaults with dangerous weapons in Ireland to fifty-one in the District of Columbia, notwithstanding the difference in population. The population of Ireland is 4,398,565, and that of the District of Columbia is 317,380. During the year 1905 there were 9,728 persons indicted for crimes in Ireland; in 1906 the total was 9,465, and in 1907 it was 9,418, or 2.2 per 1,000 of the population. The same ratio is reported for 1897, and the average for the ten years was 2.5 per 1,000. During the year 1906 there were 372 persons indicted for crime in the District of Columbia, or 1.17 per 1,000 of population, and in 1907 there were 381 indictments, or 1.20 per 1,000. During the year 1906 there were 4,922 indictments found in Chicago (Cook County), with a population of 2,166,055, or less than one-half that of Ireland, the ratio to population being 2.27 per 1,000. For the year 1907 there were 4,699 indictments found in Chicago, which was 2.16 per 1,000 of the population. In Ireland, however, at least one-fifth, and usually more of the indictments, are for cattle driving, for attempts to burn crops, hayricks, and stables, for killing and maiming cattle, and for writing threatening letters. The authorities are very severe in their efforts to suppress the land troubles, and sometimes half the population of a village will be indicted for using popular methods of persuasion to compel the large landowners to sell their farms. A great many threatening letters are written, for which there is a heavy penalty, and when some ranchman who has refused to divide up his pastures into farms and sell them to the "landless" finds his fences broken down and his cattle scattered all over the country, every suspected person is indicted for moral effect. There are very few convictions. The people who are engaged in the outrage will not testify against each other and there are no other witnesses. In Ireland there are very few cases of robbery or burglary. Petty larceny is the principal item in the list of offenses. Grand larceny, embezzlement, forgery, and similar crimes are infrequent.