The following are some of the causes of the increase in juvenile criminality. The character of many of the offences customary in former days--for instance, robbery in the streets and highways by footpads and highwaymen--was such as to render it impossible for children to undertake them. Great towns, in whose streets and suburbs children could wander about, and in which it is comparatively easy for them to commit punishable offences, did not exist. Moreover, children begin to work for a living at an earlier age than in former times. The application of draconian laws, under which even little children suffered corporal and capital punishment, exercised a deterrent influence. Since the end of the eighteenth century punishments have become much milder. A large proportion of criminal offences are to-day more lucrative, easier to carry out, and less risky than in former times. Youthful criminality is probably far more extensive than the official records show, for these latter take no account of petty offences. Many punishable offences never become known outside the limits of the family. In view of the offenders’ youth, reports are often suppressed. _The Classical Criminal Law._--It is characteristic of the classical criminal law that criminal offences committed by children were either left unpunished, or, if punished, were punished less severely than the offences of adults. In the classical criminal law several age-classes were distinguished among juvenile criminals. (_a_) Children too young to understand that an offence is punishable, and for this reason liable neither to prosecution nor to punishment. In existing legislative systems, the age at which criminal responsibility is supposed to begin varies greatly; it may be as low as seven, and as high as fifteen years. (_b_) The second class consists of those children of an age at which criminal responsibility is supposed to have begun. If such a child commits a punishable offence, it is examined as to whether it possesses the necessary understanding of the punishable nature of the offence. If it is considered not to possess this understanding, no punishment is inflicted. The punishment is, in any case, less severe than that which would be inflicted upon an adult. To this class belong children at ages from seven to eighteen years. (_c_) The third age-class consists of offenders over eighteen years of age, who are regarded as necessarily possessed of an understanding of the punishable character of their offence, but in whom also the punishment is less severe than it would be if they were of full age.