the population were arrested last year for drunkenness, therefore that proportion are in the habit of getting drunk. The same men and women are brought before the magistrates over and over again, and their arrest is recorded each time; so that the actual number of individuals apprehended annually is not known, or at least not published. Once more, then, the statistics of apprehensions serve only to convey some vague idea of the general condition of the lowest residuum; and although the ignorance and depravity of the class affected really render them all the more dangerous to society, it is quite fallacious to employ the records of our police courts to base an estimate of the increase or diminution of drunkenness throughout the whole community. We have here gone quite far enough in employing them to convey some general idea of the condition of the various ranks of society. That the annual consumption of spirits per head of the population may be a somewhat better guide to the condition of the people, we have little doubt, though there is no proof that it is so; and even a nominal prohibition of the manufacture and sale may sometimes have little effect in checking drunkenness, as we shall see hereafter. Still it is safe to affirm that the more easily drink is obtainable, whether from its cheapness or from the multiplication of drinking shops, the more liability there is to excess on the part of all sections of the community. This is, however, a mere generalisation. For example, when the “Gin Act” was passed, it is true the consumption fell off apparently two millions of gallons, but twenty-two years afterwards, long after the Act was repealed, it had first risen and then fallen much lower; that is to say, in 1737 it stood at 4,250,399; in 1743, after the repeal of the Act, at 8,203,430, and during the interim the duty was threepence per gallon; but in 1759, when the duty was raised to 2s. 3d., it was only 1,819,134 gallons. Again, if the reader will consult the interesting table compiled by the Rev. D. Burns already referred to,[305] he will find that, with slight fluctuations, there has been a steady increase in the consumption of spirits in England, in proportion to the population, from 1684, when the duty was twopence per gallon, to 1873, when it was 10s.; and that increase still continues. In Scotland, whilst in 1853 the duties were 3s. 8d. and 4s. 8d. per gallon, the consumption of spirits was 6,534,648 gallons; whilst in 1873, with the duty raised to 10s., and an increase of about 600,000 inhabitants, it was only a little more, namely, 6,832,487 gallons. This really denotes increased sobriety, due, no doubt, partly to repressive measures, and partly to the rapid spread of education.