_Detroit Aids Dependent Families of Prisoners._--In the Review for March, 1911, we described the financial success of the Detroit House of Correction. From the annual report of the board of poor commissioners of Detroit we learn that between July 1, 1910, and June 30, 1911, 88 families, comprising 360 dependent persons, were supported by the wages that the husband and father earned while confined in the house of correction. The sum expended for the dependent families was $3,355. There have been many families who would have gone in absolute want rather than appeal to the city for aid, but under this ordinance they were given the right to requisition a portion of the wages which the head of the household was earning while imprisoned, and they have not felt that they were receiving gifts of charity. Tables prepared with the report show that of the 88 families assisted from the house of correction fund, 39 were Americans, 19 Polish, 10 Austrians, 10 Canadians, and five Germans, while English, Irish, Scotch, Russians and Negroes had but one family each. Seventy-nine of the offenders were sentenced from the police court and nine from the recorder’s court on charges ranging from bigamy and forgery to failure to send children to school. The report also embodies the suggestion that some system of adequate and permanent relief is needed by means of which provision can be made for widows and their children. Three hundred and forty-five widows with young children, or 24 per cent. of the total number of cases, aided by the poor commissioners, were assisted during the year. Commenting upon this fact, the report says: “When we think that the average income of these families is not more than $4 or $5 a week, it is impossible to believe that these children are properly fed, housed and clothed. Can we wonder that so many of the children in these families go astray and find their way into the juvenile court detention homes and reformatories?” Reporting to the American prison association at Omaha, William H. Venn, parole officer for Michigan, outlined the compensation plan operated in the Detroit House of Correction, which he said had met with general commendation. “On July 6, 1911, the Detroit House of Correction passed its fiftieth milestone. During the last thirty-two years over $1,000,000 in profits have been turned over to the city of Detroit, the families of prisoners, and to the prisoners themselves. Since 1880 the city of Detroit has annually received sums ranging from $9,016.83 to $52,711.64. The original expenditure by the city of $189,841.36 has been turned back into the treasury of the municipality, the institution has paid its own way, and in the fifty years has shown a fine balance of $1,254,178.15. In addition to this showing, since July, 1901, the prisoners have been receiving financial benefits ranging from $5,958.14 to $9,670.38 annually.