The Evening Star MONDAY, OCTOBER 18, 1875.

Evening Star, Issue 3946, 18 October 1875, Page 2

The Evening Star MONDAY, OCTOBER 18, 1875.

It is much to bo feared that a larrikin elass is growing up in and around Dunedin. Xu our police courts youn‘-» offenders are often brought before the magistrates, charged with having been guilty of petty depredations, and there is scarcely a suburban flower or fruit garden that has escaped being plundered ?y them. To expect any community to be wholly tree from crane would he absurd. Unfortunately the human race has nowhere reached that perfection, and it may be safely predicted that it never will ; but that does not justify indifference to prevailing evils. Crime, like disease, has a tendency to spread, through neglect of necessary precautions and remedies, and is beat and most effectually dealt with in its beginnings. We are loth to have these young offenders stigmatised as criminals. “ Crime,” says Mr Sheldon Amos, “ iu the moral use of the term, and in the mixed moral and legal use (which is the popular use), signifies «u abominable and atrocious act which is not only injurious to some members of the community, and dan gcrous to all, but which proceeds from some exceptional wickedness in the person who perpetrates it.” Viewed in this light, it is no trilling thiim ft-.-even a child to stand in the dock°of a Court of Justice charged with having committed an offence against the law .No one would affirm that, a boy ofnin ' or t(!u y*- a ™ had become so d- ’ praved as to be pronounced exceptioi - ally wiciced. Thoughtless he ms y b, ■ or he may be wild and untutored in’ dulgcd at home in the gratifies tiou of all he desires, without morel training and he may have no clear conception of right and wroim • yet beneath this outward eoatimmay be a spirit capable of tho highest culture. He may have within lam thus the germ of a noble uaiuiand resemble the offshoot of a beautiful flower that, through neglect bus become an unsightly weec’ And ibis word “ neglect ” suggests where the true criminaJitv lies. CoKihl the short-lived history of every littl delinquent be disclosed, how his parer + . live how they manage their hoi’ L' ,imv {] "'S f,! '- : ,; " v ntal iv S , J0l) , ■loll! Tv !»V },‘iC yr< j 1. ,y • " Urn training of their offering, in n ( instances it would ta found that j

children bear tbeir own moral features. We have beard of instances in which >otb precept and example were of no ivail ;no doubt there are cases of that •lass, but they are exceptional and very rare, Impartially thtflo talents Beatl, JUst education forms the man. So true is this idea that peoph 1 1 most instinctively say. when very • oung children have the misfortune t>■>.vt«wov to a magistrate, “ they must 'm o been badly brought up ” There s, however, one view that must he taken, which forms some extenuation of parents cursed with incorrigible children. They cannot have them always near them, and are nearly powerless when unfortunately friendships are formed with badly-trained or vicious companions, Home training catl do much— much more than many very worthy people imagine ; hut there is a training of the streets that often operates with more than counterpoising influence, A boy, like a man, may he known by the company he keeps. If a lad associates with City Arabs and larrikins, he is in training for the gaol and haply the gallows. Of the same age with himself tastes soon assimilate, and instead of the reprobate rising to the standard of one better taught, he is almost certain to drag him down to his own degraded level. It must not be supposed that those children who, recently in Dunedin and Port Chalmers, were publicly exposed in Court, are even the worst that could be selected, nor were theirs the only crimes committed by the larrikin class. Not a householder is living in the suburbs who could not tell of having been robbed to a greater or less extent by children, and it is to be feared in many instances with the cognisance of and even in compliance with the instructions of their parents. And so great is the difficulty of preventing such associations being formed, that we know of respectable families in which it has been found necessary to send children to sea in order to break up companionship of that class. Unwillingly this has been done, but we hope it will prove wisely. We have described an evil which is growing, with the hope of checking it. We have no desire to see a reproduction of a state of affair’s likethatof Melbourne; yet, unless parearts rouse themselves to their rei sponsibilities, weare in a fair way towards it. If we are to escape this, the remedy must be applied at home. It is very often too late when the magistrate has to deal with a case. Few men like to be hard upon childr en. As a general rule, they are patiently borne with, and kindly excused many freaks for which older persons would be punished, but the offence is not the less because it is overlooked and forgiven. The day school and the Sunday school are mighty engines for good, but they do not relieve parents from duties which cannot be remitted without guilt lying at their door. If they will have their children grow up reputable and reliaable, let them ascertain who and what are their playmates, and if a turkey’s egg or even a marble has been taken as a bribe or a share of plunder, let it be viewed as a crime as great as if it had been a thousand pounds. We are importing people from abroad whom we hope to see prosperous and happy. They are strangers and we bid them welcome, but we do not the less desire to see our native-born children reared and nurtured for honorable and successful future pursuits.