last half century, is far from being
solved, and for this and many other reasons deserves further attention.
The psychotic manifestations of prison life are of sufficient frequency
to deserve some definite place in our nosological tables; they develop
in a milieu artificially created by society, and if this milieu is
responsible for the production of mental disorder, it is of the utmost
importance, both from a preventative and curative standpoint, to
investigate the causes operative here, and lastly, these psychoses
concern individuals who form one of the most important problems society
has to deal with, and any light which the study of psychotic conditions
in these individuals may throw upon the general problem of crime and the
criminal, should be very much welcomed.

I fully believe that in time the study of the psychotic phenomena
developing in criminals will give us a correct insight into the nature
of the criminal personality and thus aid in the solution of that problem
which baffles criminologists today.

We know that while pure experimental psychology and psychopathology have
aided us in understanding the human mind both in health and disease, we
owe the bulk of our knowledge in this field to the investigations of
Nature's phenomena and experiments. The human mind, the most complex and
intricate organ, lends itself but very feebly to analysis when all its
component parts work in unison, and it is only when through disease it
has become, so to speak, disintegrated into its various units, that a
more ready access to it becomes possible. This is being fully
appreciated both by psychologists and psychopathologists. Mental
medicine, however, if it is viewed from the present-day broad conception
of the term, must not confine itself exclusively to psychotic
manifestations in the strictest sense of the word, but should embrace
within its realm that great mass of unfortunates who populate our
prisons, poorhouses and reformatories. It is now being universally
recognized that the pauper, the prostitute, and the criminal classes are
primarily products of mental defect and degeneracy and as such must come
within the purview of mental medicine. This being the case, the same
truisms which apply to the insane in general must likewise apply to the
above-mentioned types.

We are here especially concerned with criminals who, because of a mental
breakdown, have come under the observation of a psychiatrist, and if we
agree with m