In the opinion of the Vagrancy Committee, a considerable deduction must be made from the number returned for common lodging-houses, though, on the other hand, it appears from some of the returns that many vagrants, who would otherwise have been in tramp wards or common lodging-houses, were at the time engaged in temporary work such as fruit-picking and harvesting, and so were not included in the count. Further, an addition of about 10,000 is necessary to include the vagrants in casual wards. The Committee came to the conclusion that the census could not be accepted as "a trustworthy guide to the actual number of vagrants," and their Report contains the following guarded verdict:—

"The number of persons with no settled home and no visible means of subsistence probably reaches, at times of trade depression, as high a total as 70,000 or 80,000, while in times of industrial activity (as in 1900) it might not exceed 30,000 or 40,000. Between these limits the number varies, affected by the conditions of trade, weather, and economic causes. In our Inquiry we are more concerned with the habitual vagrant, that is, the class whom trade conditions do not affect. Of this class there is always an irreducible minimum, though successive depressions of trade may increasingly swell the numbers. No definite figures as to this permanent class can be obtained, but we are inclined to think that the total number would not exceed 20,000 to 30,000."[9]

It may be added that the estimates of the vagrant population made by witnesses who gave evidence before this Committee ranged from 25,000 to 70,000.

The mean of all the seven estimates put forward above, as approximations only, is about 50,000, which is probably below rather than above the actual number in normal times. The estimates differ so widely, however, as to shake one's faith in the possibility of arriving at a safe figure except by a special census on even more comprehensive lines than those which underlay the Home Office enumerations up to 1868.

But even when the casual wards, model lodging-houses, shelters, and other resorts of the roaming poor have been enumerated, the full extent of the vagrant population is not told.

According to a statement made by the Prison Commissioners to the Vagrancy Committee, 3,736 out of 12,369 convicted male prisoners on February 28, 1905, were, in the opinion of the prison governors, "persons with no fixed place of abode and no regular means of subsistence"; and of 2,595 convicted female prisoners, 372 answered the same description. In other words, one-fourth of the prison population belonged at that date to the vagrant and loafing class.

The prosecutions in England and Wales for vagrancy offences in the narrower sense—begging, sleeping out, misbehaviour by paupers, and theft or destruction of workhouse clothes—fluctuated as follows during the ten years 1898-1907:—

At whatever figure we place the vagrant population, there is little doubt that the number tends to increase. The Vagrancy Committee frankly accept this view.

"The army of vagrants has increased in number of late years," they state, "and there is reason to fear that it will continue to increase if things are left as they are. It is mainly composed of those who deliberately avoid any work, and depend for their existence on almsgiving and the casual wards; and for their benefit the industrious portion of the community is heavily taxed. We are convinced that the present system of treating casual paupers neither deters the vagrant nor affords any means of reclaiming him, and we are unanimously of opinion that a thorough reform is necessary."[10]

As to the class of men who frequent the casual wards the great mass, both in town and country, are unquestionably unskilled labourers, though nearly all trades contribute a share, larger or smaller, to the sum total of vagrancy. A classification of the men relieved in the casual wards of Hitchin and Brixworth during twelve months ending September, 1906, showed the following result:—[11]