It will be remembered that the Middlesex Justices Act had placed the police offices under the control of the Home Office, which had the power of appointing and dismissing the magistrates: this was right and proper, but it would have been far better if any further supervision exercised by the Secretary of State had been confined to the larger and more general issues connected with the police establishments, and had stopped short of the injudicious meddling that went on. The magistrates might surely have been trusted with the selection of their own constables, but, for some occult reason, successive ministers seem to have thought it their duty to diminish the authority of the magistrates by actively interfering with the nomination and election of the rank and file. Under these circumstances it is strange that the magistrates were as well served by their subordinate officers as they seem to have been, yet, everything considered, the stipendiary policeman proved so superior to the amateur constable that Maurice Swabey, the magistrate at Union Street, declared, that he would rather have six additional officers than fifty parish constables. From the list of the Public Offices above enumerated, the most interesting has intentionally been omitted, because its unique position calls for separate and more detailed notice. Besides being of earlier date than the other offices, Bow Street exceeded them also in importance, and was distinguished as the centre of the police activities of the time. From Henry Fielding, who presided in 1753, to Sir Franklin Lushington, who recently succeeded Sir John Bridge, the Chief Magistrate at Bow Street has nearly always been a man of mark amongst his brother stipendiaries, and in their day the Bow Street Runners (as the officers attached to this Court used to be called) were of quite a different type from their comrades employed in the junior offices.