Attention has already been directed to the excessive zeal of the opponents of the "New Police"; but no mention has been made of those enthusiasts who looked for an instant millennium to follow upon the adoption of the measures they advocated. Yet there were many such who formed extravagant hopes too high for realization. It is seldom easy for the observer to arrive at a just estimate of the value of a new institution until his standpoint is far enough removed from the stress of the moment to secure him from the current partisanship which every novelty arouses. We, however, who have crossed the threshold of the twentieth century, can disregard the extreme views of both parties, and heedless of the outpourings of admirers and detractors alike, can gauge the issue by the light of ascertained results, supported by facts and figures. Judged by this standard, and viewed from the standpoint of to-day, the police reforms inaugurated between 1829 and 1856 will be found to justify all reasonably conceived expectations, disappointing as they no doubt appeared to over-sanguine extremists at the time. Since the ideal standard of excellence aimed at by every properly constituted police force is the complete prevention of crime, and as there can be no record of offences prevented, it is obviously impossible to arrive at an entirely satisfactory conclusion as to the efficiency of police by means of any arithmetical process. At the same time it will be allowed that if, whilst population increases, recorded offences are a stationary, or better still if they are a diminishing quantity, there is at least strong presumptive evidence that the result is largely due to the efficiency of the established police. Unfortunately there is no infallible method of discovering the amount of criminality existing in the country at any given time; but, of all available statistics, the best for our purpose are certainly those, which give the annual total of commitments for indictable offences from 1834 until the present day. Before 1834 the records are not altogether trustworthy; but the Parliamentary Committee which sat in 1828, stated that in the ten years between 1811 and 1821, during which the average increase of population was about nineteen per cent., the average increase of commitments for the same period was no less than forty-eight per cent. There can therefore be no doubt that prior to the establishment of the new police the increase of crime was outstripping the increase of population; but taking only those figures which are generally acknowledged to be correct, we get the following interesting table.