No modern institution has been more talked about and written about than that of the police. The police problem is, in all cities, one to which continual thought is given by citizens as well as officials. The debt we owe to the police can more easily be understood by thinking for a moment of what city life would be without that body. In Greater New York, with a population of five millions, there are about ten thousand policemen, or one to every five hundred inhabitants. In London the proportion is one policeman for every four hundred and ninety-six dwellers in the world’s metropolis. In Buenos Aires there are twice as many in proportion to the population as in New York. If these guardians of the peace were to be suddenly withdrawn, no man’s property or person would be safe at any time of the day or night in these great congested centres. Men would be obliged to go armed; business places and dwellings would have to be barricaded by night; no one could leave his home with a feeling of security as to what might happen during his absence. It was so during the middle ages when the people locked and bolted their massive doors and remained at home, or went about at night in companies in order to insure safety. In ancient times many of the duties of the modern police were performed by the soldiers. In the early days of Persia and ancient Greece guards were stationed at the gates, and at night military watchmen were placed on the walls. Rulers and persons of affluence had in addition their own personal body-guards. It was not until the days of Augustus Cæsar that the idea of a body of men trained and disciplined to maintain order for the benefit of the citizens at large was developed. The Romans were averse to the presence of soldiers within the walls, for fear that they might become a menace to public liberty. As a result of this prejudice a body of civil police grew up, a part of whose equipment were buckets of rope made waterproof with tar, for they were the firemen as well. Because of this outfit the people in derision called them “squirts,” or “bucket-boys.” The Anglo-Saxon system of police was not perfected until in the time of the eminent Sir Robert Peel less than a century ago. After several years of strenuous work in Parliament he succeeded in passing a law organizing the Metropolitan Police of London. Although this body of men gave security and protection to the citizens of that city it was considered an inroad upon personal liberty and the members of the force were termed in derision “bobbies” and “peelers,” names which have clung to them ever since.