field-drivers and pound-keepers, three surveyors of marble, nine superintendents of hay scales, four measurers of upper leather, fifteen measurers of wood and bark, twenty measurers of grain, three weighers of beef, thirty-eight weighers of coal, five weighers of boilers and heavy machinery, four weighers of ballast and lighters, ninety-two undertakers, 150 constables, 968 election officers and their deputies. A few of these officials serve without pay, some are paid by salaries fixed by the council, some by fees. Besides these there is a clerk of the common council elected by that body, and also the city clerk, city messenger, and clerk of committees, in whose election both branches of the city council concur. The school committee, of twenty-four members, elected by the people, is distinct from the rest of the city government, and so is the board of police, composed of three commissioners appointed by the state executive.[11] [Footnote 11: Bugbee, "The City Government of Boston," _J.H.U. Studies_, V., iii.] [Sidenote: How city government comes to be a mystery.] This long list may serve to give some idea of the mere quantity of administrative work required in a large city. Obviously under such circumstances city government must become more or less of a mystery to the great mass of citizens. They cannot watch its operations as the inhabitants of a small village can watch the proceedings of their township and county governments. Much work must go on which cannot even be intelligently criticised without such special knowledge as it would be idle to expect in the average voter, or perhaps in any voter. It becomes exceedingly difficult for the taxpayer to understand just what his money goes for, or how far the city expenses might reasonably be reduced; and it becomes correspondingly easy for municipal corruption to start and acquire a considerable headway before it can be detected and checked. [Sidenote: In some respects it is more of a mystery that state and national government.] In some respects city government is harder to watch intelligently than the government of the state or of the nation. For these wider governments are to some extent limited to work of general supervision. As compared with the city, they are more concerned with the establishment and enforcement of certain general principles, and less with the administration of endlessly complicated details. I do not mean to be understood as saying that there is not plenty of intricate detail about state and national governments. I am only comparing one thing with another, and it seems to me that one chief difficulty with city government is the bewildering vastness and multifariousness of the details with which it is concerned. The modern city has come to be a huge corporation for carrying on a huge business with many branches, most of which call for special aptitude and training.