Unquestionably the cause of all this was the inefficiency of the police. The necessary conditions, unity of action of the whole and direct responsibility of the parts, could never be assured under such arrangements. Each London parish worked independently, and while some made a fairly good fight, others by their apathy were subjected to continual depredation. The wealthy and populous district of Kensington, for instance, some fifteen square miles in extent, depended for its protection upon three constables and three headboroughs--none of the latter very remarkable for steadiness and sobriety. It was fairly urged that three drunken beadles could effect nothing against widespread burglary and thieving. In the parish of Tottenham, equally unprotected, there had been nineteen attempts at burglary in six weeks, and sixteen had been entirely successful. In Spitalfields, at a time not long antecedent to 1829, gangs of thieves stood at the street corners and openly rifled all who dared to pass them. In some parishes, suburban and of recent growth, there was no police whatever, no protection but the voluntary exertions of individuals and the "honesty of the thieves." Such were Fulham--with 15,000 inhabitants--Chiswick, Ealing, Acton, Edgware, Barnet, Putney, and Wandsworth. In Deptford, with 20,000, constantly reinforced by evil-doers driven out of Westminster through stricter supervision, there was no watch at all. Then the number of outrages perpetrated so increased that a subscription was raised to keep two watchmen, who were yet paid barely enough to support existence, much less ensure vigilance. Watchmen, indeed, were often chosen because they were on the parish rates. The pay of many of them was no more than twopence per hour. [Illustration: Sir Robert Peel. (_After the Painting by J. Wood._)] The Duke of Wellington, who was the head of the Administration when Peel brought forward his measure in 1829, supported it to the full, and showed from his own experience how largely crime might be prevented by better police regulations. He mentioned the well-known horse-patrol,[13] which had done so much to clear the neighbourhood of London of highwaymen and footpads. His recollection reached back into the early years of the century, and he could speak from his own experience of a time when scarcely a carriage could pass without being robbed, when travellers had to do battle for their property with the robbers who attacked them. Yet all this had been stopped summarily by the mounted patrols which guarded all the approaches to London, and highway robbery had ceased to exist. The same good results might be expected from the general introduction of a better preventive system.