"That, at the age when children suffer these injuries from the labour they undergo, they are not _free agents_, but are _let out to hire_, the wages they earn being received and appropriated by their parents and guardians, and therefore they think that a case is made out for the interference of the legislature in behalf of the children employed in factories"--p. 32. THE POLICE (1836). =Source.=--_Treatise on the Magistracy of England_, by Edward Mullins. London, 1836. _Commissioners' Report on Police._ "The constable is most commonly an uneducated person, from the class of petty tradesmen or mechanics, and in practice is usually nominated by his predecessor on going out of office. No inquiry takes place into his qualification or fitness for the office, and indeed he is said to be often the person in the parish the most likely to break the peace. So common is it for the constable to be unable to write or read, that an improper fee is often charged upon that ground by the Magistrate's clerk, 'for making out the constable's bill for conveyance to gaol.' "'The manner of appointing constables, in my opinion,' says a correspondent, 'might be advantageously altered, for the court leet jury and steward being irresponsible parties, and the jurymen (vulgarly called Tom-fool's men) not liking the burthen themselves, often appoint persons of _bad character_, and sometimes for the purpose of keeping them off the parish.' If respectable persons are sometimes chosen at the Leet, they 'find substitutes for a _small sum_, and these deputies blunder through the year, and when they are most wanted are never to be found.' What integrity or propriety of conduct can there be expected from one whose necessity renders every shilling that is offered him an irresistible temptation? "Entirely ignorant of his duties when first appointed, the parish constable is often displaced at the end of the year, when his acquaintance with them is, perhaps, beginning to improve. Even when suited in other respects to the employment, his efficiency is always in a great measure impaired by the nature of his position with regard to those among whom he is called upon to act. Belonging entirely to their class, and brought into constant contact with them by his ordinary occupations, he is embarrassed in the discharge of his duty by considerations of personal safety, interest or feeling, and by an anxiety to retain the good will of his neighbours. When all these circumstances are considered, it would, indeed, be surprising if the constables were found to render satisfactory service. In point of fact they are deficient in zeal and activity to a degree which it is difficult to exaggerate, and it may be said, without undue severity, that they are in all respects utterly unfit for the duties to which they are appointed.