52 THE EXETER ROAD 



' Charley ' was, of course, a watcliman. The thrash- 

 ing of a ' Charley ' was not an heroic pursuit, but 

 (or, rather, therefore) it was extremely popular. 

 They were generally old men, and not capable of very 

 serious reprisals upon the gangs of muscular youths 

 who thumped, whacked, larrupped, and beat them 

 unmercifully, and overturned their watch-boxes on to 

 them, so that those poor old men were imprisoned 

 until some Samaritan came by and released them. 

 No one ever attempted that sort of thing with the 

 ' New Police,' wdio were not old and decrepit men, 

 but tall, lusty, upstanding fellows. Perhaps that 

 was why the ' New Police ' were so violently objected 

 to, although the ostensil:)le grounds of objection were 

 founded on the supposition that the continental 

 system of a semi-military gendarmerie was intended. 

 The authorities were therefore at great pains to keep 

 the police a strictly citizen force, and although a 

 uniform was, of course, necessary, one as nearly as 

 possible like civilian dress was chosen. The present 

 uniform of the police, and the police themselves, if 

 they had then worn a helmet, would have been 

 howled out of existence by the violent Radicals and 

 Chartists who troubled the early years of the Queen's 

 reign. They did not, therefore, wear a helmet at all, 

 but a tall glazed hat of the chimney-pot kind. A 

 swallow-tailed coat, tightly buttoned up. with a belt 

 round the waist, a stiff stock under the chin, and 

 trousers of white duck gave him, altogether, a very 

 respectable and citizen-like aspect. It has been left 

 to later years to alter this uniform. 



