.

A barge was swinging across the stream with two men at the sweeps. The
tide caught it, and it dropped heavily down on us while we were trying
to steal a passage athwart another vessel. The launch was caught between
the two, and it seemed inevitable that our boat should crack like an
egg-shell. With my heart in my mouth, I prepared to jump. But with swift
precision the constables acted. Holding tight to the gunwale they forced
our boat over sideways, and we sidled through at an angle of forty-five
degrees into open water.

I looked for an expression of relief, but the men had calmly resumed
their seats. The escape had been a matter of course to them, and they
laughed when I spoke of it as an escape. For the men of the Thames
Police take things as philosophically as sailors. It was all in the
day's work to them.

Since then I have seen much of the men and methods of the force which
guards the great highway of London. They have heavy duties to perform,
and, from the rank and file to the superintendent, are adequately fitted
for their work. The histories of some of those who wear the blue jacket
with the word "Thames" on the collar, and the peaked cap with the anchor
badge, would make enthralling reading.

There is Divisional Detective-Inspector Helden, who probably knows more
of the ways of the waterside thieves than any man living. He is a
linguist, as are many of his staff--a qualification much necessary in
dealing with the cosmopolitan crews of ships plying to and from the Port
of London.

There is an inspector who has saved three lives--a fact none the less
noteworthy in that he holds the quaint superstition that all the
troubles of those people will accumulate on his own unfortunate head.
There is a bronzed, brown-moustached station-sergeant who had been
around the world before he was twelve, and who has had strange
adventures in every quarter of the globe. There are men drawn from the
Navy--and now serving again--the mercantile marine, and river craft.

All have an intimate knowledge of that thirty-five mile stretch of river
which passes through London from Teddington to Dartford Creek.

They know every eddy, every trick and twist of the tide; they know on
any given day what boats are on the river, be they barges or liners; and
they know the men who work them.

The force is under the control of Superintendent Mann, who has had a
varied experience of many years, and has brought a ripe knowledge of men
and