It was perhaps the recurrence of cases of this kind where the Police
were proving the enormous value of the Force to the country that caused
Superintendent Primrose in 1903 to make a plea for some increased
recognition of his men. In his report he says, "In nearly every walk of
life in the past twenty years wages have gone on increasing, but, I
regret to state, the same scale of wages still obtains in the Police
Force. For instance, I am at present employing a constable on detective
work whose pay is seventy-five cents a day for which we have to pay a
Pinkerton man eight dollars a day." And it is no disparagement to the
Pinkertons to say that the Police could give them some "pointers" when
it came to work on the frontiers.

The question of pay for their men was a constant anxiety for the
officers, who were themselves receiving a mere pittance in comparison
with the salaries paid to men of equal education and experience in other
departments of the civil service. So we find, in 1904, that fine
officer, Superintendent Wood, in the Yukon making reference to the fact
that though an increase of pay had been granted to others the pay of the
Police had remained practically the same since their organization. Wood
feels that it is humiliating for the men. "A constable's life," he
writes, "is not altogether an enviable one. He is liable to be exposed
to the inclemencies of the weather at all seasons of the year, and is at
times called upon to risk his life in the performance of his duty. He is
under much closer and severer restraint than private individuals." This
is putting it all very mildly, as was the manner of the Police when they
were speaking of themselves. Then Wood goes on to say, "It is of
importance that a member of the Force should be made to feel that his
position is an honourable one, and that he is entitled by virtue of his
office or calling to the respect of the community at large. This state
of things could be arrived at if he felt that his position was equal to
those in other walks of life, and that his services were rated equally
as high. But the mere fact of his receiving 50 cents to 75 cents a day
with his food and clothes while carpenters, blacksmiths and labourers on
the outside receive five times as much and in the Yukon ten times as
much, is enough to instill a feeling of inferiority so far as his
calling is concerned." This is an important view. And Wood in the same
report emphasizes his argument, though h