1890s: A middle-class gentleman could support his family, including several servants, on an annual income of 500 pounds. The maximum pay for a police constable was just under 2 pounds a week.

Today: The average annual household income in the United Kingdom in the early 1990s was 15,800 pounds, or approximately $25,900 in U.S. dollars.

1890: The world's first electrically operated underground subway system opens in London.

Today: Over 270 miles of electrically powered subway lines—the second-longest system in the world behind New York's—snake beneath the London metropolitan area.

1890s: The ninth edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, its 24 volumes appearing between 1875 and 1889, runs to a total of 21,572 pages.

Today: With its 32 volumes and 31,729 pages, the fifteenth edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica was completed in 1991.

The Police

Even though a British police force had been established in 1829, the institution was not held in universal high esteem. Early police...