with India, from a common-sense plane, and it is not common sense, if
I may say so without discourtesy, to talk of Imperial Dumas. I have
not had a word of thanks from that quarter, in the midst of a shower
of reproach, for what I regard, in all its direct and indirect results
and bearings, as one of the most important moves that have been made
in connection with the relations between Great Britain and India for
a long time--I mean, the admission of two Indian gentlemen to the
Council of the Secretary of State. An hon. friend wants me to appoint
an Indian gentleman to the Viceroy's Executive Council. Well, that
is a different thing; but I am perfectly sure that, if an occasion
offers, neither Lord Minto nor I would fall short of some such
application of democratic principles. In itself it is something that
we have a Viceroy and a Secretary of State thoroughly alive to the
great change in temperature and atmosphere that has been going on in
India for the last five or six years, and I do not think we ought to
be too impatiently judged. We came in at a perturbed time; we did not
find balmy breezes and smooth waters. It is notorious that we came
into enormous difficulties, which we had not created. How they were
created is a long story that has nothing whatever to do with the
present discussion. But what I submit with the utmost confidence
is that the situation to-day is a considerable improvement on the
situation that we found, when we assumed power two years ago. There
have been heavy and black clouds over the Indian horizon during
those two years. By our policy those clouds have been to some extent
dispersed. I am not so unwise as to say that the clouds will never
come back again; but what has been done by us has been justified, in
my opinion, by the event.

Some fault was found, and I do not in the least complain, with the
deportation of two native gentlemen. I do not quarrel with the man