The volume into which Mr. Valentine Chirol has collected and republished
his valuable series of articles in _The Times_ upon Indian unrest is an
important and very instructive contribution to the study of what is
probably the most arduous problem in the politics of our far-reaching
Empire. His comprehensive survey of the whole situation, the arrangement
of evidence and array of facts, are not unlike what might have been
found in the Report of a Commission appointed to investigate the causes
and the state of affairs to which the troubles that have arisen in India
may be ascribed.

At different times in the world's history the nations foremost in
civilization have undertaken the enterprise of founding a great European
dominion in Asia, and have accomplished it with signal success. The
Macedonian Greeks led the way; they were followed by the Romans; and in
both instances their military superiority and organizing genius enabled
them to subdue and govern for centuries vast populations in Western
Asia. European science and literature flourished in the great cities of
the East, where the educated classes willingly accepted and supported
foreign rulership as their barrier against a relapse into barbarism; nor
have we reason for believing that it excited unusual discontent or
disaffection among the Asiatic peoples. But the Greek and Roman Empires
in Asia have disappeared long ago, leaving very little beyond scattered
ruins; and in modern times it is the British dominion in India that has
revived and is pursuing the enterprise of ruling and civilizing a great
Asiatic population, of developing the political intelligence and
transforming the ideas of an antique and, in some respects, a primitive
society.

That the task must be one of prodigious difficulty, not always free from