of his bearers (or servants), and had nearly murdered them." This
was one of the servants, and, without knowing or caring to know
the causes of such chastisement, I cannot but express my disgust
at the severity--to call it by no harsher name--of some of our
fellow-countrymen towards their domestics.'

The reading of that paragraph gave me extreme pain. People may fancy
that this does not matter much; but I say it matters very much. Under
any system of government you will have Englishmen scattered all over
India, and conduct like that I have just described, in any district,
must create ill feeling towards England, to your rule, to your
supremacy; and when that feeling has become sufficiently extensive, any
little accident may give fire to the train, and you may have calamities
more or less serious, such as we have had during the last twelve months.
You must change all this if you mean to keep India. I do not now make
any comment upon the mode in which this country has been put into
possession of India. I accept that possession as a fact. There we are;
we do not know how to leave it, and therefore let us see if we know how
to govern it. It is a problem such as, perhaps, no other nation has had
to solve. Let us see whether there is enough of intelligence and virtue
in England to solve the difficulty. In the first place, then, I say, let
us abandon all that system of calumny against the Natives of India which
has lately prevailed. Had that people not been docile, the most
governable race in the world, how could you have maintained your power
for 100 years? Are they not industrious, are they not intelligent, are
they not--upon the evidence of the most distinguished men the Indian
Service ever produced--endowed with many qualities which make them
respected by all Englishmen who mix with them? I have heard that from
many men of the widest experience, and have read the same in the works
of some of the best writers upon India. Then let us not have these