2 MAY 1908, Page 10

. " THE 'UNREST IN INDIA.

[TO Tile EDITOR OP TRH " Sp gerATore."] SIR,—In the letter you published last Saturday, Mr. Macnicol, of Poona, drags in a sneer at me for reasons of his own. To myself the thing appears all the more unnecessary because I entirely agree with the main purport of his letter, and in all that I have written or spoken about India I have urged the same course that he does. Like him, I believe that the extremist party, always so attractive, is -rapidly' gaining power, and will continue to gain it until it makes our position in India almost impossible, unless we give moderate leaders like Mr. Gokhale and Mr. Lajpat Rai such generous- -and effectual measures of reform as they can point to with. hope. At present, as a result of their patient and constitutional effort's:they have hardly anything to point to except failures, refusals, and acts of suppression.. If they are losing ialuence over minds excited and kept in continual, irritation by our policy for the last four years; the fault is ours. For myself; I continue to hope, though with many: misgivings, that there is still just time to save the situation ; but I agree with Mr. Macnicol that this can only be done by "generous and prompt measures" such as will " satisfy the reasonable demands of-the moderate leaders, and associate the people of India. in the government of the country both at the top in the Executive Councils and at the bottom in Village nnd-District Councils." I also agree with everything he says about the .nielessness of the Simla' proposals now before the country,. based, as be

observes, in the opinion of moderate reformers, upon the cowardly principle of "Divide and rule."—I am, Sir, &c.,

HENRY W. NEVINSON.

4 Downside Crescent, Hatnpstead, N. W.