3 AUGUST 1918, Page 3

Speaking at Cambridge last Saturday, Mr. Montagu said that critics

of his Report on India had made attacks on the educated Indian people. He did not know what was to be gained by libelling the progressive part of the people of India. " Let us have it out once and for all. What was to be the principle of our government in India ? Was it to be domination, subordination, the iron hand ? Were we to have one principle of government in India and another principle in the rest of our Empire ? Was not the principle of the British Empire the principle of a commonwealth of free nations ? " We wonder whether Mr. Montagu thought this a valid argument. Surely not, unless he forgot that the British Empire contains numerous countries where self-government of the Anglo-Saxon type has not yet become possible owing to the backwardness of the population or the baffling medley of races in those countries.