THE MUNEEPORE DEBATE.
WE have no complaint to make of Sir William Harcourt's motion on the Muneepore affair. The people choose that the House of Commons should be the supreme authority in the Empire ; and while they continue in that mind, the duty of the House is to discuss every event of sufficient importance, and see that the executive agents of the Empire do their business well. The House is probably the most incompetent body to which the affairs of India could be entrusted, far more incompetent, for example, than the co-optative group of merchants, bankers, and old Indians which was called thd Court of Directors ; but still, it is the supreme authority, and if it destroys the Empire, as it quite possibly will, the people must endure that misfortune just as they would endure the consequences of incompetence in any Cabinet that they had placed in power. But we must once more urge upon the Govern- ment that if the House is to interfere in the administra- tion of India more frequently than it has done, it is indispensable that the responsible Ministers should adhere to the regular policy of every successful Executive, and either defend their agents heartily, or remove them from their places. It is madness to leave them where they are, and yet break their hearts and damp their courage by hinting that they are among the least competent of mankind. That was what Sir John Gorst on Tuesday actually did. As his chief sits in the Peers, he is in the House of Commons the responsible Minister for India, and he delivered a speech which, nominally a defence of the Indian Govern- ment, was really a cynical admission that that Government had behaved exactly as .a very stupid and rather un- principled Government might be expected to behave. The key-note of the attack on the Viceroy was, that he had ordered the exile of the Muneepore Commander-in-Chief for insufficient reason. In reality, Lord Lansdowne had ordered the removal of a truculent and dangerous soldier because he had expelled one Prince by mutiny and re- bellion, violating in so doing the guarantee which the Indian Government gives to every feudatory against in- ternal insurrection and palace intrigues, and. because he intended either to expel and substitute himself for another, or to reduce the other to a more puppet of which he should pull the strings. Sir John Gorst, how- ever, chose to defend Lord Lansdowne by accusing him of sentencing statesmen to exile because they were able men. lie described the Senaputty as an able and generous man of bad character—he beat two slaves to death for stealing some of his goods--whom the Government might have used, but whom, as they recognised his capacity, they pre- ferred to deport. " Governments never have allowed or encouraged such a policy being adopted. They have always discouraged independent and original talent, and have always promoted mediocrity. This is not a new policy. It is as old as the days of Tarquinius Superbus "—(who. recommended, schoolboys will remember, the assassination of the eminent as his principle of statecraft). " confess• that I think the Government of India are very likely right when they consider that it is better that great abilities and independence such as distinguished the Senaputty should be considered a disqualification for State service—that it is perhaps on the whole better, and more for the safety of the world, that you should depend upon mediocrity ; but, at any rate, I think it would be unreasonable for the House to censure the Government of India because, in this matter of deter- mining to remove the Senaputty, they have acted on the traditional and regular policy of Governments from almost time immemorial.' A more outrageously audacious charge. was never made against the Government of India, which exists and prospers by picking out the ablest, which tolerates in the able not only independence of judgment but of action, and which in particular, in its dealings with Native States, makes it a steady principle to correct the failings or the feebleness of the hereditary Princes by supporting capable men as their irremovable Viziers.. Some of the most dangerous difficulties Residents have had to face have arisen solely from the fact that they have pro- tected ability against birth, have, in fact, done the very thing which their official protector and representative accuses them of never doing. The Government of India does not allow, and cannot allow, either able men or in- competent men to organise rebellions ; but, with that exception, they do allow Indian Viziers, a most re- markable class whose histories and actions are far too little observed in this country, to exercise an extent of independent and despotic power which, if it were fully described, would not only surprise the House of Commons, but possibly disgust it. That an able native cannot rise in British India to a position of what he thinks power, is true, because we allow the Asiatic form of power, under which the will is instantly executive, to no one ; but in the Native States a man may still rise, and rise rapidly, from the lowest position to an authority so great that his enmity is fatal to an opponent, till, in other words, he has dis- tinctly more "power," in its direct sense, than is entrusted to any statesman in Europe outside Russia. In the case before the House, the Senaputty was not sentenced te exile because he was able, but because he was using his ability and his high birth—the latter of which alone made him Commander-in-Chief, his predecessor in that office having been his brother, the imbecile Regent—to reduce his State to anarchy, an attitude in no way redeemed by per- sonal character. The Viceroy's Government, which does not wish to hamper the despotic authority of Native Princes, but to utilise it for good, is compelled, as it allows them such vast powers, to study the character and records of pretenders, and Sir John Gorst makes even this an occa- sion for cynical remark. To him, apparently, the character of a Prince with the power of life and death in his hands seems unimportant. He said :— "We must consider who the Sonapntty is. Ho is a man of great ability and force of character, and popular among the people for his generosity, which is one of the highest virtues among Orientals. He was a man, however, of not very good moral character. I do not know that we can expect the same standard of morality among Orientals as among tho people of this country ; but a man who has been guilty of laving two slaves beaten to death for stealing is rather worse than the average among even Oriental despots. Lastly, the Senaputty is a man of independent character, and he presumed to make revolutions without consulting the paramount Power, There are two ways of dealing with a man of this sort—ono is to depose him from his State, and the other is to use him as an instrument for governing the State. It is quite evident that Mr. Grimwood desired to adopt the latter course. That was a very generous policy, and one which everybody is dis- posed to sympathise with, but it was a rather risky policy. It is a policy which depends on the Resident obtaining the ascendency of the Sonaputty, and not on the Senaputty obtaining the ascendency of the Resident. Between the two powers there is a. great difference, for one is temporary and the other is permanent. Mr. Grimwood would remain only a few years at the outside in Muneepore, while the Senaputty would be there after Mr. Grimwood loft, and might possibly obtain an ascendency over Mr. Grimwood's successor, if not over 111r. Grimwood himself."
No worse defence was ever made for a great absent official than Sir John Gorst offered for Lord. Lansdowne, or one to grind," and the authority of the Viceroy on personal than native diplomatists how to read between the lines, and VOLUNTEERS.
perceive, as he did perceive, that the easiest course was who had the slightest connection with the sea." In other also the course which would create the most apprehension words, because the Naval Volunteers are not seamen in greater Native Courts, of which Mr. Grimwood very already, we are to refuse to allow them the opportunity of properly was not thinking, and would set the most dun- learning seamanship. You may have a natural taste for gerous of precedents,—namely, that if a native soldier the sea,' say the Admiralty, 'you may be clever at the could. only make a mutiny successful, the British Govern- things required to be done by sailors, you may be apt to ment would recognise him as ruler, actual or disguised, of learn, and eager to shake off the reproach of acting like land- the State. Lord Lansdowne only did his duty in inter- lubbers ; but because you are not already experienced sea- fering on behalf of the general interest of the federal men, we will refuse to teach you, or to do anything to help system under which one-third of the Empire is adminis- you to help the country.' Of course the Naval Volunteers tered ; and Mr. Stanhope might have made that more are not as experienced in seamanship as men who have twice clear, without descending to any of the detail which sailed round Cape Horn, and they do not expect ever to the House of Commons would not understand. Fortu- become so. What they do contend, however, and what we nately, there must be another debate when the fuller believe the country will endorse, is this. Many English- papers arrive—that is, if the House of Commons has not men have a natural interest in and love of seamanship, and forgotten, while debating Free Education, that Muneepore when these men declare that they are willing, nay, anxious, exists—and we heartily hope that in that debate, with the to train themselves to help in defending their country in despatches in its hands and all doubtful points cleared up, ease of need, they ought to be encouraged instead of the Government will defend the Viceroy as earnestly and snubbed. Experience shows that men of education and cordially as if he were administering Ireland or responsible vigour, as are most of the Naval Volunteers, can soon get for a department. It is only in that way that the enough knowledge of their duties to make themselves ascendency of a public meeting like the House of Corn- useful. They may never become perfect seamen, but a mons can be reconciled with prompt and courageous couple of years' training renders them distinctly more government in India, where political storms rise, burst, serviceable than if they had not been trained at all. and disappear with a rapidity which suggests that Buckle Accordingly, they ask to be trained. The Admiralty, missed a point, and that events as well as men may be however, replies 'You are ginger-beer manufacturers affected by the peculiarities of a climate, when you are at home, and therefore it is self-evident Mr. Bryce, we perceive, in his sensible speech suggested that you can never be of the slightest possible use in that the Indian Foreign Secretary ought to sit in the keeping off an enemy.' As well might the naval authorities Cabinet or Executive Council, and. Mr. Stanhope appeared reject proffered help because those proffering it had tenor inclined to welcome that suggestion. Naturally it seems to voices, or red hair, or grey eyes. No doubt we shall be Englishmen a wise one, because it is the English practice ; told by those who side with the Admiralty, that we have but, we fancy, in India it would make little difference, not fairly represented their case, and that "the ginger-beer beyond increasing the costliness of the department. The manufacturer" argument is not the only one they rely on. Foreign Secretary is always with the Viceroy, and can be We can only say in reply, that we believe any impartial consulted, and is consulted. from day to day, just as easily person who reads the papers will come to the conclusion as if he were a Member of Council ; indeed, more easily, we have stated, and will recognise that the old "We don't because he is not distracted. by having to consider all the want a lot of damned landsmen" feeling is at the bottom remaining business of the Empire. Moreover, a Member of the attempt to destroy a very promising and, valuable of Council can oppose, and even in a certain sense resist, force. Fortunately, the country at large is composed of the Viceroy, though the latter has technically the sole "damned landsmen," and we trust they will not allow the responsibility ; and the department is hardly one in which Admiralty to have its own way. It has become the a committee may be more successful than an individual, fashion to speak well of the military Volunteers, to We take it that, of all departments in England, the one in praise their patriotism, and. to regard them as a source which the " Cabinet" least interferes is that of Foreign of national security ; but at the beginning of the move- Affairs, and that it is consequently the one in which secrecy, ment they had to put up with every sort of indignity and a certain coherence of action, can be most easily main- and ill-treatment at the hands of the War Office. The tamed. Committees are excellent things, especially when very same arguments that are now being used against
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