CORRESPONDENCE.

IMPERIAL RULE IN INDIA.—I.

[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."]

Sin,--Not many, I presume, of your readers have as yet read Mr. Morison's treatise on Imperial Rule in India.* It is a small book written by a comparatively unknown author, but it is certain to attract notice, for it sets forth with great argu- mentative power a novel and, to most Englishmen, a start- ling, not to say paradoxical, view of the principles proper to the government of our Eastern Dependency. My aim in addressing you is neither to advocate nor to combat, but to explain, Mr. Morison's doctrine, and to show why it merits careful consideration. In another letter I hope to examine the worth of Mr. Morison's policy of Indian Imperialism. Our author's examination of the principles proper to the government of India may be summed up in four leading propositions, each of which he elucidates by interesting illus- trations.

First, it is our duty so to govern India that she may one day be able to govern herself, and, as an autonomous unit, take her place in the great confederation of the British Empire. This statement of the proper aim of British policy will, if the words I have underlined be drily noted, command the assent of most Englishmen, who will assuredly accept Mr. Morison's emphatic declaration that the people of India are at this moment incapable of erecting a government of their own.

Secondly, the beneficence of our role in India must be tested by considering whether it does or does not tend to pro- duce among the inhabitants of the country a sense of national unity, and, tried by this criterion, English adminis- tration, in spite of its admitted efficiency and purity, is a gigantic failure.

The reasons urged in support of this position, which Englishmen will not readily accept, may be thus sum- marised. India is neither a nation like France, nor a col- lection of nations like Europe. A sentiment of national or civil unity can there be produced only in one of two ways, that is either by assuaging the racial and religious hatreds or prejudices which divide the peoples of India or by inducing the whole of her inhabitants to rally round and take part in the glory and the prosperity of the British Empire. Bat English administration has produced neither of these results. The enmity of races and religions has increased : it is most

• imperial .Rule in Didia : being an RivarvAnation of the Principles P►eper to the Government of Dependencies. By Theodore Morison. London-: Archibald Constable and Co.

marked where the power of England is most decisive. Indian suspicion unjustly suggests that internal fends have been purposely stimulated by the Machiavellian state- craft of British officials ; but nothing is more certain than that the reciprocal hatred of Mahommedans and Hindoos has not produced loyalty to the dominant race. The Indian National Congress is, except from one point of view, a por-

.� tentous sham ; it pretends to represent a nation which has as yet no real existence, and the proceedings of the Congress bear witness to the irreconcilable differences which divide races to whom a sentiment of national unity is unknown. The Congress, for example, is pledged to the introduction into India of representative government. But no sooner did this become apparent than the entire Mahommedan community declared against the movement, for the Mahom- medans stand to the Hindoos in a minority of one to four. In one respect, and in one respect alone, is the Con- gress a reality; it organises opposition to the English ad- ministration, and gives expression of the natural loathing of foreign domination. The freedom, moreover, of the Press, the practice of politiCal agitation, and the methods of modern democratic government imported from Europe, irritate dis- sensions which the impartial rule of benevolent despotism might lessen, and do not in the least degree conciliate a people who can neither understand nor admire democratic institutions. There is, then, good ground for supposing that English rulers have less hold on the affections of the people of India than they had sixty or seventy years ago. It is indeed idle, as Mr. Morison carefully points out, to dream of suppressing freedom of discussion, or destroying the liberty of the Press. But the bitter hostility of the native Press to England is undeniable, and this enmity of itself goes far to prove English unpopularity. Our position is a false one. Native newspapers malign our whole system of administra- tion, and the English Government makes no reply. Accusa- tions of perfidy and cruelty are repeated day by day. We let judgment go by default. We have, then, no reason to wonder that slanders dictated by ignorance or malignity are treated by natives as undeniable facts proved up to the hilt. Nor can we for a moment suppose that the inhabitants of the country have no real grievances. Members of a dominant race will always from time to time be guilty of insolence to men whom they deem their inferiors, and insults wound more deeply than injuries. What is the good of a free Press to natives who may discuss every question, but can settle no question of public policy P What is the benefit of the whole apparatus of agitation when it never leads to office ? Who can wonder if free speech turns into licentious slander, and open constitutional movements become the mask for conceal- ing unavowed sedition? The source of Indian dissatisfaction lies far deeper, our author argues, than any definite griev- ances. It has its origin in one source. The civilisation of England is essentially different from the civilisation of her great dependency; we apply to Eastern races, who need and desire the personal guidance of an enlightened Monarch, principles applicable only to a modern European democracy. Our error suggests its cure.

Thirdly, our whole Indian administration ought to be deliberately guided by the avowed desire to foster the loyalty of the people of India.

This, Mr. Morison argues, nay be in part achieved by directing the whole authority of the State towards the guidance of Indian opinion and the conciliation of Indian sentiment. Our administration should aim at the acquirement of genuine popularity, or, in other words, of the respect and affection of the people of India, Mr. Morison's suggestions as to the particular measures for the attainment of this end are, from his natural acute- nese, as well as from his intimate acquaintance with native opinions or prejudices, full of freshness and ingenuity. In many cases they may be of great value. His views as to the influence of education, as to the methods by which, without interfering with freedom of discussion, the Government might enlist the support of the native Press, are well worth consideration. His advocacy, as we understand him, of the promotion of natives to high office, not on the ground of suc- cess in examinations, but on the ground of tried ability, which is recognised and rewarded by the dovernment, is in con- formity with common-sense, though not with the policy of

pedagogues. But special devices, however ingenious for cherishing or developing loyalty to the Empire, are, from Mr. Morison's point of view, of limited and partial effectiveness. His political panacea is summed up in his last proposition.

Fourthly, our Indian administration ought to be based upon the authority of the Queen, and ought to aim at produc- ing among the people of India a feeling of personal loyalty towards the Empress of India.

This is the paradox which will startle the English public. It is supported by two considerations.

The first is that there is nothing, as far as the people of India are concerned, to prevent the creation among them of a sentiment towards the Queen which may resemble, if we understand Mr. Morison rightly, the kind of devotion entertained by our forefathers towards Elizabeth, or the regretful admiration still felt by all classes in India for the Mogul Emperors. Loyalty to a ruler is as natural to Hindoos and Mahommedans to-day as it was some generations back to the Protestants no less than to the Catholics of Europe. It is, indeed, perhaps the only political sentiment in which men of every creed and race can share, for it is a feeling grounded on a solid fact. "India is a country in which the advantages of a monarchical form of government are brought into the clearest relief; it would be impossible to find any general principle of coherence, other than monarchy, which would unite all the sections of Indian society. There are white men, and brown men, and black men in India ; there are fire-worshippers and Muhamadans, Christians and Hindus, Sikhs and Jains ; there is a very jungle of languages with a bewildering undergrowth of dialects, and not only does each considerable tract of country speak a distinct lan- guage, but almost every language has an alphabet of its own. What particular formula can be devised that would cover them all ? It is only in obedience to one great master that all can unite without heartbnrning. And as monarchy is the only form of government suitable to India, it is also the only form of government for which she has shown any apti-

tude The memory of the Moghul Empire after a hundred and fifty years of anarchy and foreign dominion, still lives in the hearts of the people." There is no reason why Victoria should not be as deeply revered from one end of India to the other as Akbar.

The second consideration is that loyalty to the Empress would remove the essential defects of our administra- tive system. There would, at last, be established in India a system of government which was understood by the people. The Empress would, in the minds of her Indian subjects, be morally justified in demanding their loyalty. Their conscience would approve the promotion to power of the loyal and the exclusion of the disloyal from all the favours of the Crown. The Empress would, in guiding opinion, be simply performing the plain duty of the parent of the country. Her authority moreover, just because it was arbitrary, would bestow on her Eastern subjects not indeed liberty according to law, which, though there is no need it should be invaded, they do not highly appreciate, but a blessing most men in most countries, and all men in Eastern countries value far more than freedom, that is equality. The Empress could appoint to any office, high or low, any subject whom she thought fit to honour. Hence the inhabitants of India could enjoy for the first time the impartial patronage by their government of men of every race and of every creed, and the authority of the Crown, whilst it gave equality to India, would give security to England. The native placed high in the Army, or in the Civil Service, by the mere will of the Queen, would hold his post, not of right, but of favour. He would be a man of known merit and tried loyalty. The least suspicion of dis- loyalty to the Empire would close his public career as decisively as in the days of the Tudors did the least sus- picion of her Ministers' disloyalty to the Crown. It is, after all, no paradox, but a plain, historical fact, that the absolu- tism of a monarch has been the guarantee for the promotion of merit. The power of the Tudors menaced English free- dom, but it opened to the middle classes the great prizes of public life, and the middle classes of England admired Henry and adored Elizabeth. Napoleon, at his worst, exhibited all the vices, as he wielded the power, of a despot ; but Napoleon

guaranteed civil equality, and held open a free career for all the talent of France, and Napoleon is still to thousands of Frenchmen a national hero. It is, then, quite conceivable that, as Mr. Morison argues, the authority of the Queen would, if boldly asserted, not only excite the loyalty, but raise the whole condition of the people of India.

Oar author's leading principles will appear to most Englishmen to involve the maintenance of a wild paradox. It is necessary, therefore, to insist on the grounds which entitle his teaching to careful atten- tion. He is himself no paradox - monger ; he relies exclusively on the force of argument. He possesses experimental knowledge of his subject. Indeed, he criticises English administration from a position of singular advantage ; he knows India as well as can a trained Indian servant of the Crown, yet he does not belong to the Indian Civil Service. He is well acquainted with its members ; he exhibits the highest appreciation of their virtues. Every line of his book breathes friendliness towards Englishmen en- gaged in the arduous task of governing an Eastern country in accordance with the principles of law and justice. Mr. Morison again understands English Liberalism, but he is absolutely free from the delusions which make Padgett, M.P., a bore in India and a dangerous nuisance in the English Parliament. Hence he is delivered at once from the bias of official optimism and from the bias of doctrinaire Radicalism. No critic can detect in Mr. Morison's pages a tone of harshness or unfairness to any man ; he never brings a railing accusa- tion either against officials or against institutions ; he has a good word to say even for the derided Baboo. His doctrine, further, which ought carefully to be distinguished from his specific proposals, is supported as regards its fundamental assumptions by writers of such weight with the English public as Mr. Rudyard Kipling or Sir Alfred Lyall. They and Mr. Morison at any rate go thus far together that they one and all impress upon a public, which is not easily recep- tive of new ideas, the obvious, though constantly forgotten truth, that India is not England.

Much, however, of Mr. Morison's doctrine is supported by something far stronger than authority ; it accords with the best known facts of history. There is in the nature of things no earthly reason to suppose that the rule of England can at the present moment be otherwise than un- popular in India. Grant for the sake of argument that our administration is perfect. But when did any one ever hear that the domination of foreigners was popular because they were good administrators? The Austrian officials were more capable and probably were less corrupt than the Italian officials who have succeeded them. Yet every Italian (includ- ing, as some people tell us, Pio Nono himself), was delighted at their expulsion from Lombardy. "India, again, it is said, must be grateful to England because our rule has terminated the anarchy which, when we entered on our career of conquest, was destroying the country." But who ever dreams of gratitude between States ? Gratitude is a sentiment proper not to nations, but to individuals, and even between individuals it is of far rarer occurrence than is generally believed ; what is called gratitude is in nine cases out of ten affection. But were gratitude possible, it can be felt only for relief from evils which have been personally experienced. The very com- pleteness with which England has established peace and order has abolished the memory of the miseries which flowed a century ago from the cruelty of invaders and freebooters. How further can men be grateful for benefits of which they do not admit the existence? We have made India pros- perous. So be it, but the mass, even of educated Hindoos, believe, erroneously enough, but with undoubted sincerity, that England ie the ruin of India, that the country is becoming every day poorer, and that Hindoos are kept in poverty in order that English artisans may revel in cheap bread. Mr. Morison's fundamental ideas, moreover, derive confirmation from the most melancholy page in the annals of Great Britain. When we ask history to account for the secular failure of statesmanship to establish a good under- standing between England and Ireland, she gives an answer which is intelligible enough to an inquirer who has got rid of the childish prejudice which attributes ages of calamity either to the devilish malignity of English selfishness, or to the

inherent perversity of Irish nature. Policy and energy have failed because engaged in a task which hardly admitted of successful achievement. This task was nothing leas than the fusion into one State of two peoples who had reached different stages of civilisation, and whereof the more power- ful has pursued the democratic, whilst the less powerful has cherished the monarchical, ideal of government. But if this difference in civilisation and in aspirations has sufficed to keep apart for centuries the inhabitants of two neighbouring European countries, it is assuredly powerful enough to prevent harmony between a predominant European race, which finds satisfaction for its wants in a Parliamentary democracy, and Eastern subjects who are the inheritors of ancient civilisation, and have at all times found their ideal of good government in the rule of a wise, a beneficent, and an all powerful monarch.-1 am, Sir, &c., A. V. DICEY.