In an " interview " published in the New York
Times, Lord Hardinge pointed out that early in the war India was practically stripped of British troops. At one time there was hardly any artillery from one end of India to the other. " How was this possible ? Only because of mutual trust. I had consultations with the leaders. I was assured there would be no serious trouble in India. I believed their assurances." As an example of loyalty, Lord Hardinge said that in the winter of 1914-15 about seven thousand Sikhs returned to India from the United States and Canada, bent on revolution. They committed all sorts of excesses. But the Government in suppressing the disorders were invariably assisted by the Sikh peasants. In the Punjab these returned Sikhs were undoubtedly parties to a conspiracy to cause a general rising. Lord Harding° also referred to an ambitious and very wicked German scheme to raise all India on Christmas Day, 1915. It completely miscarried.
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