PRECEDENCE IN INDIA.
WE do not suppose many Englishmen have studied or even read the new Warrant of Precedence for India, signed by the Duke of Argyll in May, and just received in this country ; but it is a curious document, nevertheless. Every such 'Warrant issued in India is curious, the effort being to allot rank in the European sense, that is, social rank, in some definite proportion to the utility of the officer to the State,—quite a different principle from the English one—but this particular Warrant has an importance of its own. The old theory of precedence in that great dependency was that the Civil Service as a corporation represented the State, that the Civilians individually were aristocrats, and that all human beings within the Empire ought to rank after them. The assump- tion, which was based originally upon nothing but the absence of opposition, was noteworthy, first, for its clear denial of any claim of birth,—that is, at once of the English and of the Hiudoo systems of social order ; and, secondly, for its success. The Civilians carried their point. They really were the governing chase, and in spite of the origin of their body, a mere clique of merchants' clerks, they succeeded in compelling recognition as an aristocracy, all the more easily perhaps because they formed a grand cousinhood, connected by birth with the patrons, the Directors of the East India Company—tradesmen in England, sovereign princes in Asia—and by marriage with each other. At one tirne you could not criticize an Indian without looking round the table to see if his nephew were not present. The Civilians maintained at first, as we believe, though we should have some difficulty in proving the statement, that English rank did not run in India, that a Peer must take precedence according to service ; but the Viceroys fought them about this, aud that part of the question settled itself in this way. The English precedent, which refuses the first rank to Cabinet Ministers, preferring the claim of birth or rank in the Peerage to the claim of office, was still departed from, and the Members of Council, that is, of the Cabinet in Calcutta, were ranked first, their wives taking precedence within Indian limits even of Peeresses, when goddesses of that kind make their appearance in India in any capacity except that of the Viceroy's wife. This privilege has lasted down to the present day, and is preserved in the new Warrant ; but after the Members of Council, English rank, when sufficiently visible, that is to say, when the claimant has a handle to his name, begins to tell. No English grade, however, under that of baronet confers any preced. once, and with the exception of four or five persons, the social hierarchy in Bengal is regulated strictly on the principle of posi- tion in the service of the State, such position being estimated as in Russia, by comparison with some corresponding military status. Originally an immense priority was conceded to civilians, members
of that corporation ranking while still almost boys with expe- 1 rieuced military officers. A Civilian under thirty, for example was classed with a Colonel of any standing. There was immense bitterness about this, rank in India involving not only social pre- cedence—an important matter in a country where the population regard precedence as a matter settled originally by the Almighty, and involving a divine law—but also the estimate placed by the public upon work, upon actual service to the Empire. The sol- diers remonstrated, fought, almost mutinied upon the question
we believe no ceder des dole'ances was ever received from India without allusion to it—and there are men high in office in the India House who to this very hour cannot discuss the subject with you like sane mortals, but get white round the lips, and display a sudden tendency to un-Calvinistic oaths—and after a time they almost succeeded in enforcing their view of their comparative utility to the Empire. We say almost, for even in this last Warrant they are not placed on an equality with the Civilians, who after twenty years rank with full Colonels, and after twelve years with Lieutenant-Colonels of perhaps double their standing. To the bearded Lieutenant-Colonel, who for thirty-five years has been fighting, drilling, commanding in his country's service, it seems still a little bitter that a civilian of thirty-four should be in official rank his equal, and to his wife it is almost unendurable ; but still his position
is very much better than it was half a century ago. Such a feeling is, we suppose, infinitely ridiculous ; but if so, it is as ridiculous in the Civilian, who exults iu his precedence, as in the soldier who objects to allow it ; and after all, human nature being what it is, we neither feel tempted to wonder nor to scold. John Smith enters the service as soldier, goes through all manner of dangers, performs all manner of services, is informed that his pay is in status, dignity, consideration, and honour, and then finds himself looked down upon by his brother James Smith, who has had the same education, performed the same amount of service, minus the bodily risk, and besides getting the honour gets the solid salary in addi- tion. As a rule, a fifteen years' Civilian has double the pay of a Lieutenant-Colonel, takes precedence of him, and thinks the poor soldier slightly but distinctly honoured by a call.
Our readers may imagine the bitterness on this point which prevails in India—an Empire governed by a family party as jealous about comparative position as relatives usually are—but the bitterness manifested by the soldiers is nothing compared with that of two other important classes. One of these is the outsiders, the settlers, merchants, planters, Missionaries, and so on, who have made Indian prosperity, created her railway system, built up her trade, supported her press, educated her people, done everything, in fact, except receive pay, from which they are carefully and scrupulously inhibited. They have no rank, were indeed until lately treated as pariahs by the officials, as men with whom inter- course, except in the way of business, was degradation, and are still by law the social inferiors of the smallest Ensign. The War- rant does them no good, as indeed no Warrant can do them any good, unless it recognized payment of inoorne.tax as service, in which case they would come in too far in the front for official endurance. But there is another class to which the Warrant does do good, much good, so much good that it would not surprise us if the Civilians rebelled, and that is the Uucovenanted Service. As the Empire expanded, the Viceroys, finding Civilians costly, over-inde- pendent, and few, were compelled to employ anybody competent to office, and in spite of five or six Acts and innumerable Orders from the India House, all issued to secure the monopoly of Directors' relatives, they found the practice so convenient that they continued it, and extended it till " Uncovenanted Servants" were placed at the head of departments, till gentlemen sought such positions, till in scores of instances the Uucovenanted men in the Education depart- ment, in the Judicial department, and in all the scientific depart- ments were better born, better educated, and better paid than the Civilians, who regarded them and treated them as their servants, declined to meet them at dinner, and considered an offer of marriage from one of them a deliberate insult. The Civilians fought fiercely to the last against the innovation, and sent up petition after petition demanding the posts conceded to their rivals ; but circumstances were too strong for them, and in 1853 the introduction of competitive examination destroyed the personal interest of the India House in their prerogatives. Why should the Directors fight, in the teeth of common-sense, for men who were no relatives of theirs, who, for aught they knew, might be the eons of artisans, or wholesale dealers, or small Irish gentry, as the three best of the first batch of the new men were ? They gave up the fight, the Uncovenanted wore allowed decent leave rules, obtained Lair rates of pension, and are now actually accorded precedence. It is a horrible thing, but the Directors-General of the Post Offices, Telegraphs, and Irrigation Works, who maybe and usually are Uncovenanted servants, are henceforward to rank in the first class, with Major-Generals ; the Directors of Public Instruction, mere graduates, usually with high University honours, at the head of the second class as full Colonels, immediately after the almost sacred " Commissioners ;" and even the Inspector-General of Forests, an officer who has only presented to the Empire a new revenue of half a million or so, and the Inspectors of Education are granted definite rank. The Warrant, indeed, goes further 'Still. With an audacity only possible to an Irishman, Lord Mayo has recommended, and the Duke of Argyll has agreed, that the Government solicitors, gentlemen who can cost or save the State scores of thousands a year, shall enjoy a defined position, and take precedence of Civilians under twenty-five, and rank immediately above the last grade of all, the clergymen of the English Church -commissioned by the State to teach its soldiers. We commend that last funny blunder to the special attention of the Bishop of Winchester, reckoning upon him confidently to show the Lords how it was due partly to the Presbyterian proclivities of the Duke of Argyll, and partly to the determination of the Glad- stone Ministry to disestablish the Church in ludia,—where it ds not established, but is only a branch of the military service. 'The place allotted to the poor clergymen is a cynical blunder, -discreditable to the official who drew up the list ; but the whole ,order marks advance, a distinct acknowledgment by the State that service, and not relationship to a patron, constitutes in India 'the claim to social rank. Whether such rank is worth defining is -a different question, our point is only to show that it has been 'found possible to do it without basing such rank in any way on (birth.
Some of the details of the Warrant, preserved doubtless from much older warrants, are worthy of a passing note. Thus the Gover- nor of Madras takes precedence of the Governor of Bombay, and both of the Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal, though the last named raises more revenue and governs probably more people than the two -older officers put together ; but this arrangement is historic, and therefore justifiable. So is not by any rule we can imagine, whether English or Indian, the precedence given to the Lieutenant- Governor of Bengal, and even of the Punjab, over the Commander- dn-Chief in India, incomparably the most important official in the Empire next to the Viceroy ; or the preposterous rank assigned to the members of the Revenue Boards, or the exaggerated status allotted to the Viceroy's private secretary, who may, no doubt, as Mr. Colvin was under Lord Auckland, be by far the most dmportant personage in the Empire, but may also be mere chief 'butler, and in either case ought to be kept, like the rest of the household, out of eight. Political Agents, too, who are Ambassa- -dors, and often trusted with business of vital importance, should .hardly rank on the obvious theory of the Warrant after the Recorders of Moulmein and Rangoon, more especially as the Agents in Rajpootana and Central India rank before the Com- missioner in Seinde, who is hi all but name one of the Lieu- tenant-Governors. These are mysteries, as is the position assigned to the Chaplains ; but still the Warrant is, on the whole, a good -one, a distinct effort to put down privilege as contrasted with efficiency. The effort will seem to many Englishmen meaning- dess, but India is not a Republic, is in all but name a great mili- tary monarchy, and as rank there, owing to the competition of the Services, does not settle itself, it requires to be wisely settled. The pistol would settle it else. The Duke of Argyll has settled it wisely -enough for the present, and as he wrote "The Reign of Law," and is probably the only Peer who over produced a readable book in -defence of the supernatural, possibly he may escape the wrath of the Episcopal Bench for the dreadful inconsiderateness, not to say Voltairianism, not to say Communism, evident in the place which
the has assigned to the unhappy clergymen of the Church of England.
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