NEWS OF THE WEEK.
TT is announced in telegrams both from Calcutta and Bombay that
the Commissioners appointed to inquire into the charges against the Guicowar have been unable to agree upon a verdict. The European members, it is affirmed, think him guilty of the attempt to poison the Resident, while the Native members believe him to be innocent. The final decision rests with the Viceroy, and Lord Northbrook will, it is alleged, announce it in a proclamation to be issued on the 10th inst. The business has been sadly muddled, the Government of India having tried to reconcile a despotic though just proceeding with constitutional forms, but as we have argued elsewhere, there is but one honourable way out of the scrape. The -Guicowar, guilty or innocent, must be restored. The native mem- bers of the Commission may be all wrong, or all prejudiced, or all -corrupt, though we see no reason for imputations on them ; but the Government of India chose them, and must abide by its choice. Even if the evidence were as clear as it is doubtful -and we are bound to say we never read worse— there would be no other course open to a Government which dare be faithful even to its own hurt. The Viceroy ordered a trial, the Guicowar submitted to a trial, and as there is no verdict, there can be no sentence. Guzerat will suffer, but not half so much as India would suffer if native princes believed that for them and them only of her Majesty's subjects, a charge was equivalent to a condemnation. The Guicowar may be the worst ruler in the -world, but it is not his fault that we offered him the forms of English justice. He accepted them with their disadvantages in humiliation, and he must have their benefits.
