India

Front matter

INDIA INDIA BY SIR JOHN STRACHEY, G.C.S.I. NEW AND REVISED EDITION LONDON KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER & CO., Ltd. DEDICATION TO THE FIRST EDITION. TO SIR fAMES FITZJAMES STEPHEN, K.C.S.I., &c. &c. &c. My dear Stephen, Fifteen years ago you dedicated one of your books to me, and in now offering to you this less worthy gift, the fittest words that I can find are almost those which you addressed to me. I dedicate this book to you as an expression of strong personal regard and of gratitude for great kindness, and in recollection of that time in India when we served together and which neither of us can forget. I am, my dear Stephen, Your sincere friend and late colleague, fOHN STRACHEY. October 1888. From out the sunset pour'd an alien race Who fitted stone to stone again, and Truth, Peace, Love, and Justice came and dwelt therein.

Preface

. In 1884 I gave a course of lectures on India before the University of Cambridge. They formed the basis of the First Edition of this work, published in 1888. Since that time great changes have been made in the constitution of the Indian Legislatures, in the organisation of the Civil Services and Army, and in other branches of the administration. Questions which, some years ago, were especially prominent, have fallen into the background, while others now demand more notice than was formerly given to them. Many alterations have been made in this book to bring it into accordance with present facts ; parts of it have been entirely re-written, and it is now so different from the lectures in which it had its origin that it has been thrown into a new shape, and no division into imaginary lectures remains.

I feel that this change has one drawback. While the book retained the form of a course of lectures, it was obvious that it professed to be nothing more than a series of papers, not necessarily connected with each other, on various Indian topics ; that many subjects of importance necessarily and designedly remained untouched ; and that I did not pretend to attempt the impossible task of

PREFACE.

. VIII describing in a single volume the vast and infinitely various continent of India. In this respect the purpose of the book remains as it was before ; the only change is that, instead of being a collection of lectures on certain Indian subjects, it is now a collection of chapters. During the last few years several valuable works have been published, dealing with special branches of Indian administration or with subjects of special interest, and to these I have acknowledged my obligations. I wish, how ever, more particularly to mention the contributions to our knowledge of India that have been made by the officers who conducted the Indian Census of 1891, and especially the Report of Mr Baines, the Census Commissioner, who superintended the whole of the operations. It would be difficult to give to his work more praise than it de serves.

Mr Baines, in the Preface to his Report, has applied to himself the saying of Moliere, "Je prends mon bien oil je le trouve." Every one who writes on such a subject as India must say the same ; for my own part, there is no one from whom I have appropriated so much, and, as I hope, with so much advantage to myself, as from Mr Baines. Other obligations of a more personal kind have to be acknowledged. Mr G. H. M. Batten, who has, in my opinion, given in his paper, read before the Society of Arts in March 1892, the best existing description of all the facts connected with the Opium controversy, of which we have lately heard so much, has been good enough to contribute to my book a chapter on this subject. I have also to

PREFACE.

. IX thank him for much other assistance. My acknowledgments are also due to Major-General Newmarch, without whose help the chapter on the Army in India could hardly have been written, and to General and Mrs Richard Strachey. A distinguished Frenchman, M. Harmand, has done me the honour of translating into French the first edition of this book, and he has prefaced his work with an Intro duction which, if it had been less flattering to myself, I should have been glad to reproduce in English, showing, as it does, the opinions of a most competent and intelligent foreign observer on the government of our Indian Empire. M. Harmand, during a long residence in the Asiatic possessions of France and in British India, in both of which he held important official posts, had rare opportunities of forming an accurate judgment on the problems which have to be solved by the Western rulers of Oriental peoples.

He has discussed the principles on which the government of a great Eastern possession can alone be wisely con ducted, and, taking India as his object-lesson, has en deavoured to show to his countrymen why the efforts of the English to establish a solid and self-supporting dominion in the East have been crowned with such extraordinary success. Another interesting book, written with aims similar to those of M. Harmand, has been published by M. Chailley-Bert, the worthy possessor of an illustrious name.1 I commend to Englishmen who feel an honourable pride in the work of the men who have built up and who are maintaining the wonderful 1 "La Colonisation de l'lndo-Chine, l'Experience anglaise." X

PREFACE.

. structure of their Indian Empire, the calm and impartial testimony of M. Harmand and M. Chailley-Bert. I have to thank Sir William Hunter for allowing me to use for this book the map prepared for his ' Imperial Gazetteer of India.' JOHN STRACHEY. May 1894. PAGE 28-48 CONTENTS.

Chapter I. Introductory

English ignorance regarding India — India not a country but a continent— The names India and Hindustan — The great differences between the countries of India — Bengal and Northern India — No countries or nations of the European type — No unity in India, physical, political, social, or religious — The English in India — The British Government — The growth of a single Indian nationality impossible — Danger of generalisations . . ... . . .1-7

Chapter II. The Geography Of India

The main features of Indian geography — The Indo-Gangetic plain — The countries included in it — Presidencies and Provinces — The table-land of Central and Southern India — Area and population of British provinces and Native States — Physical causes of the great differences between the countries of India — Sind and Bengal — Meteorology — The monsoons— The periodical rains and their distribution - Mr Blanford on the contrast between Indian climates ..... 8-17

Chapter III. The Himalaya

The Himalaya — Its influence on India — Its geography — The great rivers of India — The Ganges and Gogra — British and Native Himalayan districts — The Kumaon Himalaya — Scenery ofthe Himalaya ....... 18-27

Chapter IV. The Constitution Of The Government In India

Presidencies and provinces — The Presidency of Bengal — First constitution of the Government — The Regulating Act of George III. — Hastings and his Council — Changes between 1773 and 1833 — Renewal ofthe East India Company's Charter m 1833 — The Governor-General of India in Council — Separation of the North- Western Provinces from Bengal — Renewal ofthe Charter in 1853 — A Lieutenant- Governor appointed for Bengal — The mutiny of the Native army— Transfer of the Government to the Crown — The Indian Councils Act of 1861 — The existing constitution of the Supreme and Provincial Governments — The Governor-General in Council — The Indian legislatures — The Councils Act of 1892 — Their powers — The Governments of Madras and Bombay — The Lieutenant-Governors of Bengal, the North-Western Provinces, and the Punjab — The Chief Commissioners of Burma, the Central Provinces, and Assam — Former cumbrous mode of transacting business — Opinions of Mr J. S. Mill — Observations of Sir Henry Maine— The Indian Councils Act and changes made by Lord Canning — Reforms completed by Lord Lawrence — The Council converted into a Cabinet — Departments and Secretariats — Manner of transacting business — Power of Governor-General to overrule the Council — Exercise of this power by Lord Lytton — Migration of the Government to Simla — Relations between supreme and provincial Governments — Mr Bright on the government of India — Decentralisation ...... CONTENTS.

Chapter V. The Home Government

PAGE The Home Government— The Secretary of State and Council of India— Mode of transacting business— Nature of control over the Government of India— Parliamentary interference — Its dangers ........ 49-55

Chapter VI. The Civil Services

Principles on which first appointments are made — The Covenanted Service — System of nomination before 1853 — System of open competition — Natives in the Covenanted Service— The Statute of 1833— The Queen's Proclamation of 1858— The Statute of 1870 — Admission of Natives to posts of importance — Principle on which regulated — Lord Lytton's Rules — Public Service Commission — Its recommendations — Imperial and Provincial Services — Their constitution — Covenanted and Uncovenanted Service— Small number of Englishmen in the Civil Service — The greater part of the administration in Native hands — High character of Native officers — Their salaries — Necessity for maintaining English principles of Government — Question of holding competitive examinations in India — Transfer of important offices to the Provincial Services— The Public Works, Telegraph, Forest, Police, and Educational Services ........ 56-71

Chapter VII. The Laws And The Administration Of Justice

The foundations of the existing Judicial System — Regulations and Acts — The Laws and the Courts before the transfer of the Government to the Crown — Regulation and Non-regulation provinces — The Indian Law Commission — Lord Macaulay and the Penal Code — The progress of codification — Sir Henry Maine on the Indian Codes — Sir James Stephen on the Indian Penal Code — The Establishment of High Courts — The Code of Criminal Procedure — Constitution of the Criminal Courts — Criminal jurisdiction over European British subjects — Changes in the Law in 1884 — The codification of the Civil Law — Hindu and Mohammedan Law — Chapters of the Civil Code already enacted — Simplification and Consolidation of the Law — The Code of Civil Procedure — Constitution of the Civil Courts — Civil jurisdiction over Europeans — The " Black Act " of 1836 — Lord Macaulay — The Native Judges — Defects in the existing Judicial System ...... 72-89

Chapter VIII. The Finances And Public Revenues

The Department of Finance and Commerce — Reforms instituted by Mr James Wilson — Financial decentralisation — Existing system of administration — England contributes nothing to Indian charges — Wisdom of this System — Growth of the Public Revenues — Their present amount — Small proportion of revenues derived from taxation — The sources of the public income ...... 90-99

Chapter IX. Revenues Other Than Those Derived From Taxation

The Land Revenue — Its nature described — Its incidence under Native and British Governments — Moderation of Assessments— Aurangzib' s Revenues — Rates on Land ........... 100-107 CONTENTS. XIII

Chapter X. Revenues Other Than Those Derived From Taxation

— (Continued). PAGE The opium revenue— Its amount — Mr Batten on the opium question — Introduction of opium into India — State monopoly under Moghals — Existing system in Bengal — Value of poppy crop in Bengil— Opium in the Punjab — In Central India and Rajputana — Total value of Indian poppy crops — Alleged reasons for suppression of opium trade — Opium in China — Wars with China — Chefoo Convention — Poppy cultivation in China — Effect* of consuming opium — De Quincey — Opium consumption in China and India — Society for suppression of the opium trade — Its misrepresentations — Consumption by Sikhs aud Rajputs — Stringent system of excise — Injustice and tolly us attempted suppression of opium consumption — Forests — Tributes from Native States — Post Office — Telegraphs. . . . 108-132

Chapter XI. Revenues Derived From Taxation

The Salt Tax — Sources of salt supply — Former system of levying duties — The Inland Customs Line — Its abolition — The present system — Results of reforms — The policy to be followed — The stamp revenue — Excise on spirits and drugs — Misrepresentations — Principles of excise administration — Assessed taxes— Income Tax — Registration ........." 133*143

Chapter XII. Revenues Derived From Taxation

— [Continued). Customs duties — Duties before 1875 — Duties on other goods — The necessity for free trade in India — Abolition of Import duties — The results — Indian Tea— Its consumption in Great Britain — Export duty on rice — The demand for the re-imposition of Import duties ....... J44'154

Chapter XIII. Foreign Trade

— HOME CHARGES — CURRENCY. Growth of Indian trade — Conditions under which trade is carried on — Imports of gold and silver — Excess of exports over imports — Home charges — The Secretary of State's Bills — Home charges not necessarily a drain upon India — The manner in which these charges are met— The currency— Fall in the gold value of silver — Loss by exchange — Serious consequences — The closing of the Indian Mints in 1893 .......... 155-164

Chapter XIV. Public Works

Mr J. S. Mill on the duties of Governments— Famines in India— Necessity for roads, railways, and canals — Absence of roads under Native Governments — Their condition under the East India Company — Measures taken by Lord Dalhousie — Railway construction— Creation of Public Works Department — Progress up to 1887 — Irrigation works in Northern India— Canals of Mohammedan sovereigns — The Ganges and other Canals — Their value — Irrigation works in Central and Southern India and in Sind— Expenditure on railways and irrigation works— The manner of providing funds — Guaranteed Companies— Policy of Borrowing for investment in public works ,,.,... 165-178 CONTENTS.

Chapter XV. The Public Debt

PAGE The Public Debt — Its amount — Division into Ordinary and Public Works Debt — Increase of debt owing to the Mutinies of 1857 — Subsequent Decrease of Ordinary Debt — Investments of th -. Government in railways — Railways constructed by guaranteed companies — The financial results of the policy of borrowing for public works — Expenditure from revenue on public works — Insurance against famine — The policy adopted — The Famine Commission — Diminished darger of Famine in India .......... 179-186

Chapter XVI. Education In India

First establishment of colleges in Bengal — Controversy between advocates of Oriental and English study— Lord Macaulay in 1835— His contempt for Oriental literature — Mountstuart Elphinstone on Indian education — System established under Macaulay's influence — Neglect of primary education — System laid down by Lord Halifax in 1854 — Its main features — Proportion of population able to read and write — Female education — Lady Dufferin's Association —Mr Baines on illiteracy of the people — The Indian Universities — Colleges — Number of Natives knowing English — Collegiate Instruction — Education of Mohammedans — Sir Syad Ahmad Khan — His College — The Mayo College — Medical Colleges — Technical and Art Schools — Secondary Education — Small number of educated Natives— Neglect of study of Science — Sir Henry Maine on study of English classical literature — The teaching of false history — Inaccuracy and bad faith of James Mill — Books and newspapers — Their general character — Mr Baines on influence of the literate class — Liberty ofthe Press in India. ....... 187-220

Chapter XVII

RACES— LANGUAGES — CASTES — RELIGIONS. Races — Aryans — Dravidians — Languages of India — Distribution of population among various religions — The Hindus — Animism — Sir Alfred Lyall on the religion of the Hindus — Mr Ibbetson's report — Illustrations of the religion of an Indian province — Brahmanism — Caste — Reverence for Brahmans— Caste not confined to Hindus — The Mohammedans in India — Their distribution — The more orthodox Mohammedans — Animosity between Hindus and Mohammedans — Causes of political anxiety — Increase of Mohammedanism in Bengal — Jains — Sikhs — Parsis — Buddhists — Christianity in India ....... 221-246

Chapter XVIII. An Indian Province

The North-Western Provinces and Oudh — Area, population, and history — Aspect of the country — The agricultural population — Cities — Manufactures — Architectural monuments — Agriculture in Northern India — Erroneous beliefs regarding food of the people — Sir Henry Maine on Mr Buckle's generalisations — The agricultural year — The rainy season — Summer, autumnal, and winter crops — Irrigation — Methods of agriculture — Rotation of crops — Tea ■ . . . . 247-262

Chapter XIX. An Indian

province — {Continued). The land revenue — Tenures — Settlements — Village communities — Classes of cultivators — Incidents of land revenue — Settlements in Northern India — Surveys — Principles of assessment — The settlement officer — Record of rights — Village ac- CONTENTS. XV PAGE countants —Recent reforms — Settlement reports — Settlements in Oudh— The Talukdars — Lord Canning's Proclamation — Confiscation of rights — Measures of Lord Lawrence — Recent improvements — Condition of Oudh— Agricultural departments—Their importance ........ 263-281

Chapter XX. An Indian Province

— [Continued). Administration of an Indian province— An Indian district — The Magistrate and Collector or District Officer— His functions— Subdivisions of districts — The Tahsildars — Executive and Judicial Powers — The Joint, Assistant, and Deputy Magistrate and Collector— The Police— Jails — Hospitals — Sanitation— Vaccination— Public works — Education — General illiteracy— Municipalities— Local self-government— Commissioner^ of division — The Revenue Board — Heads of departments — Sanitaria — The Lieutenant-Governor — The Legislative Council — The Judicial Courts . 282-299

Chapter XXI. An Indian

province — (Continued). Condition of the people — Increasing wealth — Increase of population — Emigration — Character of the people — Their great honesty — Cruel customs — Crime — Infanticide — Criminal Tribes ........ 300-315

Chapter XXII. Bengal

Exceptional character of Bengal and its people — -The Bengal Lieutenant-Governorship — Natural features, area, and population of Bengal Proper — Products — Scenery — Climate — Cities — Art — Hindus and Mohammedans — Lord Macaulay's description ofthe Bengalis— Their effeminacy — The Mohammedan peasantry — The Permanent Settlement — Zemindars and ryots — The consequences ofthe Permanent Settlement — Loss of public revenue — Confiscation of the rights of the peasantry — Weakness ofthe Government — Absence of records of agricultural rights — Former constitution ofthe Bengal Government — Its inefficiency — A separate Government constituted — Improvements in the administration — Difficulty of problems to be solved — Great increase in rentals of the Zemindars and loss by the ryots — Maintenance of conditions of the Permanent Settlement — Claims of the Zemindars for exemption from taxation — The proper remedies for existing evils — Rates on the land — Changes in the Bengal Rent Law — Condition ofthe people in Behar — The Tenancy Act — Cadastral Surveys — Effects of English education. . . . 316-340

Chapter XXIII. The Army In India

The advance of Russia — Consequent changes in our position — The armies of India before 1857 — The Mutinies — The reorganisation of the Native Army — Its present constitution— Its fighting qualities — The Bengal Army— The Staff Corps— The Police — Increase of the army in 1885 — Present strength — The British troops — Improvement in their health — Hill stations — Frontier and Port defences — Volunteer corps — Changes in 1893 in constitution of Army — Existing commands — Armies of the Native States— Special contingents for Imperial service . . . 34^-355

Chapter XXIV. The Native States

Area, population, and revenue of Native States— Meaning ofthe term Native States — Prevalent mistakes — Native States not nationalities— Native princes often foreigners CONTENTS. PAGE — The English have destroyed no ancient dynasties — Different classes of Native States — Mohammedan and Maratha States — Their foreign character — Ancient dynasties preserved by the British — Mysore — Travancore — The States of Rajputana and the Punjab — The Governments of Native States — The personal despots — The tribal chiefs— Antiquity of Indian families — The supremacy of the British Govern ment — Our relations with Native States — The doctrine of lapse — Right of adoption — Assumption by the Queen of title of " Empress of India " — Sir Henry Lawrence on Native States and British Residents — The character of Native rulers — Frequent necessity for British intervention — The annexation of Oudh — Condition of Oudh before annexation — Baroda — Deposition of the Gaikwar — Gwalior and Indore — The States of Central India — Kashmir — Sir Lepel Griffin on misrule in Native States — Desire of the British Government to maintain the Native States — Their misrule their sole danger — The conditions essential to their preservation — The restoration of Mysore to Native rule — Terms on which the transfer was made — The results — The necessity of more general application of similar principles 356-383

Chapter XXV. Conclusion

Cruel customs not discouraged by educated Hindus — Neglect of social questions — Reasons for avoiding their discussion — The employment of Natives in the public service — Political hypocrisy — The duty of maintaining our dominion — Offices to be retained by Englishmen — Natives of India often as much foreigners as Englishmen in provinces other than their own — The manlier races cannot be ruled by the feebler — Sir Syad Ahmad Khan on Mohammedans and Hindus — The results of British Government— The popularity of our Government — Lord Lawrence's opinion — Reasons why our Government cannot be popular — The dangers to which our dominion is exposed — The principles on which our Government must be conducted .......... 384-399 INDIA

Chapter I. Introductory

English ignorance regarding India — India not a country but a continent — The names India and Hindustan — The great differences between the countries of India — Bengal and Northern India — No countries or nations of the European type — No unity in India, physical, political, social, or religious — The English in India— The British Government — The growth of a single Indian nationality impossible — Danger of generalisations. Sir Henry Maine, referring to the ignorance regarding India which prevails even among educated men in Eng land, has declared his conviction that for one who desires to unveil the stores of interest which India contains, the first necessity is that he should not shrink from speaking on matters which appear to him too elementary to deserve discussion, that he should sympathise with an ignorance which few felicitous efforts have yet been made to dispel, and that he should remember that the language of adminis tration and government in India has become so highly specialised and technical that it forms an imperfect medium for the communication of ideas to Englishmen.

Believing this, I make no apology for beginning this book with some very elementary matters, and I ask at starting this elementary question, What is India ? What does this name India really signify ? The answer that has sometimes been given sounds paradoxical, but it is true. There is no such A INTRODUCTORY. country, and this is the first and most essential fact about India that can be learned. India is a name which we give to a great region including a multitude of different countries. There is no general Indian term that corresponds to it. The name Hindustan is never applied in India, as we apply it, to the whole of the Indian continent ; it signifies the country north of the Narbada River, and especially the northern portion of the basins of the Ganges and Jumna. I have been told by intelligent Natives of India who have visited Europe that they could see little difference between the European countries through which they had travelled ; the languages being equally unintelligible offered to them no marks of distinction ; the cities, the costumes, the habits of life, the manners and customs of people, so far as a passing oriental traveller could judge, seemed much the same in England, in France, and in Italy.

The differences between the countries of India, between, for instance, Bengal and the Punjab, or between Madras and Rajputana, seemed to them, on the other hand, immense, and beyond comparison greater than those existing between the countries of Europe. Englishmen have often similar impressions in visiting India ; they can not see the great diversities that exist. As to persons who know nothing of geology or botany or agriculture, rocks and trees and crops present comparatively few distinctive features, so it is with those who look with uninformed minds on conditions of life and society to which they have not been accustomed. The differences between the countries of Europe are undoubtedly smaller than those between the countries of India. Scotland is more like Spain than Bengal is like the Punjab.

European civilisation has grown up under conditions which have produced a larger measure of uni formity than has been reached in the countries of the Indian continent, often separated from each other bv DIVERSITY OF INDIAN COUNTRIES. 3 greater distances, by greater obstacles to communication, and by greater differences of climate. It is probable that not less than fifty languages, which may rightly be called separate, are spoken in India. The diversities of religion and race are as wide in India as in Europe, and political catastrophes have been as frequent and as violent. There are no countries in civilised Europe in which the people differ so much as the man of Madras differs from the Sikh, and the languages of Southern India are quite as unin telligible in Lahore as they would be in London.

A native of Calcutta or Bombay is as much a foreigner in Delhi or Peshawar as an Englishman is a foreigner in Rome or Paris. People often complain that Indian authorities differ so greatly among themselves that you can never be sure that you have learned the truth. These apparent contra dictions have frequently no real existence, but arise from false generalisations. To one, for instance, who has gained his knowledge of India in Lower Bengal, India is a country of almost constant heat and damp, luxuriant vegetation, rivers, tanks, rice-fields, and cocoanuts, with few cities and no monuments of art, densely inhabited by a mild and timid population. To such an India as this, a vivid imagination could hardly conceive a completer contrast than the India of Agra or Lahore. Instead of one of the dampest and greenest countries of the earth, you find in the early summer one of the brownest and most arid, a country scorched with winds like the blast of a furnace, but in the winter it has the climate of an Italian spring, cold, frosty, and invigorating.

In the latter season, instead of the tropical vegetation of Bengal, you find thousands of square miles covered with wheat and barley and the products of the temperate zone. It is a country with famous cities and splendid monuments, and its population is not inferior to that of many parts of Europe in manli ness and vigour. INTRODUCTORY. 4 I have spoken of the different countries of India, but they are not countries in the ordinary European sense. A European country is usually a separate entity, occupied by a nation more or less socially and politically distinct. But in India, as Sir Alfred Lyall has explained in his ' Asiatic Studies,' a work that is a mine of knowledge and wisdom on Indian matters, there are no nations of the modern European type. The same fact has been clearly brought out by Professor Seeley in his lectures on the ' Expansion of England.' " Geographical boundaries," says Sir Alfred Lyall, " have no correspondence at all with distinctive institutions or groupings of the people, and have comparatively little political significance.

Little is gained toward knowing who and what a man is by ascertaining the State he obeys, or the territory he dwells in ; these being things which of themselves denote no difference of race, institutions, or manners. Even from the point of political allegiance, the Government under which a man may be living is an accidental arrangement, which the British Viceroy or some other inevitable power decided upon yesterday and may alter to morrow. Nor would such a change be grievous unless it divorced from him a ruler of his own tribe or his own faith. . . The European observer — accustomed to the massing of people in great territorial groups, and to the ideas (now immemorial in the AVest) contained in such expressions as fatherland, mother country, patriotism, domicile, and the like, has here to realise the novelty of finding himself in a strange part of the world, where political citizenship is as yet quite unknown, and terri torial sovereignty or even feudalism only just appearing.

For a parallel in the history of Western Europe we must go back as far as the Merovingian period, when chiefs of barbaric tribes or bands were converting themselves into kings or counts ; or perhaps, he should carry his retrospect much further, and con ceive himself to be looking at some country of Asia Minor lying within the influence of Rome at its zenith, but just outside its jurisdiction. He gradually discovers the population of Central India to be distributed, not into great governments, or nation alities, or religious denominations, not even into widespread races, such as those which are still contending for political NO INDIAN NATION. 5 supremacy in Eastern Europe, but into various and manifold denominations of tribes, clans, septs, castes, and sub-castes, religious orders, and devotional brotherhoods." ' This is the first and most essential thing to learn about India — that there is not, and never was an India, or even any country of India, possessing, according to European ideas, any sort of unity, physical, political, social, or religious ; no Indian nation, and especially no " people of India," of which we hear so much.

It is a consequence of all this, that in every great Indian province the political sympathies of large sections of the population towards men who, geographically speak ing, are their own countrymen, are often as imperfect as they are towards their English masters. We have never destroyed in India a national government, no national sentiment has been wounded, no national pride has been humiliated ; and this not through any design or merit of our own, but because no Indian nationalities have existed. They no more exist in the so-called Native States than in our own territories, and the most important of those States are ruled by princes who are almost as much foreigners to their subjects as we are ourselves. " India," M. Harmand writes, " is a mere mosaic of races, religions and languages having nothing in common with one another, and this segregation is carried out further to an in definite extent by the decomposing institution of caste.