Page:Allan Octavian Hume, C.B.; Father of the Indian National Congress.djvu/190

 towns, such as Calcutta, Bombay, Madras, Allahabad, Cawn- pore, Benares, Nagpur, Bankipore, Poona, Amraoti, Yeotmal, Lucknow, Rai Bareli, Mainpuri, Meerut, Etawah, Gorakhpur, Cuddapah, Bezwada, Berhampore, Nandyal, Trichinopoly, Bapatla, and many other places. The resolutions adopted were similar in form and character, as may be judged from the telegram forwarded to Sir W. Wedderburn by the Secretaries of the Indian National Congress, which reads as follows : —

"Indians deeply mourn the death of Allan Hume. In him the country has lost its most sincere and sympathetic friend, the Uke of whom it may never see again, and the Congress its most beloved and esteemed founder. With unexampled energy, great perseverance and unfaltering faith he had striven amidst good report and evil to promote the social and political welfare of the people and had lived to see the firstfruits of his noble and unceasing efforts. Though it is impossible that Indians can ever repay the debt of obligation they owe to him for his righteous and dis- interested service, the name of Mr. Hume will be remembered with affection and gratitude by generations to come as that of a sterling Englishman of deep and abiding sympathy with their most cherished aspirations."

The twenty-seventh Session of the Indian National Congress, held at Bankipore on December 26, 27, and 28, 1912, adopted a resolution recording "its sense of profound sorrow at the death of Allan Octavian Hume, C.B., father and founder of the Congress, to whose lifelong services, rendered at rare self-sacrifice, India feels deep and lasting gratitude, and in whose death the cause of Indian progress and reform sustained irreparable loss."