Page:Convocation Addresses of the Universities of Bombay and Madras.djvu/84

 In the matter of salaries also it is very essential that at the outset we should guard against misapprehension and disappointment. To me it appears to be most improbable, that if the admission to the higher posts of native gentlemen should become general, the present scale of salaries could be maintained; nor would it be reasonable. We are here no doubt about it—we are here now, and to my mind we ever shall be. as foreigners. The climate and other circumstances make it impossible for us, English, at any time to become what is commonly called naturalized in this country. We cannot have therefore in India most of those enjoyments and advantages which exists in our own country, and which the Natives of this country in Government employ can rely upon. We cannot have our children educated here, we cannot maintain the same style of living as we are accustomed to at the cost which we can in your own country. In the ordinary domestic life of an English public servant, separation from children is commonly the first incidence of importance. Sickness probably follows. Sickness which at home serves to draw closer all family ties, becomes here in most cases the signal for separation; in not a few the separation is final. The ordinary termination to the official career in India is to return to England with moderate means to commence life anew. For all these drawbacks the only remedy has hitherto been money—a poor one no doubt, but a better probably will not be found,—and so it has happened that the salaries of the principal public servants have been fixed at the present rates. In what way then do these considerations apply to the natives of India serving in their own country? I cannot see that they have any application whatever. Their case should be compared to that of our own countrymen similarly employed at home. We shall do no injustice if we apply the same principles to both. It may be that the position of the permanent servants of the Crown at home is imperfectly known here. The mass of public servants on entering the service of the Crown in England receive a salary commencing with £100 per annum or less than Rs. 100 per mensem. They work on for forty years, rising to the highest stations in their respective departments. They are entrusted with business affecting the whole world—most confidential and intricate—and at the end of the forty years they arrive at a salary of £1,000. That is a fair description of the position of public servants of the best ability and education in England. Therefore, it is naturally quite unreasonable to suppose that the British Government here would be justified in imposing upon the people of the country for the payment of their