Page:History of India Vol 8.djvu/277

Rh it is otherwise superfluous to tell over again an oft-repeated story.

KATKARI NATIVES ON THE WESTERN GHATS.

The system of administration set up by the Act of 1773 embodied the first attempt at giving some definite and recognizable form to the vague and arbitrary rulership that had devolved upon the Company. From that date forward, this outline of Anglo-Indian government was gradually filled in. The administrative centre was now at any rate distinctly located at Calcutta with the Governor-General as its acknowledged head, invested with the chief control of the foreign relations of the three Presidencies, and deriving his authority from a statute of the English Parliament. Thus far the