Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 125.djvu/247

Rh to a state which is almost inconceivable in Europe. Everything is lost sight of except the cunning faculty of serving the incompetent ruling powers so as to secure good appointments from their hands, Then rises supreme an incompetent, unintellectual, yet unscrupulous and overbearing element, which has no sympathetic relationship to the great sacrifices, the difficulties, and the future of our position in India; where true gentlemanliness disappears, intellect is undervalued, and genius is regarded as something like a stray panther or tiger. It is then, that while the people of India are treated with excessive and inexcusable arrogance, at the same time the most necessary safeguards against mutiny and rebellion are carelessly neglected; and when popular commotions do appear, they are allowed to gather head and to reach a dangerous height before anything like effective attempts are made to deal with them.

In Simla, last year, the state of matters as very different from that which I have just described. In both the viceroy and the commander-in-chief India had the good fortune to possess able and experienced noblemen, who thoroughly understood and rose to the level of the higher responsibilities of their position, this alone was sufficient to elevate the whole tone of the society about them, in a community which so readily answers to the guidance of its official leaders; and they had around them a considerable number of able, conscientious, and high-minded Englishmen. I was only at Simla during the month of May, but had sufficient opportunity of observing that Lord Northbrook might be compared not unfavourably with many of the greater governor-generals of India; and that the instinct of the people of the country, which had led them to esteem and trust him almost from the commencement of his viceroyship, was by no means an erroneous one. They are extremely acute, and wonderfully just judges of character; and I knew that their opinion on this subject was shared by many of the Englishmen who were best acquainted with India and most devoted to its interests. If the new viceroy did not equal Lord Mayo in charm of personal manner, and in power of setting every one around him to work energetically on their own lines, he possessed what is more specially needed at present, more than Lord Mayo's power of holding his great officers in hand, and of refusing to allow their specialties and crotchets being run to excess and developed to the detriment of India and of the imperial interests of Great Britain. If he had not all Lord Elgin's experience and large-minded dealing with the outlying questions of English policy, he brought to bear upon them the caution, the trained habits, the ceaseless thoughtful energy of an English statesman, in a manner which colonial and Indian officials have little opportunity of practising themselves in. If the insinuations of some of the newspaper correspondents are true, he may be deficient in Lord William Bentinck's aristocratic calmness under criticism and judicial appreciation of the value of the Indian press. But it is certain that India has in him a governor-general of high character and of pure-minded unselfish disposition, which it can greatly trust. I could not but be struck during my stay at Simla with his genuineness of character, his clearness of vision, and his unaffected kindness and consideration. Even in two mistakes which, as it seemed to me, he has made, his errors were almost redeemed by his manner of committing them. I allude to his approval of the conduct of the Panjáb officials towards Mr. Downes of the Church Mission, who made an attempt to reach Kafiristan through the Kaubul territory; and to a social question which arose between Government House and Major Fenwick of the Civil and Military Gazette; but in both these cases Lord Northbrook acted in an open manner, which excited the respect even of some who most differed from his conclusions. And though, of course, he is not infallible, many errors of judgment are not to be expected from him, and are more likely to arise from a supposed necessity of backing up the action of his subordinates than where he himself originates the action. For there is a white light in his mind which illuminates every object on which it shines — a searching piercing light, proceeding from the viceroy's own mind and not from the mere focussing of other rays. There is something of genius in this power which he possesses of lighting up a subject, and it is the more remarkable as existing in conjunction with his precise business habits. It struck me there was a tendency in his Excellency's mind to draw rather too decided strait lines even where conflicting interests interlap; but, truly, if he were to begin pondering over matters as a many-sided Coleridge might do, the public business of India would 