Page:The Earl of Mayo.djvu/98

90 for loyally yielding after a battle that makes the English talent for harmonious colonial rule.

Besides his personal conferences with each of his Chief Secretaries, and the hebdomadal meeting of the Executive Council, the Viceroy devoted one day a week to his Council for making Laws and Regulations. This body, known more shortly as the Legislative Council, consists of the Viceregal or Executive Council, with the Lieutenant-Governor of the Province where the Viceroy may be residing, and also certain non-official Members as representatives of the Native and European communities. The Viceroy presides. Practically, it does not initiate measures; most of the laws which it frames come up to the Government of India from the Provincial Governments in the shape of proposed enactments. They are first considered by the Viceroy and Legal Member, then circulated to the whole of the Executive Councillors, and decided on in the Executive Council before being brought before the Legislative Council as a draft Bill.

The Legislative Council next appoints a committee of its own Members to consider the Bill, and after various publications in the Gazette, rejects, modifies, or passes it into law. The Legislative Council is open to the public; its proceedings are reported in the papers, and published from the official shorthand-writer's notes in the Gazette. The law-abiding nature of the English mind, and the attitude of vigorous independence which the Anglo-Indian courts maintain towards the Executive, render it necessary to obtain