Page:The Story of India (1897).djvu/13

Rh if the very shadow of a low-caste Sudra or an out-caste Pariah falls upon it.

In only one way are the people of India united, and that is--in being the people of India. In the far past, which most of them know nothing of, some of their ancestors came from distant lands; but now they are all at home. The white men who rule them, on the other hand, are foreigners, who come and govern and go away in an endless succession of arrivals and departures. The white man could never be at home in India, even if the natives adopted his customs and his creed. I have spoken of mountains; but these cover a comparatively small part of the country. The India where the millions live and where the governing has to be done is a hot and feverish land. Here the white man may live for a time and keep his faculties fresh enough for administrative work, with frequent visits to the healthier hill-country and a trip to England every few years. By the greatest care in eating and drinking, by adapting himself to the necessities of the climate as the unbending Englishman finds it hard to do, and by the help of quinine, he may even ward off malaria and cholera for many years; but the climate has its effect at last, either on the man himself or on his descendants. Few white men even attempt to bring up their children in India; and it is said