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Introduction

That marvellous country of the East: The seat of the earliest of mankind: The source from whence language and learning have flowed to enlighten and ennoble the West. That land which filled the mind of the European with visions of riches – of beauty – of romance – of voluptuousness. The land of vast plains – stupendous mountains – wild and magnificent forests – gigantic rivers, rolling tumultuously down to the sea – inhabited by curious people! You were too grand not to excite the enterprising spirit of Europeans, who are ever craving for adventure, and thirsting for knowledge.

They came – they trafficked – grew rich, and presumptuous. They stood beside the dark man towering in strength and intelligence. They saw his weakness; and the profits of commerce were succeeded by a desire for conquest. They warred – vanquished – seized the fairest provinces with gigantic strides, did those wicked men of the West; and in two centuries they were paramount throughout the empire of the Moghul.

‘Tis the destiny of the civilised to subdue and enlighten the barbarous: the Anglo-Saxon had been selected for the work.

Misrule and oppression – cruelty and corruption – rapacity and tyranny, were now displaced by a spirit of justice and indulgence – honesty and charity – and, after a while, by generous and forbearing rulers, who, if not always right, deserve, at least, the credit of meaning to be so. Marauding armies of soldiers, and rapacious officials, no longer traversed the empire year after year, and the people were instructed that there are rights and duties which all good governments respect and enforce.

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Trade expanded to a size unknown before, and spread almost untaxed and wholly unmolested. The agriculturist saw waste lands brought under the plough, by the construction of canals, and by a greater demand for its produce. In short, peace and plenty were beginning to reign in that glorious empire of the East, where disorder and dissention existed before; and its children would have grown great under the miraculous light of the West. They were imbibing that knowledge which is the sinew and marrow of the European, and patience – a little patience – and our strength would have been their strength. Miserable wretches! they did not understand the astounding grandeur of the nation which meant to prepare them for emancipation and for self-government.

Foreign rule is perpetuated by the respect of the subjected. Alas! after two hundred years we were still without it. The white and the black men are dissimilar as day and night. There is no communion of feeling, and little of thought. The European, conscious of his superiority, is proud and disdainful, and spurns the advances of the dark man. He applauds by silence, and upbraids with a loud voice. He is feared by every one and loved by few. The white man arrogantly dwells in a strange land as if it was his, unmindful that force subdues but cannot attach a people; which is the only security for peace and prosperity. Europeans in India know little of the country in which they dwell, and less of the peculiarities of the people. Haughtiness alike alienates the wise and the simple; and this was one of the stimulating causes of the troubles of 1857.

There was, I repeat, a spirit of justice. No government was ever actuated by better intentions, or had more talented servants. But it made the mistake, (and will go on doing so till another rebellion,) of endeavouring to govern an immense empire by very few and almost irresponsible subordinates. There was too much to do, and nobody to complain if imperfectly done; and the close of every year saw most of the administrators, great and small, blowing their own trumpets. There was no public opinion to warn the indolent, and none to encourage the clever and the industrious; official praise and dispraise were not independent. Therefore, business was slow in all things, Worst

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of all, there was too little supervision; and, as a matter of course, shameful corruption in the native subordinates, who, being poorly paid and remorselessly overworked, seized every opportunity of selling their services. It is no exaggeration to say that the people oftener looked to them for the disposal of their suits, than to the European officer, who, sometimes for the want of zeal and ability, and often from the want of leisure, was unable to purify his Court.

Justice was indeed slow, expensive, and uncertain; and our officers almost inaccessible. In all things the interest of the State was considered to be of greater importance than the welfare of the people, who were, almost without exception, treated as rogues and liars. This was another cause of the discontent of 1857.

The Army of India was composed of the most able-bodied and most bigoted of Asiatics, and we had for many years endeavoured to increase their pride, in the belief that it would make them better soldiers. Step by step we put them, in imagination at least, over ourselves, and they came to know that we were few and far between, by the spread of information from our own lips, and through our own Press. Their conceit was intolerable, and, little by little, they were alienated from the officers, whose confidence was such, that they did not care to learn the conduct and characters of the men; and, like their civil brethren, were capricious in rewarding. It is a strong expression, but it is quite true, that in the course of time, the Native Army was feared. Its proportions had grown great – its courage unquestionable – and its temper excitable, when the thoughtless issue of GREASED CARTRIDGES unexpectedly provoked it to Mutiny.

It is not always that mutiny and rebellion are productive of social and administrative reforms based upon principles previously declared to be dangerous to an empire. Many of the official traditions of India, like our dwellings, have been burnt, never we hope to revive again. A fanatic army fought for its conscience, and ignorant peasants against the foreigner: without disturbing their mighty masters they uprooted long-cherished theories and systems founded on ignorance and impudence.

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Opinions once obstinately defended and enforced are now unowned and unhonoured; officials who prided themselves on their superior tact are silent, for astounding events have depreciated, if they have not wholly extinguished, their policy and their conceited knowledge.

The whole system was weak and profitless, as are all administrations founded on selfishness. By a miracle we acquired, and by chance we governed, enormous provinces. European energy and enterprize which have marvellously developed the resources of the western world lay dormant in the East. There it is a business of profit and pleasure – here Europeans are paid servants who have no interest in the progress of an antagonistic race. With small means and little earnestness they hoped to benefit and instruct millions and millions of beings. With a feebleness peculiar to Englishmen in the East they laboured languidly on the surface, and helplessly gazed at the prodigious wealth around them. While industriously labouring elsewhere to upturn hidden wealth, here they were content to receive a stipulated hire.

A rebellion has aroused them to activity, and every department has its projects of improvement. Instead of devising schemes of revenge for shedding innocent blood, and destroying an enormous amount of public property, the European has grandly turned on himself, and is busy correcting his own faults. It is of no avail! The house that needs a thousand brooms cannot be swept by fifty: the gem of the East cannot be shaped and polished by the present number of artificers. Its lustre is obscured by the dust of ages, and it is certain that we have too few, and possibly too little time to cleanse it. A tendency to discord and disorder is the chronic condition of India: its heterogeneousness; the social reforms which civilization is there ‘ timidly forcing upon ignorance; the antagonism that exists between the white and the black men; the offensive exclusiveness which Europeans will continue towards Indians, are some of the causes which will always endanger the peace and prosperity of India.

The infusion of knowledge would certainly benefit the people, and assuredly endanger the European. England considers that

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India is hers, not alone for her aggrandisement, but for the prosperity and enlightenment of the people. She is to give in exchange for the products of the East, the virtues of the West; she is to stay there till the people are able to govern themselves. A prodigious and a magnanimous task, which two hundred monitors and two hundred missionaries have gone to accomplish!

The social enlightenment of the natives is impossible unless the rule of the Anglo-Saxon is perpetuated by colonization. Committees have been formed, and persons examined, and their suggestions rejected as impracticable. If the official records of India were searched many precious things would be found which were first neglected as impossible, and adopted by another generation with complete success. It is the misfortune of India that there nothing is treated as possible. Should the convulsions of man not expel us before, the statesmen of the next century will think of us with contempt for rejecting a legitimate and, indeed, the only effectual means of imparting the knowledge and prosperity of Europe to the gentle and intelligent people of the East. It is not easy to do, but it can be done, and should be, done, at all hazards, to some extent. There is plenty of room for another race, and that other the most active and industrious of mankind What does it signify, even if it is true, that the white man would deteriorate in the land of the black man? Deterioration would be the work of many ages, and it could only be physical: it is intellectual and not physical power that is to be introduced. I have said elsewhere that the education of the people of India can only be effected through themselves; and if we socially plant Europeans among them, a grand source of reaching them will be provided. The barrier of caste is more fictions than real, and whenever we familiarly mix with the people it will be trodden down.

Europeans at present know little of the natives, and that modicum is derived from the low and the litigious. The upper and middle classes are only officially brought into contact with Europeans, and our opinion of them is formed from the conduct of menials. There is one stereotyped idea of native character which almost every European adopts, without investigation: it is the one which the early adventurers had when they plundered

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and oppressed them to retire to sumptuous homes in England – it is the same that still quickens the arm, the leg, and the tongue of Europeans on the slightest provocation. Indians may approve the honest and impartial principles set forth in our laws and our literature, but ourselves they cannot appreciate till colonization mingles and discloses the qualities of the two races. Many thoughtlessly assert that familiar intercourse is impossible; which is only true of the proud men who now reside among them: the admixture of races begins from below, and not with the higher classes. Others aver that Indians are incapable of moral culture; which is a monstrous untruth: the sources of education come from abroad, and for centuries the people of India have been debarred communication with the rest of the world, and corrupted by misrule and oppression.

This collection transcribed by Chris Gage
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