The very simplicity of the notion was its charm. What more easy to win
a reputation for far-seeing statesmanship, originality, and, above all,
deference to the desires of the people, than by appointing a child of
the country to the rule of that country? Two hundred millions of the
most loving and grateful folk under Her Majesty’s dominion would laud
the fact, and their praise would endure for ever. Yet he was indifferent
to praise or blame, as befitted the Very Greatest of All the Viceroys.
His administration was based upon principle, and the principle must be
enforced in season and out of season. His pen and tongue had created the
New India, teeming with possibilities--loud-voiced, insistent, a nation
among nations--all his very own. Wherefore the Very Greatest of All the
Viceroys took another step in advance, and with it counsel of those
who should have advised him on the appointment of a successor to
Yardley-Orde. There was a gentleman and a member of the Bengal Civil
Service who had won his place and a university degree to boot in fair
and open competition with the sons of the English. He was cultured,
of the world, and, if report spoke truly, had wisely and, above all,
sympathetically ruled a crowded district in South-Eastern Bengal. He had
been to England and charmed many drawing-rooms there. His name, if the
Viceroy recollected aright, was Mr. Grish Chunder De, M. A. In short,
did anybody see any objection to the appointment, always on principle,
of a man of the people to rule the people? The district in South-Eastern
Bengal might with advantage, he apprehended, pass over to a younger
civilian of Mr. G. C. De’s nationality (who had written a remarkably
clever pamphlet on the political value of sympathy in administration);
and Mr. G. C. De could be transferred northward to Kot-Kumharsen. The
Viceroy was averse, on principle, to interfering with appointments under
control of the Provincial Governments. He wished it to be understood
that he merely recommended and advised in this instance. As regarded the
mere question of race, Mr. Grish Chunder De was more English than the
English, and yet possessed of that peculiar sympathy and insight which
the best among the best Service in the world could only win to at the
end of their service.
The stern, black-bearded kings who sit about the Council-board of India
divided on the step, with the inevitable result of driving the Very
Greatest of All the Viceroys into the borders of hysteria, and a
bewildered obstinacy pathetic as that of a child.
‘The principle is sound enough,’ said the weary-eyed Head of the Red
Provinces in which Kot-Kumharsen lay, for he too held theories. ‘The
only difficulty is--’
‘Put the screw on the District officials; brigade De with a very strong
Deputy Commissioner on each side of him; give him the best assistant
in the Province; rub the fear of God into the people beforehand; and
if anything goes wrong, say that his colleagues didn’t back him up. All
these lovely little experiments recoil on the District-Officer in the
end,’ said the Knight of the Drawn Sword with a truthful brutality that
made the Head of the Red Provinces shudder. And on a tacit understanding
of this kind the transfer was accomplished, as quietly as might be for
many reasons.
It is sad to think that what goes for public opinion in India did not
generally see the wisdom of the Viceroy’s appointment. There were not
lacking indeed hireling organs, notoriously in the pay of a tyrannous
bureaucracy, who more than hinted that His Excellency was a fool, a
dreamer of dreams, a doctrinaire, and, worst of all, a trifler with the
lives of men. ‘The Viceroy’s Excellence Gazette,’ published in Calcutta,
was at pains to thank ‘Our beloved Viceroy for once more and again thus
gloriously vindicating the potentialities of the Bengali nations for
extended executive and administrative duties in foreign parts beyond
our ken. We do not at all doubt that our excellent fellow-townsman, Mr.
Grish Chunder De, Esq., M. A., will uphold the prestige of the Bengali,
notwithstanding what underhand intrigue and peshbundi may be set on
foot to insidiously nip his fame and blast his prospects among the proud
civilians, some of which will now have to serve under a despised native
and take orders too. How will you like that, Misters? We entreat
our beloved Viceroy still to substantiate himself superiorly to
race-prejudice and colour-blindness, and to allow the flower of this now
OUR Civil Service all the full pays and allowances granted to his more
fortunate brethren.’