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 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 Letters from the East
 
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 vi. T, fVc Al 
 
 Letters from the East 
 
 JOHN OLIVER HOBBESf^ 
 
 'a) 
 
 LONDON 
 T. FISHER UNWIN 
 
 PATERNOSTER SQUARE 
 1903
 
 C 
 
 All Rights Reserved
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 I. To DELHI FOR THE DURBAR ... I 
 
 II. THE CORONATION DURBAR. . . . 12 
 
 III. REFLECTIONS ON THE DURBAR . . . 21 
 
 IV. THE STATE BALL . . . . . 38 
 V. CALCUTTA ....... 50 
 
 VI. ALIPORE, B^RRACKPORE, AND DARJEELING . 62 
 
 PROGRAMME ...... 72 
 
 VICEROY'S CAMP LIST OF GUESTS . . 74
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 TO DELHI FOR THE DURBAR 
 
 AT half-past four in the morning, while the 
 stars made the city lights seem little more 
 than candle flames, and the bright moon made 
 the harbour signals mere spots of glowing red, 
 I saw Bombay, a dark, low mass against the 
 sky, for the first time. It was the .one still 
 hour of my voyage, for our journey had been 
 a long conversation, occasionally interrupted 
 by short nights of rest in the flattered Medi- 
 terranean, the hot Red Sea, and the sleepless 
 Indian Ocean, by picturesque delays at Port 
 Said, the Suez Canal, and Aden. Cynics (some 
 of them more disillusioned than the worldly,
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 some less confident than the much deceived, 
 and all eager to foretell little miseries) had 
 promised me an embarrassing expedition. It 
 was said that in so large a party forty bound 
 for the Viceroy's camp, and as many promised 
 to other distinguished hosts quarrels would 
 arise (sea air is irritating to the nervous 
 system) ; there would be coteries, cabals, and 
 cliques ; a number of sets, equal in import- 
 ance, but distant and distinct in their pursuits, 
 interests, amusements, and, one might say, 
 habits, were represented in the ship's com- 
 pany ; acquaintances would take sides, and 
 friends who had set forth inseparably together 
 would return with dolorous memories of an 
 association too close, unaccustomed, and strained 
 for ever dividing them. 
 
 Beyond doubt, the tendency in English 
 society is towards parochialism, or rather pro- 
 vincialism, in the point of view. English- 
 women are known to be difficult travellers and 
 suspicious of new faces ; they confuse the 
 notion conveyed by the common phrase, 4< tres 
 grande dame" with the beneficent condescen-
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 sion of a lady bountiful towards obscure, 
 illiterate, and servile dependants ; they often 
 mistake the formal precedence given by titles 
 or official rank for some actual superiority in 
 tissue ; independence of spirit bewilders, repels, 
 terrifies them, and they are annoyed at any 
 demonstration of what is called personality 
 in idea, ideals, or conduct ; each will permit 
 herself or her satellites a good deal of acute 
 eccentricity in dress and manner, but it is 
 always the eccentricity of the amateur it is 
 rarely spontaneous, original, or convincing. 
 In fact, Englishwomen can seldom become 
 citizenesses of the world the legitimate 
 heiresses of a vast Empire without losing 
 altogether the note, which should be dominant, 
 of their own Mother Country. If they are 
 found charming in cosmopolitan society, 
 they usually seem unsympathetic in England, 
 out of tune with Londoners, ill at ease, mis- 
 understood, distrusted in county country- 
 houses. 
 
 The great success, either in diplomatic, or 
 military, or political, or aristocratic circles abroad,
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 is seldom popular at home. He or she has 
 gained a larger vision, a flexibility in thought, 
 an impatience under arbitrary local pettinesses 
 in every disguise. The return of the native 
 means too often the return of the utterly 
 estranged. 
 
 These considerations were filling my mind 
 when I left Marseilles for the East. I wondered 
 how the guests invited to the spectacle of the 
 Durbar would regard their fellow-subjects ; 
 whether, in truth, the Imperialism of the times 
 was a case of rhetoric or a matter of instinct 
 a passing question of party politics or an entail- 
 ment by irresistible destiny. It is delightful 
 to be able to say, with truth, how agreeable 
 life on board actually proved 
 
 During the day people talked, played bridge, 
 walked, read, and slept ; in the evening there 
 would be music, or dancing, or more bridge, 
 or more talking. Had some unprepared 
 foreigner joined the party at Suez or Aden, 
 he would have thought that Britons had at 
 last lost all their least genial qualities, and 
 suddenly become as charming as they were
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 dutiful. And, as I have said, the talk was 
 incessant. Among the men every profession 
 was represented by one of its most dis- 
 tinguished members ; every interest had its 
 follower. The women were unusually remark- 
 able in their appearance and their amiability ; 
 they showed a real disposition to spend the 
 hours in kindness. The small steamer, there- 
 fore, which conveyed the Viceroy's party from 
 the Arabia to the private landing-stage con- 
 tained the best-humoured, the most animated, 
 the least affected crowd ever seen in English 
 society of the present day. No one was bored, 
 no one pretended to be bored. It is encourag- 
 ing to find that pretentiousness of this minute 
 and ridiculous kind is no longer considered a 
 sign of good breeding ; the fashion now runs 
 toward joyousness loudly, even uncouthly, de- 
 monstrated. Who is not grateful to see 
 absurdity die out, and naturalness revive, on 
 any terms ?
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF BOMBAY 
 
 The spirit and pride of Empire must fill 
 the heart of the least ambitious Englishman 
 when he sets foot on Indian soil and beholds 
 the life, the colour, the imposing buildings, 
 the strangeness, the fascination of the city of 
 Bombay. We were driven swiftly in small 
 victorias from the docks to the railway station, 
 but during those brilliant moments when 
 one unforgettable impression succeeded another 
 as weird and unforgettable (the light in the 
 East makes every scene a permanent silhouette 
 in one's mind nothing here is elusive) I saw, 
 for me, a whole new continent revealed new 
 in feeling, action, motive, form, philosophy, 
 thought, achievement. The eternal energy of 
 the world was manifesting itself in ways, for 
 objects, on principles and under conditions 
 magnificently unfamiliar to the European. 
 Yet this was the point for wonder and exalta- 
 tion ; it had all been organised, it is now 
 governed and subdued by Englishmen, who,
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 having inherited England's prejudices and 
 traditions, had received the great advantage of 
 an English education and suffered the disad- 
 vantage of English insularity. Imperialism 
 in the ordinary London man seems, and is, 
 vanity ; to foreigners, who have never visited 
 India and the colonies, it is the last feather 
 straggling on a moulting peacock. But let the 
 satirist come to Bombay even for an hour 
 he need not go further ; he will admit freely, 
 and no more doubt the vigour of the Anglo- 
 Saxon or his stability to hold a vast possession. 
 The conviction was not called out by the sight 
 of large buildings, carts driven by white 
 bullocks, or groups of natives in brilliant 
 turbans and dull rags. The first impression 
 of Bombay may be compared to the first im- 
 pression of New York power and enterprise 
 are in the air ; but whereas New York has 
 already an appearance of too much luxury, too 
 much ease, and of being, as it were, the haunt 
 of mere pleasure lovers, Bombay, built as 
 Venice was built, on small islands, seems 
 still in her first youth a rising city, immature,
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 not over-rich ; a city where all men go forth 
 early to their labours, and dream at night of 
 ambitions hardly to be fulfilled, of wishes which 
 must wait, at best, for many a year before they 
 may be gratified ; a city of patient hearts, 
 watchful eyes, hopes long deferred. 
 
 Our party had brought between us forty- 
 seven tons of dresses and uniforms for the 
 Durbar festivities ; there was no time to look 
 at Bombay while boxes so valuable had to be 
 collected, sorted, and stacked in the special 
 train bound for Delhi. As it was, we left the 
 station nearly two hours late. For two days 
 and a night we rushed in the heat and dust and 
 cold past cities with curious names, and scenes 
 from old picture-books, and groups of lean 
 Hindoos, decently naked. We saw vultures 
 waiting for the dead, and pelicans, wild green 
 parrots, and monkeys ; starving, sore dogs, 
 thin pigs, weak goats ; sweetmeat, flower, and 
 fruit sellers, coolies, lascars, sweepers, tillers 
 and cultivators of the soil, sturdy native 
 infantry, English soldiers, poor Brahmins 
 superb with caste marks, pilgrims bound for
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 the tomb of Salim Christi, every kind and 
 description of small boy, vagabond, and adven- 
 turer waiting at the various stations to see the 
 trains, to do a little bargaining, stealing, or 
 conjuring, to get carried on possibly, by good 
 luck, to the camp at Delhi. The tracts of 
 country between the halting-places suggested 
 only the desert and despair ; sandy roads and 
 flat, interminable plains, which, in spite of 
 their desolation, seemed invisibly inhabited 
 perhaps by unhappy ghosts, perhaps by some 
 of the despised baser sort of native, with meek, 
 famishing eyes and brittle limbs. There is a 
 force in these plains as cruel and as forbid- 
 ding, as deep and as hungry as the sea ; there 
 is, one feels, a world of worlds engulfed in the 
 barren soil ; it has a fearful vitality the 
 ruined city of Fatehpur Sikri is dead, im- 
 perial ancient Rome is dead, Versailles is 
 dead, but the plains breathe as the ocean 
 breathes ; they hold a terror which strikes, 
 captivates, appals the imagination. You look 
 away in weariness the eternal sameness and 
 aridity hold no plea for your love, but your
 
 io IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 eyes will have caught the dull dye of the sand ; 
 the blue dome over Florence, the tender- 
 ness of the sky in Touraine, the autumn 
 sunsets off the Hampshire coast will seem 
 unreal and fading impressions after the mono- 
 chrome of India. 
 
 It was Sunday morning when we reached 
 Delhi ; and the platform, decorated with red 
 baize and flags for the Viceroy's State entry on 
 the morrow, was the first exhibition we had 
 seen of characteristic English custom ; but we 
 steamed on to the camp station, where white 
 tents covered the land as far as the sight would 
 reach. It was cold, bright, wonderful, but 
 we had slept all night in a side-line, we had 
 travelled many thousand miles, we were thank- 
 ful to arrive, we were full of enthusiasm, but 
 we were no longer impressionable. I remember 
 arriving at the large Shamiana, where we had 
 breakfast ; then I was helped into a rickshaw 
 and taken to my own tent, which contained, 
 I noticed, a bed, two wardrobes, a writing- 
 table, easy chairs, books, and electric light. 
 The bugles were sounding for church. I took
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA n 
 
 my chair out into the sun and sat staring at 
 the rows of tents opposite and the members of 
 our party passing to and fro, followed by their 
 European servants, their bearers, their ayahs, 
 and carts of luggage. I have seldom felt such 
 cold. I ordered a hot bath while my maid 
 unpacked my muslin dresses and my heaviest 
 furs.
 
 II 
 
 THE CORONATION DURBAR 
 
 THE last Monday of the year was fixed for 
 the Viceroy's State entry into Delhi, Long 
 before seven that morning the bugle was 
 heard echoing through every camp, and those 
 who had slept, awoke, after a cold night, to a 
 piercing day. Pleasure, in such conditions, 
 was to be found not in thought, for there was 
 no time to think ; not in sensation, for frozen 
 bodies and excited brains work unaccountably ; 
 but in impressions which, rapid, veritable, 
 keen and bright, filled up blank regions, never 
 before occupied or discovered, of one's fancy. 
 Yellow dust and glittering mica covered the 
 road, parched our throats, powdered our eyes. 
 We formed a long line of carriages driven by 
 native coachmen, each attended by two foot- 
 men, who hung behind, in scarlet livery. The 
 roads were lined by thick-set, smooth-faced 
 
 12
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 13 
 
 Gurkhas, desperate, immutable Sikhs, fiery 
 Pathans, gallant Highlanders, English and 
 Irish soldiers, sturdy, short, smart, pale and 
 anxious. We saw multitudes of Orientals by 
 the way, who bore living tribute to the photo- 
 graphic unimaginative accuracy of similar 
 groups in Tissot's New Testament. The 
 famous Chancjj Chauk (called by some, without 
 reason, the richest street in the world) had 
 stands for its wealthy, wily and amiable mer- 
 chants ; great Hindoo and Mahommedan ladies 
 were supposed to be watching the crowd from 
 behind the chinks of certain dark windows. 
 
 On the Champ de Mars native retinues, 
 camels and elephants these last drugged for 
 the day, and painted in patterns variously 
 with gamboge and vermilion for the festival 
 were drawn up to join the rear of the pro- 
 cession as it passed by. We watched this 
 from the great Mosque, with marble cupolas 
 and copper-gilt spires, the Jumma Masjid, 
 built by Shah Jehan's five thousand workmen 
 toiling all day for six years. Crowded in 
 every part by Europeans in uniform or gayest
 
 i 4 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 morning dress, and natives in their most 
 brilliant colours, it presented the effect of a 
 large isolated hill, set with tier upon tier, 
 packed with human beings to the very top. 
 The State entry, seen from this height, looked 
 like the curious old flat woodcuts, drawn 
 without regard to perspective, of historic 
 events in the fourteenth, fifteenth and six- 
 teenth centuries. One saw the splendid, 
 haughty stream winding along more than a 
 mile away, for there were no buildings, trees, 
 or impediments to block the sight. Com- 
 missioners headed the procession, then Pathan 
 chiefs, strangely attired ; Baluch chiefs, with 
 dark, passionate faces, long hair, and twisted 
 beards ; then carriages of English officials, 
 Lord Kitchener and his staff on horseback, 
 then the carriages and staff, and escort, and 
 bodyguards of the Lieutenant-Governor of 
 the Punjab, the Governors of Madras and 
 Bombay, the Grand Duke of Hesse ; then 
 the elephants, with the great chiefs and native 
 retainers, indescribably clothed some in old 
 coats of chain armour over faded rose velvet,
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 15 
 
 others in antique brocade, gaudy stuffs, tinsel 
 coats, unbleached, hand-woven linen an 
 Eastern survival of the old feudal grand 
 seigneurs of Catholic Europe. 
 
 The chiefs themselves wore embroidered 
 velvet, satin, and cloth of gold, chains of 
 emeralds and pearls, diamonds and immense 
 white sapphires ; turbans covered with hanging 
 gems, or tiaras set in Paris. One Maharaja, 
 half insensible from opium, had a loyal, bene- 
 ficent smirk, which could neither fade nor 
 falter, painted, out of purest courtesy, on his 
 inexpressive countenance. On and on they 
 passed, in their howdahs of fantastic design 
 fifty-five ruling princes of the Indian Empire, 
 from Hyderabad, Baroda, Travancore, Mysore, 
 Kashmir, Central India, Rajputana, Bombay, 
 Bengal, the Punjab, Burma, and the United 
 Provinces. What histories, what traditions, 
 what crimes they represented ! This portion 
 of the procession seemed a horrible medley 
 of the infernal and the grotesque, the ancient 
 barbaric and the modern vulgar, the superb 
 and the squalid, a manifestation of power
 
 1 6 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 without glory, and rank without grace, of 
 riches without beauty, of pomp without 
 philosophy, and pride without strength. All 
 processions of the kind are the same : in 
 Rome, in Seville, in France, in London, 
 these exhibitions display little that is beauti- 
 ful in the human countenance ; here and 
 there one may see a fine face, and .little 
 ashamed, but most faces bear the fierce light 
 ill. The native spectators looked, but were 
 silent ; the Europeans exclaimed, stared, mar- 
 velled, appraised extravagantly, were, indeed, 
 dazzled and impressed mainly by the display 
 of jewels. To the average Western mind, a 
 man who can carry 50,000 in ornaments 
 on his own person is to be regarded with 
 something a little deeper than reverence. 
 
 REPRESENTATIVES OF THE KING-EMPEROR 
 
 The Duke and Duchess of Connaught were 
 recognised with enthusiasm. The Viceroy,
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 17 
 
 wearing the blue sash of the Star of India, with 
 her Excellency, a beautiful, gentle lady, sweetly 
 smiling, exquisitely dressed, on his left, sat in 
 a gold and silver howdah, on an elephant from 
 Benares the finest animal in India. An 
 elephant, however, is not an appropriate animal 
 for Europeans ; the gait of the beast is clumsy ; 
 the howdah looks and is exceedingly uncom- 
 fortable. It says much for the personal 
 magnetism of their Royal Highnesses and their 
 Excellencies that they appeared to advantage 
 during the trying and graceless ride. Few 
 men of impatient and authoritative genius 
 could have met, during their own lifetime, 
 with the cordial expressions of appreciation 
 which greeted Lord Curzon when he passed 
 the Jumma Masjid. It is not possible to be 
 at once a just ruler and a popular idol ; the 
 essential charm of an idol, or fetish, lies in its 
 supposed potential and frequently active 
 injustice. But it is equally impossible for the 
 least gracious and bigoted to deny the concen- 
 trated devotion, the energy of the intellect, the 
 special distinction of the gifts which have com-
 
 1 8 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 bined to make the present Viceroy's reign so 
 remarkable in the history of the Empire. 
 
 The great Durbar, for instance, which took 
 place two days after the State entry, will 
 count beyond question as the most significant, 
 the most brilliant, the most successful pageant 
 of its kind. There were nearly 40,000 troops 
 outside, and 12,000 persons within the amphi- 
 theatre. The latter included the chiefs and 
 their personal attendants, high dignitaries, 
 British officials, councillors, governors, generals, 
 every distinguished civil and military officer 
 in all India. Judges in Court robes, Chief 
 Justices, Consuls in uniform, European guests 
 of the highest rank ; and " over one hundred 
 rulers of separate States, whose united popula- 
 tion amounts to sixty millions of people, and 
 whose territories extend over 55 degrees of 
 longitude. The officers and soldiers present 
 were drawn from a force in India of nearly 
 230,000 men the King's Army. The leaders 
 of Indian society, official and unofficial, present, 
 were the mouthpieces of over 230 million souls. 
 One-fifth, therefore, of the entire human race
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 19 
 
 was represented in that arena." This is a 
 quotation, which will bear much repetition, 
 from Lord Curzon's impressive and nobly- 
 delivered address. The twelve trumpeters in 
 scarlet and gold, the Royal salute of one hundred 
 and one guns, the firing of the feu de joie, the 
 march of the Mutiny veterans, the playing of 
 the massed bands, the homage of the native 
 Princes and the veiled Begum, the dashing 
 Imperial Cadets in their embroidered white 
 tunics, their blue kumerbunds with crimson 
 tassels, and their blue turbans with gold 
 aigrettes, the snow leopard skins on their 
 black chargers ; the Shan chiefs in gold coats 
 like pagodas ; the young Maharaja of Patisja, i 
 in pale blue velvet, embroidered with pearls, 
 have all been described by telegraph to every 
 corner of the globe. But the exhilaration, the 
 movement, the atmosphere cannot be tele- 
 graphed ; they cannot be reproduced in any 
 form or any language. It may all have been 
 of the earth earthy ; it may have seemed to 
 some the supreme exhibition of that vanity of 
 vanities which, so far from lacking hope, is
 
 20 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 full of confidence whether God or no God 
 is in the world. He is sometimes forgotten 
 by small committees ; but among fifty-five 
 thousand souls he can never lack witnesses. 
 And so the Durbar was neither vainglorious, 
 nor a show to impress the better vulgar. It 
 was a worthy expression of all that is best in 
 Imperialism the desire and aim to administer 
 justice, to deliver the oppressed, to give 
 freedom from anarchy, to dispense mercy in 
 the hour of suffering.
 
 Ill 
 
 REFLECTIONS ON THE DURBAR 
 
 THE charm counteracting the inconvenience 
 of camp life is a matter of fresh air and infor- 
 mality. I have been in large tents, canopied 
 and lined with Kashmir shawls or with painted 
 chintz ; they have had their board floors 
 covered with fine carpets (some I remember 
 were of Persian rose colour surprisingly 
 beautiful) ; they contained sofas, chairs, tables, 
 bookcases, pianos, pictures, indeed all the 
 familiar furniture of a comfortable room ; but 
 for me, "Pleasure dwells in height" tents are 
 too close to the earth. I like the sky better, 
 and my contentment during rest, or play, or 
 work depends on my getting a little higher, at 
 least, than the footpath. The enclosure, 
 
 21
 
 22 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 moreover, gives me a sense of imprisonment 
 and narrowness, and when there are no 
 windows I miss a consoling glimpse of the 
 world to remind me of the horizon and the 
 illimitable. To live, therefore, for any length 
 of time in a tent no matter how luxurious 
 would be to many persons, beyond doubt, a 
 real hardship. But during the ten memorable 
 days at Delhi an unaccustomed shelter seemed, 
 for so long and brilliant a dream, the natural 
 sleeping-place ; the special simplicities of our 
 life gave a rugged basis for what might other- 
 wise have seemed artificial, and proved actually 
 enervating. There is a stage in the relations 
 of any large gathering when people begin to 
 know each other too well to be mere acquaint- 
 ances, and yet not well enough to be intimate 
 friends. At this point social intercourse be- 
 comes a discipline ; its exhibition a test of 
 worldly knowledge, its agreeableness a factor 
 to be determined solely by one's capacity to 
 enjoy shallows and circumscribed areas rather 
 than depths and wide fields. A camp, in these 
 circumstances, has many advantages over a
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 23 
 
 country house or a yacht ; one's tent is one's 
 refuge it is less sultry than a room because 
 it has four entrances which cannot be locked, 
 or barred, or closed ; it is fresher than a cabin ; 
 it is large enough for callers and conversation, 
 for music, for letter-writing. 
 
 The large mess-tent, where we all met for 
 our meals, was planned like an Italian villa. 
 The reception-room led into a drawing-room 
 (with side-rooms for cards and smoking), and, 
 from this, one walked through a long passage 
 into a dining-room. Here dinner was served 
 for one hundred and fifty or so of us every 
 evening, in informal parties, at small tables, un- 
 less their Excellencies or their Royal High- 
 nesses happened to be present, in which case 
 the arrangement of their tables only was settled 
 beforehand. 
 
 THE GIRLS AND SCHOOLBOYS OF THE WORLD 
 
 As there were probably several hundred visi- 
 tors and important officials at other camps, a
 
 24 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 series of State banquets took place in the great 
 Shamiana (a flat-roofed tent), near the white 
 pavilion built especially for Lord and Lady 
 Curzon's use during the Durbar. Every guest 
 was invited to one at least of these banquets, 
 which were given with as strict etiquette as they 
 would have been at Government House. 
 English guests, notoriously shy, bored and in- 
 elastic on formal occasions, are at their best 
 taken unawares and hurried into merriment ; 
 surprise them out of self-consciousness and 
 you find them the girls and schoolboys of 
 the world essentially fresh-hearted, kindly- 
 natured, and unspoilt. Affectation and pre- 
 tentiousness in any form are altogether 
 discouraged at the Court and by the Royal 
 Family ; every competent student of modern 
 manners (a science rather dismal than gay) 
 must have observed that the more distinguished 
 the company in England, the more ingenuous 
 and natural is its tone. This is equally true of 
 the best Anglo-Indian society ; the difference 
 between the London and the Calcutta con- 
 tingent was marked enough to be interesting,
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 25 
 
 but not enough to make comparisons ill- 
 judged. Perhaps the London guests had less 
 worldly wisdom of the riper kind. For 
 instance, the open applause at the Durbar of 
 the Princes who wore the most jewels was an 
 extraordinary, if well-meant, blunder ; the 
 cheering of the 9th Lancers was not excusable 
 on the grounds of its childishness ; the attempt 
 to form small coteries was innocent enough, 
 but inappropriate on an occasion which was 
 cosmopolitan or nothing. 
 
 For the rest, the social experiments at the camp 
 were perfectly successful. As I have said, 
 English people are at their best when surprised 
 into agreeableness. On New Year's Eve (to 
 give an example) an impromptu dance sprang 
 up among a few couples after dinner in the 
 mess-tent. The Duke and Duchess of 
 Connaught, who are universally loved for 
 their charming qualities, and the Grand Duke 
 of Hesse came on after a banquet at another 
 camp, and joined the lancers. As the clock 
 struck twelve, every gentleman present wished 
 the Duchess, and every lady present wished the
 
 26 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 Duke, a happy New Year. The spontaneity 
 of all this, the sincerity, gaiety, and homeliness, 
 as it were, illustrated everything that is most 
 admirable in the national character ; after the 
 necessary pomp and circumstance of the great 
 public functions, it was specially refreshing, and 
 it will remain among the most delightful 
 memories of that period. The polo ground, 
 where one watched games or listened to the 
 massed bands, was often crowded, and the 
 jewellers' shops in the Chandi Chauk were 
 filled every morning with anxious bargainers 
 for pearls, emeralds, turquoises, or enamel- 
 work. The native merchant squats on the 
 floor in front of a low counter. He has a 
 cheap tin travelling-box by his side, and here, 
 wrapped up in coloured rags or grimy bags, he 
 keeps the astonishing collection of gems, neck- 
 laces, charms, and rings which form his stock- 
 in-trade. Occasionally fine stones may be 
 bought in this way ; as a rule, however, Indian 
 jewellery is more effective than exquisite, and 
 the choicest gems are almost universally 
 secured by European and American dealers.
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 27 
 
 Nevertheless, there is a strange attraction about 
 an Eastern bazaar. It soon becomes as natural 
 to buy a jewel as it is to choose a hat. The 
 reason why comparatively few people in 
 England are great gem collectors lies in the fact 
 that the shops in Bond Street and Regent 
 Street have a prohibitive, most forbidding air, 
 and women who spend hundreds yearly on 
 their clothes never dream of considering the 
 better and permanent investment offered by the 
 acquisition of precious stones. 
 
 Now, if I have spoken so particularly of 
 manners and amusements, it is because it must 
 not be forgotten in considering the Durbar 
 that for the stranger and onlooker it was less 
 a serious political event than a gorgeous, 
 unique, Eastern entertainment, conceived by an 
 administrative genius of the first rank, and 
 achieved with a splendour, a thoughtfulness 
 wholly abnormal. Right, in the sense that a 
 minor clause is always too important to be 
 overlooked, this view, adopted exclusively from 
 the secondary standpoint, was at once too 
 flippant and too narrow. The fact, however,
 
 28 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 remains to most of the strangers it was a gala 
 on the heroic scale. To gazing travellers it 
 was a spectacle infinitely more amusing than an 
 average Jubilee thanksgiving, and better worth 
 the money than a Passion Play or a fortnight at 
 Bayreuth. As a Coronation festival, it was 
 meant to be, and it proved, an exhilarating 
 affair ; but it was not a show, not a circus, not 
 the display of any one individual taste, no 
 matter how perfectly disciplined and justified, 
 for the grandiose. Political exigencies alone 
 could have rendered so costly a pageant desir- 
 able, could have given the energy behind it all 
 the necessary power, inspiration, magnetism, in 
 fact, which must be in every triumphant under- 
 taking whether carried out on miniature local 
 or vast Imperial lines. 
 
 The Durbar was held for the Princes and 
 people of India, and the policy of the Viceroy 
 goes toward the cultivation of those talents 
 in the British Government which Joubert 
 attributed to the Roman Catholic Church 
 " the talent of making herself loved, the talent 
 of making men happy.'' Now, avoiding any
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 29 
 
 reference to the essential differences between 
 the supreme ecclesiastical authority as it is 
 understood by Roman Catholics, and kingly 
 authority as it is understood by Protestants, 
 it may be allowed, without offending the most 
 delicate religious sensitiveness, that the Vatican, 
 at the height of its secular power, stood, as a 
 political force, in much the same relation 
 toward the countries of Europe as England 
 now stands toward the feudatory States of 
 India. The analogy is broad ; it must not, 
 and need not, be pressed too closely. It will 
 serve its purpose in giving some idea of the 
 situation the privileges of the native chiefs 
 and the suzerainty of England a suzerainty, 
 moreover, free from the dangerous and com- 
 plicated duty of enforcing adhesion to the 
 doctrines of one faith and one Church. In Lord 
 Curzon's view and at this point it is best to 
 quote from his own addresses " the cause of 
 the Indian aristocracy is bound up with the 
 British Government in this country, and stands 
 or falls with it. Native Princes are the natural 
 pillars of the State ; they have that indefinable
 
 30 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 quality endearing them to the people that arises 
 from their being born of the soil. It is 
 essential, therefore, to the welfare of a nation 
 that its aristocracy should not be divorced from 
 its public life." 
 
 THE RESPONSIBILITIES OF RANK 
 
 It must not be supposed, nevertheless, that 
 the present Viceroy forgets, in reminding the 
 chiefs of their prerogatives, to express himself 
 in strong terms on the subject of their respon- 
 sibilities. u The Princes and nobles in India," 
 he said at Mayo College, "have to fight 
 against a double danger. On the one side is 
 the survival of the archaic idea that rank is a 
 dispensation from work instead of a call to it, 
 and that a chief need do nothing in the world 
 beyond spend the money drawn from his people 
 and enjoy himself. The second danger is that, 
 in our desire to train up the rising generation 
 to a wider conception of their duties, we may
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 31 
 
 allow their training to run ahead of their op- 
 portunities, and may produce in them inclina- 
 tions or capacities which are unsuited to their 
 surroundings, or for which there is afterwards 
 an insufficient field." From this last remark 
 it is abundantly clear that Lord Curzon does 
 not seek to conjure up those spasmodic ambi- 
 tions which degenerate always into bitterness, 
 if not active revolution. Nor does he promise 
 the ruler any indulgence. " When wrong 
 things go on in British India," he says, "the 
 light of public criticism beats fiercely upon the 
 person or spot. Native States have no right 
 to claim any immunity from the same process." 
 Again : " The chiefs are called upon to rule 
 not an English but an Indian people. It is 
 not by English models alone, but by an adap- 
 tation of Eastern prescription to the Western 
 standard, that the ruler can hope to 
 succeed. . . . He must remain true to his 
 religion, his traditions, and his people."
 
 32 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 THE ORIENTAL ARISTOCRAT 
 
 This, then, was what the Durbar meant a 
 proclamation of suzerainty, the unification of 
 India under one supreme Government. 
 European Sovereigns know each other. Some 
 of them are closely related, or connected by 
 near family ties. Many of the Indian Princes 
 had never seen their peers before they met on 
 this occasion at Delhi, and here, where race 
 distinctions, from the subtleties of religious 
 belief to the exterior differences of dress, are 
 more decisive than they are in any other 
 continent of the globe, the achievement of 
 making such hereditary strangers acquainted 
 with each other was in itself an action of the 
 highest importance and consequence. At the 
 evening party especially given for the native 
 chiefs, Europeans had an opportunity of being 
 presented to the most remarkable, of observing 
 them closely, and in some cases of conversing 
 with them, either through interpreters or in 
 English. The Oriental aristocrat is better
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 33 
 
 studied in a room than on an elephant. He 
 has, as a rule, finely-cut features : eyes which 
 seem to express every possible evil and good 
 emotion at a single glance, an effeminate 
 figure, a clumsy gait, and an air of unmistak- 
 able intelligence. It has become a commonplace 
 among the untravelled to speak of the noble 
 Oriental manner, and to contrast the vulgar 
 familiarities of modern European society with 
 the dignity, courtesy, and sublime tact of 
 Eastern etiquette. 
 
 A desultory study of Omar Khayyam, 
 The Arabian Nights, and The Light of Asia 
 has no doubt produced this opinion in the 
 people's mind. No one on the spot would 
 maintain that the deportment of the Indian 
 chiefs could bear comparison with that of well- 
 bred Italians, Frenchmen, or Englishmen. 
 They may be amiable, and a number are 
 probably sincere, but they are curiously lacking 
 in grace or graciousness. The young Princes 
 of the Imperial Cadet Corps have been drilled 
 and disciplined into gallantry, but their dis- 
 tinction in this respect is still so unapproachable 
 
 c
 
 34 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 that they have contracted an exaggerated form 
 of that very " swagger" which is most disliked 
 and condemned in certain types of the English 
 cavalry officer. This will pass, of course 
 mainly because the Anglo-Indian official, 
 whether military or civil, detests any display 
 of what is known as " side." He will not 
 tolerate it, and no egoism could be strong 
 enough, no vanity blind enough, to resist the 
 healthy cure waiting at Simla or in Calcutta for 
 the man or woman with any minute tendency 
 toward self-importance. But meanwhile native 
 noblemen who go abroad assimilate, most un- 
 fortunately, all that is astonishing and silly, 
 lamentable and decadent, in Western life. 
 They represent not a new but a most 
 ancient aristocracy ; they gravitate by an in- 
 stinctive, perhaps irresistible, sympathy toward 
 the many inane, often vicious, descendants of 
 the once powerful families of feudal Europe. 
 They drift about killing time, imagining great 
 passions, squandering money, craving notoriety, 
 stimulating the curiosity and wonder of a multi- 
 tude too wise to follow their example, but not
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 35 
 
 wise enough to treat them with indifference. 
 No statesman can foretell, no legislation could 
 prevent, the consequences, good or bad, which 
 must come from the inevitable closer association 
 of rich Orientals with richer Europeans. But 
 whereas the European has the faculty of making 
 money or starting afresh after any loss of 
 fortune or prestige, the Indian chief has no 
 such recuperative power. When he has spent 
 his capital, sold his jewels, his resources are at 
 an end. He has had no training for business. 
 As a " guinea pig " the last humiliating and 
 fast depreciating mainstay of the impoverished 
 English nobleman the penniless and landless 
 Maharajah is quite useless. He becomes, in- 
 deed, " the brave music of a distant drum." 
 
 THE MAKERS OF INDIA 
 
 Lord Curzon has uttered the plainest warn- 
 ings ; he has raised the standard of chivalry of
 
 36 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 the Indian Princes ; he has proclaimed his 
 belief in them ; he has appealed to them for 
 their own sakes to remember the duties in- 
 separable from high rank ; he has spoken with 
 no double tongue, and from no hidden or 
 sinister or complicated motive in favour of 
 what is certainly the greatest modern develop- 
 ment of the feudal system. India, until that 
 system became organised, was a hemisphere of 
 hells. That this is no longer the case is due 
 to the magnificent administrative work done by 
 Englishmen some of them already famous in 
 history, others patiently obscure, and never now 
 to be remembered outside a small local circle. 
 The native Press, and certain journals in the 
 English Press, which have criticised with much 
 bitterness and more ignorance the pleasures and 
 banquets, the reviews and the balls, enjoyed by 
 the English officials and their friends at Delhi 
 and Calcutta, have quite overlooked the fact 
 that Englishmen work here as they work no- 
 where else ; that the life means in nearly every 
 instance the hardest possible to a European 
 constitution ; that the duties and responsibilities
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 37 
 
 are always great and often thankless ; that the 
 rewards for distinguished or faithful service are 
 most inadequate ; that any possible diversion 
 or amusement offered to British residents by 
 the Coronation festivities, as apart from the 
 actual Durbar, ought to have received the 
 heartfelt support of the entire Indian popula- 
 tion. And if we may judge by the appearance 
 of the vast native crowds, their smiles, their 
 mildness, their interest in all the proceedings, 
 this was the case. After all, as Georges Sand 
 once wrote to a discontented politician, the 
 people at least have great common sense.
 
 IV 
 
 THE STATE BALL 
 
 LESS than a hundred years before Horace Wai- 
 pole commenced his imperishable correspond- 
 ence ; a little more than a hundred years before 
 'The History of Clarissa Harlowe set senti- 
 mental Europe into floods of tears ; while 
 Innocent X. was struggling in vain against the 
 policy of the Hapsburgs and the decline of the 
 Holy Roman Empire ; while Charles I., of 
 unhappy, if blessed, memory, was fighting his 
 doomed cause with Cromwell ; in the year that 
 Louis Quatorze was born (as some pretend, 
 miraculously), and Richelieu was at the summit 
 of his fortunes ; when America, little valued by 
 
 the English, was beginning to attract the notice 
 
 38
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 39 
 
 of French commercial enterprise, thirty years 
 after the founding of Quebec, seventy-four 
 years after St Peter's at Rome was finished, 
 Shah Jehan was building the most magnifi- 
 cent Palace in the East perhaps in the 
 world the beautiful Palace of the Moguls 
 at Delhi. It is made of red sandstone and 
 white marble ; some of its walls and arches 
 are still inlaid with malachite, lapis-lazuli, 
 bloodstone, agate, cornelian and jasper ; there 
 were once silver ceilings, silk carpets, and 
 hangings embroidered with gems ; the pillars 
 were hung with brocades ; the recesses were 
 filled with china and vases of flowers ; 
 treasures of the goldsmith's craft, also, no 
 doubt from Italy and France the Italy of 
 the Renaissance, and the France of Mary 
 of Medici ; beyond doubt there was the 
 famous Peacock Throne "a sort of large 
 fourpost bed, all made of gold, with two pea- 
 cocks standing behind it, their tails expanded, 
 and set with sapphires, rubies, emeralds, pearls, 
 and diamonds, while a parrot cut out of a single 
 emerald perched upon the tester." On the
 
 40 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 front side of the canopy was a diamond the 
 Koh-i-noor, now among the Crown Jewels of 
 England. 
 
 "A SUPREME PLEASURE-HOUSE 
 
 Tavernier, the jeweller, who was at Delhi in 
 1665, beheld these wonders, and thought they 
 represented, all told, " two hundred millions of 
 livres." And the terrible Nadir Shah came 
 from Persia in 1739, drawn sight-seeing by 
 stories of luxury and pomp. He sipped his 
 coffee on the glorious couch ; he dreamed 
 dreams ; he saw visions ; and next day, after 
 watching a massacre of the citizens of Delhi, he 
 broke up the Peacock Throne. But although 
 he took much plunder (valued at eighty 
 millions sterling), he left the proud inscription
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 41 
 
 under the cornice, where it remains to this day, 
 ironically triumphant : 
 
 " If on earth be an Eden of bliss, 
 It is this, it is this, it is this." 
 
 Nor could he take away the great Audience 
 Hall, " similar in plan to a Gothic Cathedral," 
 with its two-and-thirty columns sustaining as 
 many arches, " inlaid with finest work, like the 
 great Duke's chapel the Medicean chapel at 
 Florence " ; he could not take away the 
 Jasmine Tower, the gardens, the fourteen 
 courts, the baths, the grilles of alabaster, the 
 little pavilions and kiosks, the nobility of the 
 vast design, the genius of the master-builders. 
 Many descriptions have been written of this 
 Palace, but in giving the rich details one loses 
 the delicacy of the whole effect. A precious 
 stone is not beautiful because it is large, or 
 costly, or extraordinary, but because of its 
 colour, or its position, in some decorative 
 scheme. Carved marble may be easily vulgar. 
 Nothing, indeed, is so repulsive as inferior 
 marble-work. The streets, cemeteries, restored
 
 42 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 churches, and modern edifices throughout 
 Europe offer testimony to this fact. It is not 
 the splendour of the Diwan-i-Am and the 
 Diwan-i-Khas, but their exquisite symmetry 
 which enchant the eye ; it is the design of the 
 inlay, not the rarity of the materials employed, 
 which seems to cast upon the walls some far- 
 off reflection from " the City not made with 
 hands." Nevertheless the atmosphere of the 
 Palace, and its appeal to the heart, is that of the 
 earth and the fulness thereof. After two-and- 
 a-half centuries of tragic, mysterious history it 
 stands, true to its inscription, a supreme 
 pleasure-house the one perfect temple in 
 existence for pride and the flesh. 
 
 If one could imagine the Joy of Life 
 wandering restless, homeless, and forgotten 
 through the world, she would halt at last at 
 Shah Jehan's Eden of Bliss and make it her 
 abiding-place. It is perfect, because of all 
 architects the Hindu, the Buddhist, the 
 Egyptian, the Jew, the Pagan, the Christian 
 the Mohammedan alone could believe in the 
 permanency and everlasting dominion of the
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 43 
 
 senses. To him there was no mockery in 
 earthly passions ; to him there was no need of 
 Epicurean philosophy to dissuade his mind 
 from pondering too bitterly on the evanes- 
 cence of every delight. He did not say, with 
 the old heretic Omar : 
 
 "And if the wine you drink, the lip you press, 
 End in the nothing all things end in Yes ; 
 Then fancy while thou art, thou art but what 
 Thou shalt be Nothing. Thou shalt not be less." 
 
 He did not have before him, as the reward for 
 a life of self-abnegation, the indefinable Nir- 
 vana, which, according to some, is a country 
 of celestial happiness, to others a state of 
 absolute annihilation, where man is delivered 
 for ever from life, its evils, and its fugitive 
 gladness. To him the absorption of his own 
 soul hereafter in the universal spirit offered no 
 recompense for religious austerities and medita- 
 tion here ; for him the bliss of Moksha was 
 neither credible nor alluring ; to him there was 
 no blessedness in mourning, no inheritance for 
 the meek and lowly, no vanity in youth, no
 
 44 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 folly in love, no snare in bodily beauty, no 
 deception in riches, no adder in the cup, no 
 hidden woe in festivals. And so he was able 
 to create with exultation and security a palace 
 to the greater glory of man. In the gayest 
 capitals of Christendom there is a lurking self- 
 contempt and a certain defiance about the 
 mansions, whether new or old, of the rich. 
 They are built, let us say, to last long enough. 
 Royal abodes are grave and chilling ; the new 
 hotels, restaurants, theatres and music-halls, 
 have a forced brightness ; their gorgeousness 
 is tawdry ; little in them is even tolerable by 
 daylight ; one feels that they were all conceived 
 in melancholy, as a financial speculation for the 
 use of a fatigued, feverish, and unbelieving 
 race. 
 
 I had intended to describe the State Ball : 
 and have attempted, instead, to give some idea 
 of the place in which it was held ; for, given 
 uniforms, animated faces, new gowns, jewels, 
 military music, and excitement, one great ball 
 is precisely the same as another. Whether 
 Europeans have the art of enjoying themselves
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 45 
 
 naturally, or dancing with grace, or fitting 
 harmoniously in the background of pure 
 romance, are side questions which each of us 
 may answer according to our experience, our 
 prejudices, our education, or our honesty. It 
 cannot be maintained that the average waltz, as 
 a series of movements, is dignified or pretty : 
 it may be amusing, and it is frequently to use 
 a paradox a languorous romp. So far as 
 enjoyment is calculable, the guests at Delhi 
 seemed wholly enthusiastic. But among the 
 many charming beings to be seen in the vast 
 crowd, the woman who presented the most 
 romantic appearance and embodied the romantic 
 ideal was Lady Curzon herself. A perpetual 
 reason for this lies, no doubt, in the fragile 
 beauty of her countenance ; it does not follow, 
 however, that the possession of beauty makes, 
 in the modern, for romance. Lady Curzon 
 suggests this rare sentiment, because she does 
 not smear her face with red-and-white washes, 
 nor disfigure her head by the pyramids of curls, 
 pads, fringes, tulle and ribbons, which, pinned 
 on without regard for proportion, balance, or
 
 46 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 line, alter many handsome members of English 
 society until they resemble the ignoble adver- 
 tisements of fashionable wig-makers. English 
 women have, as a rule, far better hair than 
 other Europeans, the Germans excepted ; but 
 they dress it in the most extravagant styles ; 
 they have also fine complexions which they 
 take pleasure in hiding and good figures. 
 Nevertheless, they seldom wear their clothes 
 well. Dress counts for so much in picturesque- 
 ness : clothes nowadays are made of everything 
 except ideas. Lady Curzon always wears 
 elaborately woven or embroidered materials, 
 but she never overloads them with ornaments ; 
 she does not pile lace on passementerie, mix 
 ostrich plumes with flowers, and sprinkle the 
 whole with spangles ; nor, affecting homeliness, 
 does she trust to a necklace, some bracelets, and 
 a tiara to counterbalance the deficiencies of soiled 
 or ill-made garments ; nor, for the purpose of 
 inspiring the sense of what is called a "pre- 
 sence," does her hair visibly augment in 
 proportion to the considerableness of the 
 occasion.
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 47 
 
 Beauty is not given to one woman in many 
 hundreds, but every woman has at least some 
 measure of individuality, and it is surely better 
 to preserve this and be recognised by it, than to 
 put on stereotyped vulgarities which harden the 
 softest features and form the most repellent 
 frame possible to any face. We all feel the 
 attraction of a poetical appearance, and fortun- 
 ately it depends rather on the atmosphere one 
 can suggest than on the accident of a straight 
 nose, or a fresh complexion, or liquid eyes, or 
 a smiling mouth, or a gentle brow. In speak- 
 ing of poetry and the poetic, moreover, it 
 should be remembered that there are many 
 kinds of poetry : some of it is peculiar for its 
 vigour and downrightness, its ruggedness and 
 simplicity. A lady, for instance, who deter- 
 mined, on entering a ball-room, to call up the 
 best quotations from Keats, would be fore- 
 doomed, I think, to disaster. This reflection 
 brings me back to the Ball at Delhi. There 
 were nearly four thousand persons present, 
 including a number of Chiefs in full dress ; the 
 Duke and Duchess of Connaught and the
 
 48 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 Grand Duke of Hesse took part with their 
 Excellencies in the State Lancers ; ladies who 
 had chairs stood upon them in order to watch 
 every figure in that historic dance. At supper, 
 I am told, the following amount of nourish- 
 ment was gratefully consumed : 
 
 8,OOO eggs. 300 partridges. 
 
 360 quarts of soup. 94 hams, 
 
 i, 600 entries. 130 pheasants. 
 
 300 jellies and creams. 150 tongues. 
 
 200 dishes of pastry. 9,000 rolls. 
 
 300 turkeys. 8 boars' heads. 
 
 100 legs of lamb. 1,000 plates of sandwiches. 
 
 700 chickens. 150 quarts of ice cream. 
 
 400 quails. 850 dishes of sweets. 
 
 About three o'clock in the morning the last 
 carriages drove away ; their lights flickered 
 later like fire-flies below the electric globes 
 and great arc-lamps of the camps. The stars 
 which had seen the ancient kings of whom even 
 the stones have kept no record, which had lit 
 the last Emperor of Hindostan on his way 
 forth to his last battle, which had looked upon 
 the majesty and the downfall of the mighty
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 49 
 
 Moguls, which had trembled at the horrors of 
 the Mutiny, shone down on Hindoos, 
 Mohammedans, and Christians sleepily dis- 
 cussing with their respective associates the 
 brilliant success of the greatest entertainment 
 ever given in the Indian Empire.
 
 CALCUTTA 
 
 EVERY traveller is invited to give his impres- 
 sion of India. Here, on the spot, it is pro- 
 bably an act of flattering courtesy ; at home it 
 must often mean a real desire for news or 
 information. Yet how many people realise, I 
 wonder, that the Province of Bengal alone is 
 three-fourths the size of France ; that the 
 North-West Provinces are nearly equal in 
 area to the whole of Great Britain ; that the 
 Punjab has the same extent as the Kingdom of 
 Italy ; that Oudh is equal to Belgium and 
 Holland together ; that Madras is a little 
 larger that Great Britain and Ireland ; that 
 the Bombay Presidency is about as large as 
 England and Scotland ; that the whole Empire 
 
 5
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 51 
 
 under British rule is somewhat larger than 
 Europe without Russia? One might as well 
 ask a tourist, passing for the first time, as 
 quickly as express trains and the necessities 
 of sleeping, eating, resting, and sight-seeing 
 permit, from London to Edinburgh, from 
 there to Killarney, from Queenstown to Paris 
 and Naples, from Sicily to Constantinople and 
 Athens, from Rome to Vienna, Brussels, 
 Stockholm, and Amsterdam, to give his im- 
 pressions of Europe, its politics, its beauties, 
 its art. To be sure, he will have some im- 
 pressions. The individual observes what he 
 has been trained to observe, and thus any 
 view, so long as it is sincerely personal, has 
 interest on psychological, if on no other 
 grounds. 
 
 One of the classic authorities on India, 
 for example, has described Calcutta briefly as 
 "a town set in a swamp out of which there 
 is only a single carriage road." After that 
 the humblest superficial judgment can but err 
 on the side of elaboration. Another eminent 
 critic gives a report which is even less pro-
 
 52 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 mising. " The native portion of Calcutta, 
 although full of wealth, can hardly be sur- 
 passed in mere ugliness. People who are 
 comfortably rich are often content to live in 
 hovels ; and among the Zemindars and Rajahs 
 of Bengal, with -incomes which even in England 
 would be thought immense, there is hardly 
 one who lives in a house which, in its decora- 
 tion and architecture, is not detestable." This 
 may not be over severe, yet to the mind it 
 offers no real picture of the city founded by 
 Job Charnock. The charm of Calcutta works 
 slowly, and apart from Government House 
 and its garden, there is nothing which at 
 once, rushing in as certain atmospheres do, 
 fills the imagination ; and there is nothing 
 which, by enchanting grace or romantic history, 
 at once stirs the mind. But the charm is 
 the more enduring because it is so slow, so 
 unassertive, so uncommon. Calcutta, in fact, 
 may be compared with the subtle women of 
 history, whose portraits in State galleries leave 
 us wondering how they altered the fates of 
 Empires and consumed the hearts of men.
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 53 
 
 Its founder, Job Charnock, was, we are 
 told, " not a beautiful person. He was a 
 block of rough-hewn British manhood always 
 a faithful man to the East India Company." 
 In the year 1690 more than one hundred 
 and sixty years after the Portuguese had first 
 cast anchor in the Hoogly Charnock, with 
 thirty sullen followers, who confused the very 
 name of the place with Golgotha, climbed 
 the eastern banks to the three ruined mud 
 huts which made up the cotton thread bazaar 
 of Sutaneti. Its swampy land sloped away 
 into a forest path which led to the shrine 
 of Kali, Kali, the indefinable and obscene 
 goddess of destruction, with a black face, 
 three eyes (symbolising the present, the past, 
 and the future), a long gilt tongue hanging 
 out of her mouth, four arms, her clothing a 
 garland of men's skulls. The forest path 
 has been cleared away, the jungle and the 
 marshes are now built upon ; but Kali is still 
 worshipped. Goats and kids are sacrificed to 
 her daily ; men and women, prostrated on the 
 ground, worship her till the priest closes the
 
 54 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 door of her temple each night. It is almost 
 impossible to discover just what is felt about, 
 and feared, and, it may be, loved in Kali. 
 She is there, and she remains, with her history 
 and her secrets and her power, eternally 
 mysterious, eternally baffling a world of 
 symbols to the metaphysician, a menace to 
 the ignorant, a reality to the despairing. 
 
 " The midday halt of Charnock 
 
 Grew a city. 
 As the fungus sprouts chaotic from its bed 
 
 So it spread 
 Chance-directed, chance-erected " 
 
 Charnock himself spent two terrible years 
 there, struggling against fever, the monsoons, 
 the heat, the discouragement and disloyalty of his 
 men, the ever-threatening death t( in the long 
 pool." It rose at last, and called him, but 
 his city is now among the first in Asia, and 
 holds the fifth place among the cities of the 
 world. 
 
 A stranger who arrives at Howrah for the 
 first time will have to wait in a large railway- 
 station, resembling the Gare du Nord, while
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 55 
 
 natives from all districts, squatting or perched 
 by their bedding and tin boxes, maintain a 
 chatter as incessant as the crowing of the 
 crows ; and half-naked coolies, urged on by 
 bearers, some in cap and livery, some in white 
 linen suits and turbans, stagger with luggage 
 to the bullock-carts and " ticca-gharries," 
 The "ticca-gharry," which is the cab, the 
 fiacre^ the gondola of the nation, deserves a 
 whole treatise to itself. Those of the first 
 class resemble the old-fashioned barouches 
 relics of a once noble establishment, which 
 one sees occasionally in some provincial 
 joiner's yard ; others are closed, and one sits 
 behind doors and panels like shutters ; others 
 are much the same as the familiar " fly," 
 which most people have used, but few indeed 
 have ever seen built. It is tolerably certain 
 that they are never new, and their career, which 
 starts apparently before the beginning of time, 
 is unhampered by stuffed cushions and un- 
 assisted by springs. The " ticca-gharry " is 
 generally clean, and the drivers, if one delivers 
 a steady course of instructions in a loud,
 
 56 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 threatening, and indefatigable voice, are 
 honestly eager to reach some kind of destina- 
 tion. But they must be watched and guided, 
 or they will rush into every obstacle, whether 
 a wall or a lamp-post, and perpetually lose 
 the way, which, failing constant admonition, 
 they seem never able to find. 
 
 As I crossed the bridge over the Hoogly, 
 I was reminded, for a moment, of Dublin, 
 of Cork, of the quarter near the great wharves 
 of New York, of the earliest streets in old 
 Boston. Then I saw the .Hindoos bathing, 
 and the curious, irrelevant, unexpected associa- 
 tion of memories faded away, and I was 
 conscious only of the strangeness of the 
 whole scene. On the east bank of the 
 river, the first white or yellow buildings 
 with green shutters, the warehouses, the mean 
 shops, and the saloons so curiously like those 
 of the Bowery in New York are not im- 
 posing. The individuality of Calcutta is not 
 felt till one reaches the Maidan, a plain about 
 a mile and a half in diameter, bounded by 
 the river and Fort William on one side, and
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 57 
 
 on the other by buildings of every sort, from 
 the principal hotels to the Presidency jail, 
 from the fashionable shops to the Cathedral, 
 from the theatre to the private villas of 
 merchants and others, from the clubs to the 
 Bishop's Palace. Some of the streets leading 
 from the main road are Italian or Spanish in 
 character ; beautiful white or purple or blue 
 vines hang over the garden walls and gate- 
 ways ; the houses have fine verandahs, 
 pavilions and balconies, imposing porticoes 
 and large, green-shuttered windows. Much 
 time is spent daily in paying calls between noon 
 and two o'clock a custom which, apart from 
 its inconvenience, has compensations. A 
 morning drive through these attractive roads 
 and rows, where the leading officials and their 
 wives live during the season, is a pleasure 
 which gains by familiarity new effects of light 
 and shade, fresh aspects, unexpected notes of 
 colour, constantly strike the artistic sense. 
 In India the best domestic architecture is 
 admirable, and it suggests what the same 
 thing too often fails to suggest in the cities
 
 58 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 of Europe individual existences. Anatole 
 France has pointed out, in a passage of 
 sardonic humour, the ignominy of the huge, 
 modern flat-buildings, where the routine of 
 modern life under civilisation, deprived of any 
 possibility of reserve, or mystery, or sentiment, 
 is -symbolised by row upon row of sleeping, 
 eating and living rooms, all identical in plan, 
 position, and outlook, and differing only in 
 the prices paid for their rent or the graduated 
 luxuriousness of their furniture. 
 
 AT NIGHT 
 
 The business, native, and less fashionable 
 streets of Calcutta, again, are cosmopolitan ; 
 at points one can easily be reminded of the 
 great avenues in the less-frequented parts of 
 modern Rome. It never suggests London, 
 however, or Paris, or Berlin. Although the
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 59 
 
 French influence was once considerable, and 
 the English influence is now supreme, the 
 winter seat of the Indian Government is wholly 
 un-French and un-English. Illuminated as 
 the Orientals understand illumination it be- 
 comes beyond description picturesque the 
 crowds on the pavement, the thousands of 
 lights placed on bamboo frames, the barbarous 
 music, (it is claimed, nevertheless, that the 
 musical scale of India is doubly more delicate 
 than ours) ; the archways and roof gardens 
 hung with Japanese lamps ; the odd open 
 shops, which are in reality three-walled rooms 
 without windows, or so many miniature 
 stages ; the effigies of gods and goddesses ; 
 the Nautch girls made of cheap balloon silk, 
 and worked ingeniously by wires, the gaudy 
 prints of the Royal Family and their Ex- 
 cellencies, drawn by native artists, and all 
 made to resemble, in some curious way, the 
 Hindoo deities. Then the river is covered 
 with lighted ships, and the noble designs of 
 the chief public buildings stand out in lines 
 of disciplined fire, where, now and again, a
 
 60 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 lithe coolie, as dark, deft, and noiseless as 
 some insect on a vine, balancing himself at a 
 great height on the framework of bamboo, 
 re-lights some flickering or faded lamp. 
 
 THE PUBLIC GARDENS 
 
 In the afternoon one can hear the band play 
 in the Eden Gardens, or walk in the Zoo- 
 logical Gardens of their kind the prettiest 
 in the world. There, too, the lion's roar 
 seems as natural as the twittering of swallows 
 in England. At sunset the greedy otters 
 (Dante himself speaks of their greediness) 
 squeal at every passer-by for more supper ; 
 the flamingoes by the lake strut through their 
 pavane the primeval measure of the 
 Court minuet one may wonder at the 
 mandrill's blue cheeks and scarlet nose. Then
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 61 
 
 there is the racecourse a brilliant scene on 
 Saturday afternoons. The Botanical Gardens 
 the Kew of the East is on the other side of 
 the river. Wise people spend the day there, 
 wandering down shady alleys, resting in palm- 
 houses made without glass, telling stories 
 about the famous banyan tree, and making 
 unpardonable mistakes in botany.
 
 VI 
 
 A ALIPORE, B$RRACKPORE, AND 
 DARJEELING 
 
 AT Alipore stands the villa once occupied by 
 Warren Hastings. Some maintain that the 
 place is haunted ; certainly it has, as it were, a 
 hushed life. The empty chairs and sofas in 
 the drawing-room seem occupied ; one fears to 
 speak lest one should break rudely upon a 
 private if unheard conversation. Are the once 
 pleasant rooms inhabited by the unseen and 
 the inaudible ? Could one, by peering long 
 enough, see some ghostly shadow of the 
 Baroness Imhof and her auburn ringlets ? 
 Did Mrs Grand ever look out of these windows 
 and dream, by moonlight, that she would one 
 
 day win her way through the Court of the 
 
 62
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 63 
 
 great Napoleon, marry Talleyrand, and become 
 the Princess of Benevento? Poor phantom 
 Princess ! Even the name and inscription on 
 her tomb in Paris was made so "readily 
 effaceable " that not the " slightest indication 
 of it now remains." But perhaps she danced 
 once, or oftener, at Alipore ; perhaps she 
 played cards there. Historians think not. I 
 fancied I saw her standing by a pillar "the 
 tall and elegant nymph" of the memoir 
 writers, "with more feminine softness than 
 strength of mind ; with eyes of the brightest 
 blue ; with golden curls ; very beautiful, very 
 indolent ; her nose slightly turned up." Lord 
 Curzon has bought this historic property, and 
 it is now used as a guest house for the native 
 Princes when they visit Calcutta ; but its early 
 associations are still overpowering. It was 
 inhabited by the restless and the unhappy, 
 and the faintest breeze there on the hottest 
 day comes laden with sighs.
 
 64 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 ''THE MOST DELIGHTFUL HOUSE IN INDIA 
 
 For repose and joy there is the Viceroy's 
 residence at Bfcrrackpore, where the birds 
 whistle in the seventy dialects of Bengal, and 
 sing "cuckoo" in Hindostanee. One would, 
 by choice, arrive in the evening, when the 
 hundreds of fire-flies dart through the air, and 
 the pergolas leading from the river seem like 
 the mysterious groves which surrounded every 
 Palace of every Arabian Princess in the fairy 
 tales. A vine of bougainvillea covers the en- 
 trance. This splendid web of purple flowers 
 shelters the verandah from the sun by day, and 
 by night makes it as fresh as an arbour in a 
 Florentine garden. Roses grow by the 
 thousand at B&rrackpore ; the rose orchard at 
 twilight which comes and goes as swiftly as it 
 does in the Far West is one of the unforget- 
 table acres of the earth ; the perfume is as soft 
 as the air ; the hues, without blending, glow in 
 fragrant and serene contrast ; the beds are
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 65 
 
 measured and orderly the red, the yellow, 
 the white, the pink, are each in their own rows. 
 Further on one can find the tall eucharis^lilies 
 edging along the path ; violets fill another 
 large space, tube-roses another, morning- 
 glories another, mignonette another. In the 
 spring one can hear the nightingales sing. 
 Whenever the house is occupied, kites, which 
 are almost tame, hover near the banyan trees, 
 hoping to snatch some food from the lunch 
 tables which are spread there. The Viceroy 
 and Lady Curzon spend their Sundays during 
 the winter at this villa, which was built origin- 
 ally by Lord Minto early in the last century. 
 Lord Canning lived there ; Lady Canning's 
 monument, with its pathetic inscription, is in 
 the grounds. It was the favourite home of 
 Lord and Lady Lansdowne. It must be, for 
 Europeans, the most delightful house in India. 
 The journey both ways by launch on the 
 Hoogly offers a living chronicle of Anglo- 
 Indian civilisation. One sees ironworks, build- 
 ings new and old, ghats where they burn the 
 dead, bazaars, hospitals, Hindoo temples, Mo- 
 
 E
 
 66 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 hammedan mosques, cotton, gun, and sugar 
 factories, jetties, villas, gardens. And then 
 it must never be forgotten that the Hoogly 
 belongs to the sacred river ; the religion of 
 centuries moves in its uncertain current and 
 breathes from its shifting waters. 
 
 FROM THE SEA TO THE CLOUDS 
 
 From Calcutta to the Himalayas is from the 
 sea to the clouds something less than 400 
 miles as a journey. You cross the Ganges by 
 moonlight if you choose the right date and, 
 in the early morning, after a night in the 
 train, you reach the mountains by the little 
 steam tram which resembles a toy, and runs 
 on a line which cost in engineering about 
 twenty-seven lakhs of rupees. This unpreten- 
 tious, miraculous machine glides first through
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 67 
 
 swamps and a region of forest trees ; it rushes 
 over the Mahanadi River, passes by tea plan- 
 tations and bungalows, woods and tracts of 
 jungle ; then, with turns and bends and loops 
 and backings and windings, the climb above 
 the valley begins in earnest, towards the peaks 
 1000 feet each hour. The point aimed 
 at is 7000 feet, when you descend a few 
 hundred feet to Darjeeling. This exhilarating 
 experience seems perfect until you take the 
 journey homewards by trolley, when you have 
 no engine or other cars in front to hide the 
 magnificent scene or the amazing intricacies of 
 the road. Darjeeling itself is not so striking 
 in its beauty as Lucerne or Chamounix or St 
 Moritz. It may be questioned whether it is 
 beautiful at all. The town has no plan, and it 
 straggles apparently over several hillsides. But 
 three to name no more of its attractions 
 offer atonement for any shortcomings in its 
 symmetry the excursion to Tiger Hill before 
 sunrise, when the lights in the valley look like 
 fallen stars ; the descent, through enchanting 
 scenes, to the meeting of the Rungeet and the
 
 68 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 Teesta Rivers ; and the walk in the native 
 bazaar. 
 
 Comparisons between the Himalayas and 
 the Alps are commonly, and I think wrongly, 
 made. The vast, vague, and sentimental terms 
 applied to mountain scenery are in the vocabu- 
 lary of every tourist, and cover pages of every 
 guide-book ; unless one has something to offer 
 which is peculiarly illuminating or profound 
 on this tortured subject, silence is best. 
 Mountain regions, moreover, demand the 
 most faithful study. Let me confess that I 
 have not the audacity to attempt a description 
 of the sunlight on Kinchinjunga and Mount 
 Everest, merely because I once rose at four in 
 the morning and saw that glory. As well 
 spend an hour at daybreak with a pilgrimage 
 outside St Peter's at Rome, and write an ex- 
 position of Renaissance architecture. One 
 receives a stupendous and stupefying impres- 
 sion of forces unrealised, heights unreachable, 
 depths incalculable, worlds elsewhere, cities 
 without sites, towering, it may be, between 
 the earth we know a little and the sky we
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 69 
 
 question in vain. We may send our souls 
 there, but we must leave our language, our 
 daily similes and metaphors, our secret idols, 
 our weights and measures, behind. 
 
 BETWEEN THE MOUNTAINS AND THE BAZAAR 
 
 The descent to the Teesta valley means a 
 day of pure romance in the Spanish manner. 
 You pass tea-gardens, plum trees in blossom, 
 oak, chestnut, and magnolia, laurel, hydrangea, 
 rhododendron, and palm trees, slopes and 
 chasms, purple hills and black peaks, the 
 dark green river running between sands as 
 white as snow, the singing peasants, the dark- 
 eyed children, the pig driver with his pigs, 
 the boys driving cattle, the nut sellers, the 
 drinking booths, the girls washing by the way-
 
 70 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 side, the tea-gatherers. How is it possible to 
 convey so many sights and sounds, so much 
 colour and movement, such light and heat, 
 on paper ? At Darjeeling my favourite haunt 
 was the bazaar. Here one saw a row of barbers, 
 a row of tailors, a row of silver and turquoise 
 dealers, a row of moneylenders from the plains 
 for the reckless nature lovers of the hills. One 
 could buy skins of beasts, turquoise earrings 
 silver girdles, prints of the gods, bangles, 
 dreadful drugs from the native apothecary, 
 prayer wheels, rice, maize, yellow ochre and 
 powdered carmine for one's face, bangles and 
 dress materials. The girls often have their 
 cheeks stained horribly with the blood of goats 
 or chickens, and they wear their wealth in 
 necklaces made of rupees for which they are 
 sometimes murdered. The blind beggar who 
 waved his prayer-wheel and chanted the act of 
 worship the chant was almost Gregorian 
 " God is in the lotus flower ; God is every- 
 where ; hail to him of the lotus and the jewel " 
 pleased me most. And always, between the 
 mountains and the bazaar, I saw the poles with
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 71 
 
 the prayer flags long slips of linen inscribed 
 with texts fluttering in the wind, to dismay 
 evil spirits and offer favourable omens to the 
 devout passer-by. 
 
 DECEMBER 1902 FEBRUARY 1903.
 
 PROGRAMME 
 
 DELHI 
 
 December 1902 
 Monday, 29th. 
 Tuesday, 30th. 
 
 State Arrival, 11.30 a.m. 
 Opening of the Arts Exhibition, 
 
 ii a.m. 
 
 Wednesday, 3ist. Massed Bands on Polo Ground, 
 4 p.m. 
 
 January 1903 
 Thursday, ist. 
 
 Friday, 2nd. 
 
 Saturday, 3rd. 
 Sunday, 4th. 
 
 Durbar. 
 
 State Dinner. 
 
 Native Garden-Party in the Vic- 
 toria Gardens, 3.30 to 5 p.m. 
 
 Fireworks, 10 p.m. 
 
 Assault-at-Arms. 
 
 Investiture, 10 p.m. 
 
 Church Service, ii a.m. 
 
 Massed Bands on Polo Ground in 
 afternoon. 
 72
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 73 
 
 Monday, 5th. Native Review. 
 
 Assault-at-Arms. 
 Tuesday, 6th. Football Final Match in afternoon. 
 
 Manipur and Gilgit Polo. 
 
 State Ball. 
 Wednesday, yth. Final Hockey Match in morning. 
 
 Final International Polo Match, 
 
 3.30 p.m. 
 
 Thursday, 8th. Review, 1 1 a.m. 
 Friday, gth. Final Indian Army Polo Match, 
 
 3.30 p.m. 
 
 Massed Bands on Polo Ground. 
 
 Distribution of Prizes. 
 
 Evening Party to Native Chiefs. 
 Saturday, loth. Departure.
 
 VICEROY'S CAMP 
 
 LIST OF GUESTS 
 
 T.R.H. The Duke and Duchess of Connaught. 
 
 H.S.H. The Grand Duke of Hesse. 
 
 Mr T. Raleigh, Member of Council. 
 
 Sir E. F. Law, Member of Council, and Lady Law. 
 
 Major-General Sir E. Elles, Member of Council, 
 
 Lady Elles and Miss Teague. 
 Mr A. T. Arundel, Member of Council, Mrs and 
 
 Miss Arundel. 
 Mr D. C. J. Ibbetson, Member of Council, Mrs and 
 
 Miss Ibbetson. 
 
 The Duke and Duchess of Portland and Miss Grenfell. 
 The Duke and Duchess of Marlborough. 
 The Earl and Countess of Crewe. 
 The Earl and Countess of Lonsdale. 
 The Earl of Durham. 
 Lady Anne Lambton. 
 Viscount Errington. 
 Lord Lamington. 
 Lord and Lady Wolverton. 
 Lord Elcho. 
 Lady Ulrica Duncombe. 
 
 74
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 75 
 
 Hon. F. Curzon. 
 Hon. Lady Miller. 
 Hon. D. and Mrs Marjoribanks. 
 Hon. Spencer Lyttelton. 
 Lieut.-Col. Hon. C. and Mrs Harbord. 
 Hon. G. Peel. 
 
 Right Hon. Sir G. Taubman-Goldie. 
 Sir E. Vincent, M.P. 
 
 Sir John Dickson Poynder, M.P., and Lady Poynder. 
 Sir R. Mowbray, M.P. 
 Sir E. Ruggles-Brise. 
 Mr and Mrs W. James. 
 Major and Mrs L. Drummond. 
 Major and Lady Eleanor Byng. 
 Mrs and Miss Leiter. 
 Mrs Craigie. 
 
 Mr and Mrs E. Tennant. 
 Miss Muir. 
 
 Mr and Hon. Mrs Maguire. 
 Captain and Mrs H. Lindsay. 
 Mr Hicks-Beach. 
 Mr E. T. Reed. 
 Mr O. Seaman. 
 
 The Most Rev. The Bishop of Calcutta (Metro- 
 politan of India), Mrs and the Misses Copleston. 
 Mr A. H. L. Eraser, C.S.I., and Mrs Eraser. 
 Sir Colin and Lady Scott-Moncrieff.
 
 76 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 Rear-Admiral Drury, Commander - in - Chief, His 
 Majesty's Naval Forces in the East Indies. 
 
 Flag-Lieutenant to Rear-Admiral Drury. 
 
 Captain A. M. Farquhar, H.M.S. Renown. 
 
 Commander F. D. Gilpin-Brown, H.M.S. Renown. 
 
 Mr J. M. Macpherson, Secretary to Government, 
 Legislative Department, and Mrs Macpherson. 
 
 Mr H. S. Barnes, Secretary to Government, Foreign 
 Department, and Mrs Barnes. 
 
 Maj.-Genl. Sir E. Barrow, Secretary to Government, 
 Military Department, and Lady Barrow. 
 
 Mr E. N. Baker, Officiating Secretary to Government, 
 Revenue and Agricultural Department, and 
 Mrs Miller. 
 
 Mr H. H. Risley, Officiating Secretary to Govern- 
 ment, Home Department. 
 
 Mr S. Preston, Officiating Secretary to Government, 
 P. W. Department, and Mrs Preston. 
 
 Mr F. Cowie, Secretary, Central Committee, 
 Coronation Durbar. 
 
 Lieut.-Col. Hon. Cecil and Mrs' 
 
 Bingham. u . . ... 
 
 His Royal High- 
 Mr and Mrs Leslie. 
 
 _ . ness the Duke of 
 
 Lieut.-Col. Weston Jarvis. > , 
 
 Connaugh t s 
 Colonel and Mrs Herbert. 
 
 atari. 
 Surgeon-Major W. Beevor. 
 
 Sir Maurice Fitzgerald.
 
 IMPERIAL INDIA 77 
 
 Baron Massenbach, Hessian Light 
 Dragoons. 
 
 Major-General Von Wachter. 
 Captain Kraemar 
 
 H. S. R. the 
 Grand Duke of 
 Hesse's Staff. 
 
 Major A. R. Dick. 
 
 Sir W. R. Lawrence, Private Secretary to the Viceroy, 
 
 and Mrs Lawrence. 
 Lieut-Col. Hon. E. Baring, Military Secretary to the 
 
 Viceroy. 
 Lieut.-Col. E. H. Fenn, Surgeon to the Viceroy, and 
 
 Mrs Fenn. 
 
 Captain R. G. T. Baker-Carr, Rifle Brigade, A.D.C. 
 Captain C. Wigram, i8th Bengal Lancers, A.D.C. 
 Captain Hon. J. R. L. Yarde-B tiller, Scots Guards, 
 
 A.D.C. 
 
 Captain Hon. R. Lindsay, 2nd Dragoons, A.D.C. 
 Captain Earl of Suffolk, Gloucestershire Regiment, 
 
 A.D.C. 
 Lieut. G. A. Akers-Douglas, Argyll and Sutherland 
 
 Highlanders, A.D.C. 
 Captain A. W. F. Knox, 5th Punjab Infantry, 
 
 A.D.C. 
 Lieut. V. A. S. Keighley, i8th Bengal Lancers, 
 
 A.D.C. 
 Lieut. L. A. Jones-Mortimer, Somersetshire Light 
 
 Infantry, A.D.C. 
 Lieut. R. H. S. Dashwood, Royal Irish Rifles, A.D.C.
 
 78 IMPERIAL INDIA 
 
 Major F. Lee, 4th Hussars, A.D.C. 
 
 Lieut. K. Wigram, 2nd Gurkha Rifles, A.D.C. 
 
 Captain Poynter, A.D.C. 
 
 Lieut. Hon. F. W. Stanley, loth Hussars, A.D.C. 
 
 Captain F. L. Adams, Scots Guards, A.D.C. 
 
 Major E. L. C. Berger, 3Oth Baluch Infantry, 
 
 A.D.C. 
 
 Colonel H. Goad, Staff Corps. 
 Major R. E. Grimston, Commandant, Viceroy's 
 
 Bodyguard. 
 
 Captain H. N. Holden, Adjutant, Viceroy's Body- 
 guard. 
 Mr F. W. Latimer, Assistant Private Secretary to 
 
 the Viceroy. 
 Captain W. E. A. Armstrong, I. M. S., Medical 
 
 Officer. 
 Captain F. G. Smallwood, R.A., in charge of Viceroy's 
 
 Camp, and Mrs Smallwood. 
 
 Major C. F. Murray, Supply and Transport Officer. 
 Captain H. T. Dennys, District Superintendent of 
 
 Police. 
 Mr F. X. J. Cassera, District Superintendent of 
 
 Police. 
 Mr F. C. Isemonger, District Superintendent of 
 
 Police.
 
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 " Some of the imaginative passages are very fine. . . . 
 The book is powerfully written." Scotsman. 
 
 " Is well and impressively written." Pall Mall Gazette. 
 11, Paternoster Buildings, London, E.G. ^
 
 T. FISHER UNWIN, Publisher, 
 
 BUILDERS OF GREATER 
 BRITAIN 
 
 H. F. WILSON 
 
 A Set of 10 Volumes, each with Photogravure Frontispiece, 
 and Map, large crown Svo., cloth, Ss. each. 
 
 The completion of the Sixtieth year of the Queen's reign will be the occasion of much 
 retrospect and review, in the course of which the great men who, under the auspices of Her 
 Majesty and her predecessors, have helped to make the British Empire what it is to-day, 
 will naturally be brought to mind. Hence the idea of the present series. These biographies, 
 concise but full, popular but authoritative, have been designed with the view of giving in 
 each case an adequate picture of the builder in relation to his work. 
 
 The series will be under the general editorship of Mr. H. F. Wilson, formerly Fellow 
 of Trinity College, Cambridge, and now private secretary to the Right Hon. J. Chamberlain 
 at the Colonial Office. Each volume will be placed in competent hands, and will contain 
 the best portrait obtainable of its subject, and a map showing his special contribution to 
 the Imperial edifice. The first to appear will be a Life of Sir Walter Ralegh, by Major 
 Hume, the learned author of " The Year after the Armada." Others in contemplation will 
 deal with the Cabots, the quarter-centenary of whose sailing from Bristol is has recently been 
 celebrated in that city, as well as in Canada and Newfoundland ; Sir Thomas Maitland, the 
 "King Tom" of the Mediterranean: Rajah Brooke, Sir Stamford Raffles, Lord Give, 
 Edward Gibbon Wakefield, Zachary Macaulay, Ac., &c. 
 
 The Series has taken for its motto the Miltonie prayer : 
 
 ** e0ou JE?o of C$2 free grace fct'brf Buitb p <${ (griffannfc* 
 <mptre to a gforlou* and enShfife 0et'g0f0+ 5Sif(J off 0er 
 l&augfjfer 3fan& afiouf ?er, stag us in t$ia feftcift'e." 
 
 1. SIR WALTER RALEGH. By MARTIN A. S. HUME, Author 
 
 of " The Courtships of Queen Elizabeth," &c. 
 
 2. SIR THOMAS MAITLAND; the Mastery of the Mediterranean. 
 
 By WALTER FREWEN LORD. 
 
 3. JOHN CABOT AND HIS SONS; the Discovery of North 
 
 America. By C. RAYMOND BEAZLEY, M.A. 
 
 4. EDWARD GIBBON WAKEFIELD; the Colonisation of South 
 
 Australia and New Zealand. By R. GARNRTT, C.B., L.L.D. 
 
 5. LORD CLIVE ; the Foundation of British Rule in India. By Sir 
 
 A. J. ARBUTHNOT, K.C.S.I., C.I.E. 
 
 RAJAH BROOKE; the Englishman as Ruler of an Eastern 
 State. By Sir SPENSER ST. JOHN, G.C.M.G 
 
 ADMIRAL PHILIP; the Founding of New South Wales. Bj 
 Louis BECKE and WALTER JEFFERY. 
 
 5IR STAMFORD RAFFLES; England in the Far East. By 
 the Editor. 
 
 11, Paternoster Buildings, London, E.G.
 
 SIXPENNY EDITION 
 
 THE . . . 
 STICKIT . 
 MINISTER 
 
 AND 
 
 SOME COMMON MEN 
 
 By . . . 
 
 O MV* 
 
 CROCKETT 
 
 T. FISHER UNWIN, London
 
 EVELYN 
 
 INNES 
 
 By 
 
 GEORGE 
 
 MOORE 
 
 6 D . 
 
 EDITION 
 
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 HOLDEN 
 
 T. FISHER 
 
 UNWIN 
 E.G. 
 
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 6 
 
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 EDITION
 
 DATE DUE 
 
 JAN 4 
 
 1972 
 
 MTED IN U.S.A.
 
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