Page:Sir Henry Lawrence, the Pacificator.djvu/147

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
138
SIR HENRY LAWRENCE

scheme and its regulations organized. It was for the benefit both of boys and of girls, and open to all denominations. The first school was started at Sanáwar, near the Hill Station of Kasaulí, and the Kashmír Rájá, Ghuláb Singh, insisted on being allowed to contribute £10,000 towards starting it, and £2,500 afterwards. Sir Henry further endowed it largely both in his life and by legacy; and so beneficial did the arrangements prove that Government took upon itself the charge of the institution. Public charity came further to its assistance; and similar institutions have been later on organized at Murree in the Punjab Hills, at Mount Abú in Rájputána, and at Utakamand and in the Nílgiris in the Madras Presidency. The benefits resulting from Sir Henry's wise and benevolent proposals can be easily imagined; but it may be mentioned that in about twenty-five years the Sanáwar Asylum was sheltering and educating nearly 400 children, and that at Murree about 160 — the proportion of boys to girls being generally about three to two; the ratio not being a fixed one. At the Utakamand school there are about 300 boys. Upwards of 4,000 children passed through Sanáwar in fifty years.

Such being the character of the man, it can be well understood how he was able to rule and manage a warlike race and a recently-conquered province with almost absolute authority — supported by a Governor-General who sympathized with all his views; loved and respected by his own subordinates; and in the