Presidency witnessed in the half century between Thomas Munro's arrival at Madras as a military cadet in 1780, and his death as Governor in 1827. In the former year Haidar was devastating the Karnátik up to the walls of Fort St. George, and 'black columns of smoke were everywhere in view from St. Thomas' Mount.' During the following forty years the history of Madras was one of wars, of cession of territory to the British, and of the settlement of the new Districts. How large a share Munro took as a soldier and as a civil administrator in the British settlement of Southern India, these pages will show.
They will also exhibit a character worthy of imitation by every Indian official and by every well-wisher of the Indian races. His own letters paint the man—brave, wise, and kindly. No truer estimate of his qualities could be given than that by the Hon. Mountstuart Elphinstone—'strong practical good sense, simplicity and frankness, perfect good nature and good humour, real benevolence unmixed with the slightest cant of misanthropy, activity and truthfulness of mind, easily pleased with anything, and delighted with those things that in general have no effect but on a youthful imagination[1].
'It is not enough,' the same writer observes, 'to give new laws or even good courts. You must take the people along with you, and give them a share in your feelings, which can only be done by sharing
- ↑ Colebrooke's Life of Mountstuart Elphinstone, ii. 35.
