bewildered statesmanship; it was full of surprises to those who were least likely to be surprised; it misled the wisest and the best informed. It bequeathed to us the unpretentious lesson that the government of two hundred millions of human beings, about whom the governing race know little except that they differ, toto caelo, from themselves in temperament, belief, taste, and the way of looking at life — is likely to produce unexpected results and to be diversified by unexpected incidents. The occurrence of panics is one of them, though it may be hoped that the fraction of the population, which is yearly raised out of absolute ignorance, will tend, as years go on, to render the occurrence of panics less probable. But, to this day, no great bridge is begun in India without a local panic, baseless and childish as that to which the greased cartridges gave rise.
A second modest lesson follows on the first, namely, that India is not a country with which it is well to play pranks — political, administrative, or philanthropic. The English rule in India, as Sir James Stephen has well observed, represents a belligerent civilisation; England must be prepared to fight as well as to civilise. When, as in 1857, she allows other considerations to outweigh the observance of this precaution, she runs a frightful risk. As a civilised and civilising administration she does, every day, things which millions of her subjects misunderstand, dislike, or disapprove. It is beyond the scope of mortal faculty to conjecture at what point mis-
