not answer the bell for any one in Europe, and is a most troublous neighbour with whom to sit at meat.
If, overstepping the boundaries of Europe, we inquire whether our predominance over the Asiatic and native peoples is due to any special attraction of personality exercised by us over them, it must equally be answered, no. We present ourselves to oriental eyes in the threefold aspect of soldiers, business men, and civil administrators. The British officer, admirable in discipline and conduct, is exclusive. In habit and pastime he is insular. He obeys orders; he utterly ignores local politics; he maintains discipline. Our men of business are meritorious, upright, and efficient. Our civil officials are models of what such men should be. But to the oriental they are all more or less unpalatable. They range from the inconvenient to the intolerable. For they are all the off-shoots of the stem of Japhet.
Hence it is clear that the greatness of England cannot be ascribed either to the resources of her wealth, or to the impulse of her religion, or to the organisation of her armaments, or to that inborn attraction which shines in some characters.
The true cause has been otherwise. There are two forces, always verging on the tyrannous, and seeking to oppress us all, the one exercised by man over his fellows, and the other exercised by nature over man. To resist the one, England led the way in organising modern freedom; and next, to resist
