The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1876-02-26 00:00:00

"EMPRESS" OR " QUEEN ? "

The Saturday Review writes :—" Is the Queen to
termed Queen or Empress of India? and is the addi-
tion to the title to regard India only, or the colonies as
well as India? It is said that for India 'Empress' is
a better word than 'Queen,' because Empress is a
grander word, and also because there are subject
Princes in India, and Empress means, in an especial
way, the Queen of Kings. This raises the question,
what are we to think of these Princes? Are they
really like Sovereigns? Sir George Campbell says
positively that they are nothing of the sort. They are in
his view, at the utmost on a level with the Duke of
Argyll, chiefs of great clans. Mr. Disraeli urges, on
the other hand, that some of them are the-
descendents of ancestors who were independent
princes when Britain was a Roman Province. To
call the Queen Empress is, therefore, a tribute to the
importance of the native princes. Other speakers
added that if Emperor implies conquest—which it is
difficult to see why it chould be thought to do, except
that the memory of Napoleon is always running in
British minds—the truth is that India is a conquered
country, and that it is a good thing to express true
things. It was alro suggested that the natives like
that
there i
personal government, a
rnmgreenatt,ear rig of personalnothingndunnderstand
else,
governmentand
about an Empress than about a Queen. This is an
argument from precisely the opposite point of view.
There will not be, and cannot be, anythieg in the least
like personal government in India, whatever the title
of the Sovereign may be; so that in this way the
advantage of the title of Empress would be that it
would suggest to the untutored native mind some-
thing that was not true. With regard to the
Colonies, it was asked by Mr. Lowe and Mr. Forster
whether, if an addition to the Royal title was
to be made because India was important, the Colonies
were not also important, and did not deserve to have
their importance marked in the addition? Mr. Disraeli
replied that their importance was already marked in
a far more significant manner; for, as was expressly
decided at the time of the union with Ireland, they are
to be regarded as parts of Great Britain and Ireland.
An Australian is an Englishman who happens to be
in New South Wales, and not in Sussex; and to
imply that he was anything else would be to in-
sult him. If this is so it is obvious that, by an
addition to the Royal title referring only to India, a
distinction would be set up between the Queen's
subjects unfavourable to India. At the present
moment the Queen's subjects in India must be taken
to be included among those persons over whom she
rules as Queen of Great Britain and Ireland. To take
the Indians out of this class would be, according to
Mr. Disraeli, to put them in a separate and lower
class. It is quite true that we, in point of fact,
do look on the natives of India as a lower class
than colonists of English descent, and it is now pro-
posed to record this pre-possession. The preferp.nce
for the titie of Empress over that of Queen is quite in
accordance with this view. We should think it going
down, not going up, if our Queen :tailed herself an
Empress. But Empress is thought just good enough
for India. It conveys with it a sort of contempt dk-
guised under the show of a compliment. It is sup-
posed to be likely to flatter the vanity of native Princes,
and it is thought to be calculated to inspire a delusive
but pleasing belief in the personal power of the
;Sovereign, while at the same time it records the fact
;that India is a conquered country. Empress is in
every way a lower title than Queen when applied to
India, for it is a word despised by the governing race,
and thought specially suited to the governed. When
an occasion presents itself for marking the intimate
connexion of all the Queen's subjects with each other,
it seems scarcely worth while to stamp upon a portion
of them this mark of inferiority."