The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1904-05-30

route into China from Burma, by which he
has saved the province from both compl-
cations and debt. though il required a
strong man to cut losses as heavy as these;
in his redelimitation of the Sikkim frontier,
whereby few hundred extra square miles
or fairly good land have been added to
the empire and long-standing disagree
ment enCed; IN his assertion OF our priority
In Muscat and the upper shores of the Per-
sian gulf; in his creation of the new north
west frontier province; in the settlement
of the Berars-a solution equally to the
benefit of the debt-burdened Nizam, the
Indian government, and the inhabitants of
the territories in question; and, finally, in
his strong exclusion of American control
of the one source of oil in the whole of
the British empire, Yenangyoung, he has
exhibited the same width of grasp and eSti-
mate of concrete. abstract and contingent
factors that promise all that the empire
Will ask In the future of minister of foreign
affairs.
STANDARD OF OFFICIAL WORK.
Turning to home affairs in India, the
main lines of the governing system have
been permanently laid down for many
years. and the first duty of viceroy is to
see that the work is properly done along
those lines. He is rarely called in to carry
through heroic measures; he is there to
see that the machine in his case works
we'll Incidentally he must replace parts
OF IL IIdI OuIWOTn, DHI MS
duty is 10 see to the working of an instru-
ment that, whatever it's shortcomings, is
admittedly the finest ever devised by man
for similar purpose.
/ In smaller ways Lord Curzon has done a
good DEAL but it is perhaps juster to say
that internal affairs in India are far more
Influenced by what he is than by what he
does
Before moving a finger in new direction
he determined TO test by high pressure the
capacity of the instrument in his hands.
BY half turn-more was hardly possible
he screwed up the standard of official
work. and stood by TO see if any part
worked loose under the strain.
As he would be the first TO admit, the
civil and political services of India stood
the test well enough, and the trifling nature
of the reforms he then initiated is a testi-
monial to the soundness of their work. He
reduced the inordinate burden of dispatch
and minute writing that weighed heavily
upon the more competent officials, and he
readJuSted the leave regulations, reducing
the unsettling frequency of short visits
home. Then he proceeded to overhaul in
turn every part of the machine Ii has been
said that even the viceroy's five years of
office are quite insufficient for any one to
form real opinion upon Indian affairs.
But whatever criticisms Lord CurZon has
received, it is admitted by all that he has
brought to his work a wider and fuller
standard than had been applied by any pre-
v1ouS governor general.
If he has been unable, in the brief period
or his vice reign, TO carry many new meas
ureS through TO completion 1t is due to
three causes. The first is the slowness of
moving the Oriental, the second is the dis
organization in the body polite, the third,
and by far the most important of all, is
that he had no sooner seated himself firmly
on his gaddi than an almost unprecedented
famine broke out in the central provinces
and the west, delaying the prosecution of
other schemes and swallowing by millions
of lakhs money that was badly needed else
where.
EDUCATION IN INDIA.
From this and from plague he has never
been free. His exertions during the sum-
mer o. 1900 reduced the disaster to the
smallest dimensions possible and his active
support of extensive irrigation works will
do more in the future than will probably
ever be recognized to minimize the always
imminent cloud of danger that has always
hung over India.
Small changes dealing with the land laws
have been made and some of the most
effective and probably the most pleasant
work done by the viceroy has been the
careful restoration and up-keep of ancient
buildings. Here Lord Curzon has lent his
heart rs we'll as his head.
University education in India has been
| for the last twenty years a remarkable ex-
ample of the unwisdom of grating Occi-
| dental methods en- bloc upon the East. The
| whole system has failed.
| There has never been suggested an alter
| native for examination a test of a course
of instruction, though its futility as a real
| touchstone of education, or even of learn
/ ing, is admitted In England where the
| evil has no alarming power to undermine
a habit of mind and point OF view vastly
older than itself, the trouble is obvious
| enough. In China, the examination schools
| of Canton and Picking form the nursery OF
all the forms or visionary folly, incapable
| government and cruelty that mark the &C.
| lestial administration. Somewhere between
| these two the examination system of India
stands, and il must be obvious enough that