The Collector is constantly touring his District, in order that he may know it from personal investigation. A good Collector may become very popular, and may do much to make his District prosperous. It is a great position which may thus be held by young Englishmen of, say, thirty years of age. They are rulers of a million people at an age when their brothers of the professional classes at home are struggling to establish themselves as young barristers or doctors or clergymen. It must not be thought, however, that the Government of India, either in its Legislative, Judicial, or Executive capacities, is wholly British, and alien from the subject population. The Legislative Councils of the Governor-General and also of the Lieutenant-Governors in the Provinces contain elected Indian representatives, both Hindu and Musulman. The provincial Councils have, in fact, non-official majorities. Only in the Council of the Governor-General is there an official majority. Many of the Judges even of the High Courts are Indian, either Hindu or Musulman. In the Executive some of the Collectors of Districts are Indian, and also the great majority of the assistant officials, who in the aggregate are an immense number. [Sidenote: 29. Darjeeling Railway, Chinbatti Loop.] [Sidenote: 30. Darjeeling Railway, Loop No. 4.] [Sidenote: 31. Darjeeling.] As we think over these things we are continuing our journey northward. We must change from train to steamer as we cross the Ganges. The passage of the river occupies about twenty minutes from one low-lying bank to the other. Then, as we traverse the endless rice fields with their clumps of graceful bamboo, the hills become visible across the northern horizon. We run into a belt of jungle, and change to the mountain railway, which carries us up the steep hill front with many a turn and twist. There is tall forest on the lower slopes, of teak and other great trees, hung thickly with creepers. Presently the wood becomes smaller, and we enter the tea plantations with their trim rows of green bushes. Far below us, at the foot of the steep forest, spreads to the southern horizon the vast cultivated plain. Trees of the fir tribe now take the place of leafy trees, and we rise to the ridge top on which is placed Darjeeling, a settlement of detached villas in compounds or enclosures, hanging on the steep hill slopes. Darjeeling is about seven thousand feet above sea level, on a ridge overlooking northward the gorge of the Rungeet River.