“When we recollect that at the commencement of the recent mutiny it was not uncommonly said that one cause of our weakness in other parts of India was the necessity which existed of concentrating our forces for the purpose of occupying the Sikh territory; and when we remember on the other hand that through your instrumentality that province which had been our terror became one of the sources of our strength, that instead of concentrating the British forces in the Punjab you were able to send men to aid in the capture of Delhi, so that the weapon which seemed so formidable to our power was by you so wielded as to be our best defence; when we reflect that those very soldiers, who but a few years ago were engaged in mortal conflict with our own, became under your superintendence our faithful allies,--there appears in the whole history something so marvellous that it is but right we should return thanks, not so much to the human instrument, as to God by whom that instrument was employed.” This passage in the Chairman’s speech shows an accurate appreciation of the position of the Punjab during the crisis. In the address itself, after due allusion to the war and its results, there comes this special reference to the despatch regarding Christianity in India, which has been already mentioned in a previous chapter. “You laid down the principle that ‘having endeavoured solely to ascertain what is our Christian duty, we should follow it out to the uttermost undeterred by any consideration.’ You knew that ‘if anything like compulsion enters into our system of diffusing Christianity, the rules of that religion itself are disobeyed, and we shall never be permitted to profit by our disobedience.’ You have recorded your conviction that Christian things done in a Christian way will never alienate the heathen. About such things there are qualities which do not provoke distrust nor harden to resistance. It is when unchristian things are done in the name of Christianity, or when Christian things are done in an unchristian way, that mischief and danger are occasioned.’ These words are memorable. Their effect will be happy not only on your own age but on ages to come. Your proposal that the Holy Bible should be relieved from the interdict under which it was placed in the Government schools and colleges, was true to the British principle of religious liberty and faithful to your Christian conscience.” Some passages may be quoted as extracts from Lawrence’s reply as they are very characteristic. Expressing gratitude for the good opinion of his countrymen, and again commending his officers to the care of their country, he thus proceeds: