We have, as a nation, so taken it for granted that India is our own to do as we like with, that it is perhaps not a pleasant reminder which faces us as we cast our thoughts back to the initial steps taken by ourselves in the days which preceded the formation of the Honourable East India Company. It bids us realize that at first, as Francis Newman says in his _Dangerous Glory of India_, "neither king, statesmen, nor people ever deliberately planned from the beginning or desired such an empire. It began as a set of mercantile establishments which took up private arms for mere self-defence.... The Honourable East India Company was glad to legitimate its position by accepting from the Grand Mogul the subordinate position of a rent-collector; indeed, from the beginning to the end of its political career it was animated by a consistent and unswerving disapproval of aggression and fresh conquest." Since that time, however, the English dominion spread rapidly. Since that time we became more and more aware of what a splendid field lay ready for occupation by our surplus population. Since that time we have moved forward through a vast country that formerly, through lack of European ways of civilization and co-operation, practically lay at our feet. It is true that we have done much--very much for India. It is impossible for anyone to deny that. We have brought to her doors European civilization; modern points of view; the miracles of new discoveries in science; inventions for making the wheels of life move easier; opportunities for cultivating and selling her land's produce, and for its quick transport. We have lifted her up--yes, but here is where the mental shoe pinches--we have insisted on preventing her from reaching her full stature. We have trained her sons to be able to work side by side with ourselves in various official duties; and then when they are desirous--as is indeed only the inevitable consequence of their education--of entering the lists side by side with Englishmen, they find there is no crossing the rubicon which officially divides the two nations. It is true that many Anglo-Indians stand aghast at this idea that they should cross it, but it is only those who are unaware that, as a general rule, education and environment combined come out as top dog over heredity in most instances in which it plays a part. It is only those who, when they go out to India, take, as it were, England with them, and fail to recognize how far Indian points of view and power of dealing with things have progressed. It is only those who have forgotten--if indeed they ever truly realized it--that it is a point of honour that such a proceeding should be carried out, if we, as Englishmen, remember all that the notable charter of 1833 bound us to do.