I should like to have seen how the troops of India stood the raw autumn in Artois and Flanders. But the Indian prisoners at Lille were transferred to the East in order to make room for fresh contingents. I, myself, have experienced the difficulty of transplanting Indians to a colder climate. On my last journey to Tibet I had two Kadschputs from Cashmere with me. When we got into the mountains they nearly froze to death, and my caravan leader, Muhamed Isa, declared they would be about as useful as puppies. I had to send them back. The same thing happened to me with my Indian cook; outside India he was absolutely useless. In Tibet they live on meat, in India on vegetables. How could he stand so sudden a change of both climate and diet! Now the press has been claiming that the English have ordered a full contingent from India to Europe. I found it hard to believe but at the front I learned that it was true. "How do you treat the Indian soldiers?" I once asked a couple of officers. "We just arrest them," answered one, and the other added: "We don't need to do even that; they will soon die in the trenches." When I admit that I myself made a stupid blunder in thinking that Indians could do service in Tibet, I am justified in claiming that Lord Charles Beresford made ten times as stupid a blunder when he expressed the hope of seeing "Indian lances roaming the streets of Berlin and the little brown Gurkas making themselves comfortable in the park of Sans Souci." But the import of Indian troops is more than a stupid blunder--it is a crime! For almost a century and a half Great Britain has performed the shining mission of acting as India's guardian; no other people probably could successfully carry through so gigantic a task. Indian troops have fought with honor against their neighbors, and, moreover have assisted in maintaining order among the 300 millions of their people. But never has it occurred to an English government as now to the Liberal government, to oppose black infidels to Christian Europeans! That is a crime against culture, against civilization and against Christianity. And if the English missionaries approve it, then are they hypocrites and false bearers of the Gospel. India's English rulers despise--and rightfully--all marital relations between whites and Hindoos; the children of such marriages are regarded as mules, and are often called such; they are neither horse nor ass, they are half caste. In Calcutta they have their own quarter and are allowed to live in no other part of the city. But--when it comes to the question of overthrowing the "German barbarians," then an alliance with the bronze-skinned people is good enough for England!