(_Miss Nightingale to Lord Cranbrook._) _August_ 10 [1878]. DEAR LORD CRANBROOK--Very meekly I venture to send you a poor little article of mine on the People of India in the _Nineteenth Century_. I hope if you read it you will not call it a shriek (I am astonished at my own moderation). I am not so troublesome as to expect that you can find time to read it, but the India Office has untold treasures (which it does not know itself) in Reports on these subjects which will engage your busy time; and especially the Deccan Riots Commission Report, on the relation of the ryots and the extortionate money-lenders in the Bombay Deccan, will, I am sure, call for your attention. Can there be any private enterprise in trade or commerce, in manufacture, or in new interests, when to money-lenders are guaranteed by our own Courts the profits, the enormous and easy profits, which no enterprise of the kind that India most wants can rival? What are the practical remedies for extortionate usury in India, and principally in the Bombay Deccan? The Bill now before the Legislature at Simla does not seem to promise much. Does it? The whole subject is, I know, before you. Pray believe me (with some wonder at my own audacity), ever your faithful and grateful servant, FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE. (_Lord Cranbrook to Miss Nightingale._) INDIA OFFICE, _August_ 13 [1878]. DEAR MISS NIGHTINGALE--Having been out of town for two days your note only reached me this morning. I read your article last week with much interest; but, without underrating the griefs of India, I think you generalise too much from one locality. Nevertheless there is enough to stir the heart and mind in search of remedies for admitted evils.--Yours very sincerely, CRANBROOK. [173] Mr. Francis William Fox; he had sent to her his pamphlet on _Reform in the Administration of India_, suggesting _inter alia_ a National Agricultural Bank. Miss Nightingale's letter of three sheets (June 18, 1879) is eloquent both of her profound knowledge of Indian conditions and of her enthusiastic interest in Indian problems. The Secretary of State wrote to the Viceroy, Lord Lytton, in much the same sense; calling his attention to Miss Nightingale's article, saying that she had generalized too much, but adding, "I shall be truly glad if your legislation can afford a remedy."[174] The Viceroyalty of Lord Lytton was more famous, however, for the forward policy in Afghanistan than for internal reforms. Miss Nightingale, as a disciple of Lord Lawrence, was wholly opposed to an aggressive policy which, moreover, had the effect of causing retrenchment in all departments except the military. [174] The letter to Lord Lytton is printed in vol. ii. p. 80 of Mr. A. E. Gathorne-Hardy's _Memoir of Lord Cranbrook_ (1910).