During the years 1881 and 1882 Miss Nightingale was very busy with Indian questions, and when Lord Ripon's policy was disclosed, he became a hero to her almost comparable to General Gordon. In forwarding to Lord Ripon a copy of one of her Indian pieces, she sent her "deepest reverence and highest hopes for all the great measures by which the Viceroy is bringing peace to the people of India and fulfilling England's pledges. And the love and blessing of India's people be upon him!" Readers of the present generation, who do not remember the political controversies of thirty years ago, and who are familiar with experiments in Indian reform, more daring in some respects than any which Lord Ripon attempted, may wonder at Miss Nightingale's enthusiasm. But it was very natural to one holding her views at the time. The admiration which she felt for Lord Ripon and his policy was equalled by the passionate detestation felt by the larger, if not the better, part of Anglo-Indian opinion. The opposition to the "Ilbert Bill," named after the member of the Legislative Council who introduced it, was intensely bitter; that to some other branches of Lord Ripon's policy, hardly less so. Miss Nightingale was behind the scenes both at Calcutta or Simla and in London: in India by confidential communications from Lord Ripon himself, in London through friends in the India Office. She knew how uncertain was the support he received in his own Council, and how strong was the opposition in the Council in Downing Street. He was a good man fighting against adversity, and she was eager to do what she could to help him. His reforms were also hers. She had spent years of labour in mastering the intricacies of land tenure in India. For years her heart had been full of the grievances of the cultivators. And now Lord Ripon had prepared Land Reform Bills for Bengal and Oudh which, if passed, would give the ryot security against oppression. She had thought much and written something on Indian education.[200] It was "not enough," she had said, "to read Locke and Mill." She wanted an education which would teach the peoples of India to be "men," which would encourage them to the better cultivation of agriculture and industries, which would enable every _patel_ (village headman) to understand and enforce the principles of sanitation. And Lord Ripon had appointed an Education Commission (1882), from which some useful reforms followed. As for the "Ilbert Bill," which sought to confer upon duly qualified native judges powers equal to their position, it was in Miss Nightingale's eyes a measure of simple justice and duty; it was an honest fulfilment, within its scope, of the Proclamation of 1858, in which the Queen declared her pleasure, that as far as may be "Our subjects of whatever race or creed be impartially admitted to Our service, the duties of which they may be qualified by their education, ability, and integrity duly to discharge." Lord Ripon's measures in the direction of local