Various schemes for sharing out the administrative burden of the vast province with its dependencies had been discussed for at least twelve years before, and there were obvious ways in which it could have been done—by creating the three contiguous districts of different race into a new western province with the capital at Patna, or by placing them under Chief Commissioners, while in either case Bengal should be raised to a Presidency under a Governor in Calcutta, enjoying the same privileges as Madras and Bombay. By the Charter of 1833 we promised a Governorship for Fort William (Calcutta), and the promise was renewed by Lord Dalhousie in 1853. It is hard in England to understand the difference that Indians feel between a Lieutenant-Governor trained in Anglo-Indian routine and a Governor appointed from among the leading men of England, and coming to their country free from the narrowing routine of the Service and Anglo-Indian society. But a very short time in India shows what that difference means. Far from carrying out these pledges or following a smaller scheme of devolution favoured by Mr. Brodrick (Lord Midleton), at that time Secretary of State for India, Lord Curzon determined to split the Bengali people roughly in half and give them two Lieutenant-Governors instead of one—with a view, of course, to “greater administrative efficiency”; for, as Mr. John Morley somewhere remarked, “the usual excuse of those who do evil to other people is that their object is to do them good.” The first sign of Lord Curzon’s purpose was Sir Herbert Risley’s letter of December 3, 1903, announcing a Partition in the name of the Government of India. The scheme then proposed was instantly met by a storm of opposition throughout Bengal, among Mohammedans and Hindus alike, and to the credit of Anglo-Indians it must be said that the opposition of the Bengalis was supported by many of the officials and by the leading Anglo-Indian newspapers, though the worldly success of officials and newspapers largely depends on Government favour.