Your servant steals a little silver ornament, a few rupees you left about; or some hungry loafer takes some fruit off your tree. You may not forgive him, you may not overlook it. You are bound by law to tell the police and get the offender arrested and convicted. By the petty theft public morality has been outraged, and you must assist morality to vindicate itself. You have no option. If you do not tell the police, you are "compounding a felony," and may be punished. Having told the police you will have no further trouble. They will get up the case, look up evidence, summon the witnesses, prosecute the case, and you will be paid for giving evidence. The thief will be sent to gaol. But if your enemy meets you in the fields, knocks you down, rolls you in the dust, dishonours and abases you in your own esteem and before all who know of it, public morality is not offended. It is of no use going to the police-station; they will not listen to you, they will not prosecute, nor take any notice. If you desire justice you must go yourself to Court, pay to have a petition written, pay for a stamp, get an advocate and pay him, pay for summonses to witnesses, spend, say, three or four pounds, and eventually your enemy may be fined five shillings, of which you, if lucky, may get two as compensation. You may, if you like, at any time withdraw your complaint, if, for instance, your enemy apologises to you or compensates you. Now these are not selected cases, exaggerated cases, nor unusual cases. They are common, and in both cases the instincts of the people are outraged. They are not sordid-minded. A petty theft is not to them a very serious thing. They put a higher value on their personal dignity and self-respect than on a trifling piece of property. To them, therefore, all this is wrong. Theft is never a very deadly offence, and if of small things is easily forgiven. _But they may not forgive_. If the police hear of it, they must give evidence against the culprit--or must lie. They lie. Who blames them? The concealment of thefts, the refusal to report them to the police, the subsequent refusal to give evidence, are common. Is theirs the fault? On the other hand, as it is impossible in the Courts to get any satisfaction for an assault, the hot-tempered Burman seeks revenge in other ways. The Court fails him, so he takes the law into his own hands. He will waylay, will stab, will sometimes murder. Then Government grieves over the large number of serious-hurt cases and wonders what causes them. The wily Madrassi or Bengali coolie gets square in a different way. The injured complainant goes off straight to the police-station and there describes the assault more or less correctly. This, of course, he knows will not help him, so he adds as follows: "During the assault a rupee dropped out of my pocket, and when A had finished battering me he picked up the rupee and went off with it." This makes the offence "theft," which is