THE ROAD TO RUIN.
WEATEvEa. may have, been the faults of the system upon which India was ruled in the days of the Company Bahadoor and they were great, for they bred the most stupendous military mutiny of modern days, the new Government of India seems determined to rival the old less on the side of its virtues than of its faults. Already, two steps, or strides, have been taken on the road to ruin, and a still more fatal step is announced. The new governors so bungled the simple business of transferring the soldiers enlisted under one master to the service of another, as to destroy the greater part of an army ; and they have followed up that indefensible transaction by determining to abolish the army altogether as an Indian institution. First, they do a public wrong and then they take ad- vantage of their own wrong to manufacture out of it an argument which is put forward to justify the doing of a still greater wrong. Upon the home Government with Lord Stanley for its Indian coun- sellor, upon the Indian Government with Lord Canning for its head, rests the whole responsibility of the insubordination and subsequent discharge of so many thousands of the Local Euro- peans. And yet this very conduct to which they were provoked by the incredible meanness of both branches of the Government, is used by our pre\ -et Cabinet as an engine to uproot the local army. " It was not because they were a local force that they misconducted themselves, but because they conceived themselves to have been treated with deliberate injustice and contumely," is the apt remark of Sir James Ontram. Nothing can be more disingenuous, and we say so with great pain, than the use made of the insubordination of the Local Europeans by Lord Clyde, Sir William Mansfield, and even Lord Elphinstone. Each advocate for the abolition of the Local Army forgets all its former loyalty, all its former services, nay all its recent services, and seizes on what is called the mutiny of these troops to urge with emphasis the utter destruction of the local force. A year ago the majority of what are called authorities, was in- favour of a local army. The Government passed an act empowering them to keep up an army of 30,000 local troops in India. Then came the discon- tent and " mutiny "; the royal army in India and at home sympathized with the locals ; the public at home and in India sympathized with them ; it was felt they had a great deal of right en their side. Nevertheless their misconduct, so directly traceable to the larger misconduct of the Government, is amplified and brandished about, not to show up the folly and blundering of the Government, but to show that local armies in India do not deserve to exist. And now, the same Minister who last session carried the Act to maintain 30,000 local troops in India, has introduced a bill to put an end to the em- ployment of local troops in any shape, and to deliver India over to the " griffins" of the Royal army. For the idea of a special body of officers devoted to an Indian career from their youth is abandoned. The old plan which has grown out of the exceptional nature of our rule in India is con- signed to oblivion. In its place we are to have some new kind of force officered by competition, promotion going by seniority and selection, and a staff corps chosen from the whole body of officers in the Queen's army. This staff for India is the only grain of salt in the new system._ affords the only chance of protracting our hold of India for another half century. It ought to have been adopted years ago, and had it been adopted the great mutiny might never have occurred. But the special benefits that should flow from the creation of a really able staff of thoroughly Indian officers will be vitiated by the evils that will flow from the con- stant arrival in India of new European regiments with men and officers who know nothing of the country or its people, the greater part of whom will be strangers in the land, and who will sigh for the signal of departure. With a floating and antipathetic gar- rison the men on the staff and the governors at Calcutta will strive in vain to win over the feelings, as well as command the admira- tion and call out the fears of the people. We hold that the chief part of the European force in India, both the army and the military and civil staff, should consist of men specially devoted to an Indian career. But under the new soheme those who devote themselves to Indian leadership will have no guarantee that the royal favourites of fortune will not come in and carry off the prizes and ruin the empire. Sir Hugh Rose says it is a fixed idea in India that the Horse Guards would fill the staff appointments with their own men. No doubt this arises from a sense that " coming events cast their shadows be- fore." As an antidote he recommends " publicity of the defects of the Indian military system;" in other words he proposes to put in force the old maxim, abuse plaintiff's attorney ; and he does so with a vengeance. But all we need answer is that such an expo- sure for the purpose of promoting amalgamation, comes ill from an officer in the army that made shipwreck in the Crimea. It is a bad sign when revolution is substituted for reform, and when you uproot- an institution which has grown out of special conditions, and plant in its stead an untried and dangerous novelty. Yet this is what our Isetato-ftrery dstipsin India, by abolishing the Indian armv.
And it is said they propose to go further ana armies also. It may be possible to rule India withou ropean troops, and real Indian officers as distinguished migratory officers of the regular army ; but it will be found possible to rule without Native troops. When the step of abolish- ing them is taken, we shall from that moment change the founda- tion of our rule. Hitherto, we may be said to have ruled with the consent of the people, for the Native armies represent the peo- ple. Destroy those Native armies, cut off the dashing Native gentlemen and warlike peasants from all hope of a military career under our flag, convert the Native force into a police, and you de- liberately knock away from under her- Majesty's Indian throne one of its main props. Our soldiers in India will be mere foreign conquerors. The first serious war in Europe and our In- dian empire will slide from under our feet ; for the temptation to withdraw troops from India no Minister will be able to resist, and the withdrawal of European troops from India, the Native soldiery being abolished, will compel us to contract our frontiers, and by degrees give up our Indian empire. We have entered with a will upon the road to ruin, and when we have abolished the Native armies, we shall be half way there. Some day we shall pay dearly, in more ways than one, for the fatal policy of 1859-60, lish the Native cal Eu- the
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