Lord Morley spoke admirably on India last Saturday at a
dinner at Oxford given by the Vice-Chancellor and the teachers of the Indian Civil Service probationers. He had observed with rather a grim feeling the very small attention given to India at the Imperial Press Conference, for if anything went wrong in India the material and military condition of the Empire might be strangely altered. Eight months ago there had been severe tension in India, but the present position and the prospects were reassuring. The Government had kept the pledge to the people of India given by the King in November. Finally, Lord Morley dis- cussed the deportations of seditious Indians " under a law which is as good as any law on our own statute-book." Some Liberals in the House of Commons had protested, " and," he added, " a Bill had been brought in, and the first reading of it was carried two or three days ago, of which I can only say-.— with all responsibility for what I am saying—that it is nothing less, if you consider the source from which it comes, and if you consider the arguments by which it is supported, than a vote of censure on me and Lord Minto." He explained that an emergency law was necessary for. India just because it was India, and not England, Scotland, or Ireland. • The result had justified the use of it. The speech had all the courage and intellectual freedom from misleading general principles with which Lord Morley has made us familiar.
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