The warlike agitation in the Punjaub has for the time
sub- sided ; the display of force having brought the Sheik Imam-ed- deen to his senses. But it is apparent that the Vale of Cashmere is a glaring instance of the absurdity which characterizes the whole system of "independent" Native states. We have left a Sikh ruler over the country, from a vague mixture of conscience and cunning, which makes us think it expedient to keep up a show of government by Natives : but the Sikh is as much an alien to the Mussulman population of Cashmere as we are. So that the effect is this : we have not given to the people of Cash- mere a Native government ; the actual enforcement of order and allegiance at last falls upon us, to whom alone it is essential, and who alone possess the power of enforcement ; but we interpose be- tween ourselves and the people whom we have to rule, a barbarian horde of irregular predatory soldiers as the medium of govern- ment. That which we choose to employ as our tool is an ob- struction or a clog. Had we at once established British dominion in Cashmere' we should, it is evident, have done no more vio- lence to the Mussulman feeling than in setting up the heretical Sikhs ; and we should have offered the less temptation to contu- macy in proportion to our own greater power. We believe that the case of every protected Native state is similar. Not that there is always the religious schism ; but India has in all parts a population so heterogeneous—pure Hinduism is in itself so heterogeneous—that the ruler is regarded by the ruled as alien and hostile ; and so in estrangement of feeling and selfish tyranny of purpose he commonly is. At the same time, as vicar for the British Government, he is weak and inefficient. Our own direct rule could sparcely be viewed with more jealousy, while it would be more efficient and more beneficent. Every event of this kind seems to illustrate that true policy which our officials hesitate to carry out. Wherever we interfere at all, we should abolish Native governments ; while, by the encourage- ment of education, of European ideas, and the thstribution of Eu- ropean honours and official duties, we should Anglicize the Natives, and naturalize them as individual instruments of direct British rule.
