deduction from salary. None of these latter items is, in itself, large; and the aggregate only comes to 20 per cent. of the whole "Home expenditure. It is not, therefore, probable that the Home charges can be materially curtailed for the present, and we must look upon it that India has to pay a tribute of, say, fifteen million per annum, for which she receives some sort of equivalent, in past or in present service. Even if it were to be regarded solely as the latter it would only come to £3 per annum for the agency of every forty of the people, which is no heavy wage. But it is obviously much more than pay for present work. If any reduction is possible it must be in the Indian expenditure; and accordingly it is to this by far the larger portion of the whole -that the attention of reformers must be invited. The heaviest item is that of "Army Service," and it must be confessed than an outlay of over seventeen millions looks enormous. The "Salaries, etc., of the Civil Administration" form an item of over ten millions, and it is startling to find a sum of nearly seven millions set down as expended on "Public Works not classed as Reproductive." Total, say, thirty-four millions. Here, one would be disposed to think, is matter on which retrenchment might be brought to bear if persons honestly anxious for economy were to take the several items in hand with the due departmental knowledge. Beginning with Civil Administration, it may be allowable to observe that the general scheme is really obsolete, being based on a state of things that has quite passed away; one in which there were neither railroads, telegraphs, nor steam vessels; and which it was considered necessary that the subordinate Presidencies should communicate direct with the Home Government and be provided with the complete machinery of a Governor and Council. But Bengal is larger than the Madras Presidency, while that of Bombay is scarcely larger than a single commissionership in the Punjaub or in the United Provinces of the North-west and Audh. Yet each of these is efficiently administered by a single Lieutenant-Governor. There appears to be no valid reason why Madras and Bombay should not henceforth be upon the same footing. This would save a great part of the money now spent on councilors, aids-de-camp, body-guards, and such like pomps. In the interior administration, on the other hand, the minor Presidencies have an advantage over the Lieutenancies, for while each of these has to maintain Commissioners in considerable numbers in addition to a Board of Revenue, the Presidency of Madras has a Board but no Commissioners, while that of Bombay has only two Commissioners and no Board. This might be equalized. Turning to the Military Staff we find a similar extravagance. Although the Commander-in-Chief is supreme over the whole Indian Army, there are at Madras and Bombay minor Commanders-inChief, each with a full staff of Military Secretary, Adjutant-General, Principal Medical Officer, etc., etc. Now it is a notorious fact that the Commission over which the late Sir Ashley Eden presided advised five years ago that this anomaly should cease, and that the Divisions at Madras and Bombay should be commanded, like other divisions, by a Major-General in each, with the usual divisional staff. It looks as if nothing but an incorrigible passion for patronage-to use Lo harsher word-had prevented the adoption of this salutary reform. Among minor military extravagances may be mentioned the Colonels' allowances. In the old Bengal Army, for instance, there were seventy-five colonels-one to each Sepoy regiment. Under the present system every officer becomes a Colonel after a certain number of years' service. It is believed that there are now about 250 of these, each of whom receives 11007. a-year. This abuse, however, will die out with the present incumbents. As regards non-productive Public Works, we can only say that great and constant care is needed to see that these never transcend the legitimate needs of a poor country. At the same time it is always to be remembered that the country is enormously largeeight times as populous as Great Britain-yet yielding a far smaller annual revenue. The unskilled laborer is miserably poor, but his obligatory contributions to the income of the State is only seven pence halfpenny a year. As to that part of the national wealth which is represented by precious metals, the figures are remarkable. "Ever since accurate returns of trade are available, the imports have exceeded the exports During the forty-four years beginning with 1839-40 and ending with 1882-3, the total imports of treasure into India have amounted to about 419,000,000." We have no means of knowing what amount of bullion was in circulation, or available for coining, before 1839; but there is no reason to suppose that it was greater in amount than the sum since added. Prices of provisions and clothing, and population have not doubled since then. Clothing is notoriously cheaper since the ports of India have been completely opened to the Manchester trade; and the number of persons who wear good and abundant garments has enormously increased, so that there has been, in this respect, an addition to the resources of the people. We will conclude with a story which strongly illustrates this portion of our subject. In the year 1861, in a certain district which was included in the area of a considerable local famine, the Englishman in charge of the district was accosted in a garden he was visiting by a fine-looking man, evidently of extreme old age, and blind from senile cataract, who was seated near the entrance-gate. Invited to join him, the Englishman took a seat by his side, and opened the conversation by some remark on the hardness of the times. "Hard times, indeed, Sahib!" said his new acquaintance; "I never remember prices being so high since the Chalisa." "The Chalisa," replied the Englishman; "why that was in 1784." "Ay," said the old man, "I was then a young man, serving in Himmat Bahádur's Gosains. Flour was then selling eight sirs (kilograms) for the rupee, as it is now. But it was harder then than now." "Was it? And how do you account for that?" asked the Englishman. "Well," answered the veteran, with something like a wink of his sightless eye, "I reckon there's more money in the country now than there was then." We submit, then, that the poverty of India, if great, has diminished, and is diminishing. But it is an element that we ought never to forget for a moment. And the first duty of a Royal Commission or a Parliamentary Inquiry should be to spy out the nakedness of the land.- Westminster Review. CURRENT THOUGHT. THE REASONING POWER IN CHILDREN. crossings to sweep, and will get more -The London Journal of Education con- money."-B. Fine; because it does not tains a series of questions put to a num-rain."-C. "Wet weather: because they ber of school-children, of from six to get more money."-D. "Fine: because eight years, for the purpose of testing he can be outter more, and can sweep the their reasoning power. The children,' roads more. Do they get money for it? it is said, "enjoyed the questioning I shouldn't do it unless I had money greatly, and it was more difficult to keep given to me.”—E. Fine weather: well them to the point than to extract answers perhaps they do like wet weather for from them." One of the questions pro- more sweeping; they like it wet, and then pounded was, "Why do children have to to leave off raining while they sweep."— go to bed so much earlier than grown F. "Wet: because they get more money, people?" The following are some of the because people don't want to walk in the answers to this problem :mud." A. 'Because it is better for them, don't know why; is it to make them strong? -B. Because they are not so old; I don't know anything else."-C. "Because they are so little; to make them get up early."-D. Because they get so tired; I think it is a good plan."-E. "Because they get so tired, and because they are smaller."-F. "Because children are younger and they must get more sleep, and that they don't get so tired as grown up people." Another question was: “Do crossing sweepers like fine or wet weather better? and why?" The following were the an Another problem laid before the juvenile philosophers was, "If your porridge is hot, why do you eat the outside first?'' Here are some of the replies : A. " Because it would be cooler; I don't know why."-B. Because it is colder, because the edge of the plate goes round it."-C. "The edge: because it is cooler, because the plate is cold."-D. "I should eat the edge of the plate first, because it is cooler; because it touches the mug, and the mug is cold."-E. "Round the edge, because it is coolest, because it is against a cold basin."-F. "Because it is cooler; I don't know why it is cooler." Another series of questions was: "What do dogs think about? Can they talk to each other, and how?" The answers were as follows: A. "Oh! I don't know; I don't know if they think or not; they talk in their way; I don't know what they say."B. Don't know; I don't think they do think."-C. "They don't think at all, do they? They can bark, not talk properly; but then they understand each other." D. "Think about nothing but eating, except they can bark."-E.Some dogs think about biting people; some about eating things; and some dogs talk about being kind to people. They talk in a dog-language that people can't understand."-F. "Biting and fighting; I don't know anything else. Yes, they bark." More practical than most questions propounded to these six or eight years' old girls was this: "What age do you think it to be nicest to be; and why?" Here follow some of the answers: to A. "I don't know; I don't want grow old all of a sudden."-B. "Twelve," but she was too shy to tell the reason why.-C." Seven, because it is then a year older; because then I should not have to go to school so long."-D. "Nine, because I think then I should know a little more."-E. "Well, for myself, I should think about thirty, because you would be of age, and could do nearly what you liked. I should go to theaters and crickets, and play football and run races. Wouldn't I do any work? Oh, yes; if I had my own choice, I should not mind being a coachman. I like horses, and I like dogs, too; but I haven't had much to do with dogs."-F. Twenty, because I could wear trousers then. And what age would you like to be?" THE OWNERSHIP OF IDEAS.-At a recent meeting of the New York Nineteenth Century Club, composed mainly of men of letters, the subject of discussion was "The Idea of Property in Literature." Mr. Charlton T. Lewis, himself an author said : "It is a superstition that there can be such a thing as property in ideas. To wish to have enforced such a theory is to wish to turn back the wheels of progress. We who live to-day are the heirs of all the ages. Enforce the theory of property in ideas and there can be no advance. There are ideas which have been brought into the world within the memory of men in this room. One is Ricardo's idea of rent, the foundation of the entire modern system of political economy. Another is that of the conservation of force; another Darwin's idea, which has been seized and utilized by Herbert Spencer. What a tremendous loss to society there would have been if these ideas had not been free to all to be built upon and developed! It is also a superstition, that authors believe in, that they are a favored class for whom there should be special legislation apart from the others of the State. Authors are not a class. We are simply those who express the opinions and give utterance to the developments of society. Legislation for a class is always pernicious, and it would be a detriment to the many to enact laws which would benefit simply a few authors. The question should be: What legislation on this subject will benefit the whole community?' Let authors be the best and noblest of mankind, but let them not expect special privileges. The utterances of Tennyson and Arnold and Huxley on this question are founded on the false assumption that a man has an intrinsic and perpetual and eternal and infinite right in the product of his own mind. Here is the fundamental error in the whole discussion. If I write a book it is mine. I can do with it as I please-burn it up, lock it up, or publish it. Now, when I give it to the world, what is its commercial value then? It is dependent on the action of society which may create a monopoly of it in the hands of a publisher. comes in the question of deprivation. If it is a coat I have made I am entitled to a monopoly of that, for while one man is wearing it no other man could use it, and he is deprived of no benefit that he may complain of. But with a book it is different. It is no deprivation to me if others are reading it as well as I myself. The man who pens the pages of a book can justly have no monopoly in fact. It is not his work alone. It is the product of society of which he is but a part; society which has moulded and developed him, and he is only the medium of expressing the growth of that society and of putting into book shape the results of its teachings and influence. I think it is expedient only that the author should have copyright control for a limited time. Congress, under the Constitution, I claim, cannot give absolute property in literature in ideas." Here THOUGHTS ON THE THEATER.-The ligious man, was the accredited imperRev. H. R. Haweis recently delivered a Sunday evening discourse on "The Theater,' an abstract of which is given in the Pall Mall Gazette: sonator of villains-so is Henry Irvingbut he is not the prisoner at the bar or the condemned felon. In speaking of the ballet, Mr. Haweis said that not the dis "The Church of the future, he said, would play of the human outline or the exposure have to make room for the drama among of the human body were wrong, but the other things, as merely to repeat the names conditions, times, and seasons of such disof the great dramatists past and present play. He alluded to bathing costumes, proved that the drama was an instinct that swimming exhibitions, and fashionable could never be stamped out-man was toilets, which left little to the imagination, essentially a dramatic animal. Expression and said as long as such displays of outwas the imperative mood of his nature. line were covered by the conventionalities The Church and stage was not an unholy of 'spectacle' or 'fashion' it was irrational to alliance. The whole of the Roman condemn all ballet dancing, and cruel and Catholic mass was in itself intensely dra- censorious to brand as infamous the ladies matic, and all through the middle ages of the ballet as a class-many of them sacred plays were performed in churches. good girls and virtuous married women. In 1378 the Dean and Chapter of St. He spoke to principles only, not to details Paul's Cathedral petitioned Richard II. to-dancing was as legitimate an instinct as stop the performance of plays outside the cathedral, because they had spent so much on their miracle plays and dreaded secular competition. The clergy in those days objected to the secular stage because it interfered with their interest, and it must be added satirized their foibles. Must, he asked, an immoral tendency be inseparably connected with a play? Let the sublime roll of the Shakesperean drama answer that. Are actors necessarily immoral? Shades of Siddons and Garrick answer me from Westminster Abbey, while the noble figure of Macready steps forth from his "Explain the meaning of the Canonical own autobiography. The actor who imper- Books; of the Vulgate; of the Authorized sonated a villain was not necessarily a Version; of the Vatican Codex; of the bad man, he is in a well-balanced play en- Synoptists; of the Evangelical Prophet. gaged in giving a true presentment of life Where do the following characters occur? with that right moral thrust to which he Ariel, Meg Merilies, Sydney Carton, Greatis indispensable. He is only the storm- heart, Jessica, Dinah Morris, Major Dobcloud in the finished picture. He is lifted bin, Amyas Leigh, John Ridd, Mephinto the dignity of a representative person.istophiles, Harpagon, Jean Valjean. He is purified in the fire of the universal Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers." sympathy. He goes down to his house What is meant by saying that there is justified. Macready, a scrupulously re- more knowledge than wisdom nowadays?" acting, and the human body would always SOME ENGLISH CIVIL-SERVICE QUESTIONS.-The London Standard contains what purports to be a portion of the series of questions propounded to candidates for Scholarships in the Marlborough Government School.-. |