ia
where agriculture is still the greatest of all national industries, have
a special claim to respectful hearing, even though they have hitherto
for the most part held aloof from the fashionable methods of political
agitation. There was indeed a good deal of disappointment among the
urban professional classes, in whose eyes a Western education--or rather
education on what are, often quite erroneously, conceived to be Western
lines--should apparently constitute the one indispensable qualification
for public life. But they too had secured no inconsiderable number of
seats, and if the voice of the Indian National Congress did not
predominate it had certainly not been reduced to silence.

Doubts were freely expressed among Englishmen before the meetings of the
new Councils as to the competence of the Anglo-Indian officials for the
novel duties allotted to them in these assemblies. It was argued, not
unreasonably, that men who had never been trained or accustomed to take
part in public discussions might find themselves at a disadvantage in
controversial encounters with the quick-witted Hindu politician. It is
generally admitted now that the first Session at any rate of the
Imperial Council by no means justified any such apprehensions. Not a few
official members, it is true, were inclined at first to rely exclusively
upon their written notes, and there was indeed, from beginning to end,
but little room for the rapid thrust and skilled parry of debate to
which we are accustomed at Westminster. Most of the Indian members
themselves had carefully prepared their speeches beforehand, and read
them out from typed or even printed drafts before them. In many cases
the speeches had been communicated two or three days ahead to the Press,
and sometimes a speech was printed and commented upon in the favoured
organ of some honourable member, though he had ultimately changed his
mind and preserved silence, without, however, informing the editor of
the fact. In other cases a speech was published without the
interruptions and calls to order which had compelled the orator to drop
out some of his most cherished periods. As it was the custom for Indian
members to communicate also to the departments immediately concerned the
gist of the remarks which they proposed to make, the official members
were tempted at first to frame their replies on similar lines and to
read out elaborate statements bristling with figures, which would have
been much mor