obscure" as describing the situation, and he desired to know whether
I thought the situation was still obscure and formidable. I will not
abandon the words, but I think the situation is less formidable and
less obscure. Neither repression on the one hand, nor reform on the
other, could possibly be expected to cut the roots of anarchical crime
in a few weeks. But with unfaltering repression on the one hand, and
vigour and good faith in reform on the other, we see solid reason to
hope that we shall weaken, even if we cannot destroy, those baleful
forces.

There are, I take it, three classes of people that we have to consider
in dealing with a scheme of this kind. There are the extremists, who
nurse fantastic dreams that some day they will drive us out of India.
In this group there are academic extremists and physical force
extremists, and I have seen it stated on a certain authority--it
cannot be more than a guess--that they do not number, whether academic
or physical force extremists, more than one-tenth, or even three per
cent. of what are called the educated class in India. The second
group nourish no hopes of this sort; they hope for autonomy or
self-government of the colonial species and pattern. The third
section in this classification ask for no more than to be admitted to
co-operation in our administration, and to find a free and effective
voice in expressing the interests and needs of their people. I believe
the effect of the reforms has been, is being, and will be, to draw the
second class, who hope for colonial autonomy, into the ranks of the
third class, who will be content with admission to a fair and workable
co-operation. A correspondent wrote to me the other day and said:--

"We seem to have caught many discontented people on the rebound,
and to have given them an excuse for a loyalty which they have
badly wanted."

In spite of all this, it is a difficult and critical situation. Still,
by almost universal admission it has lost the tension that strained
India two or three months ago, and public feeling is tranquillised,
certainly beyond any expectation that either I or the Viceroy ventured
to entertain.

The atmosphere has changed from dark and sullen to hopeful, and I am
sure your Lordships will allow me to be equally confident that nothing
will be done at Westminster to overcloud that promising sky. The noble
Marquess the other day said--and I was delighted to hear it--that
he, at all eve