cial Co-operative Conference in 1917 when in connection
with the admirable Co-operative Credit movement in India he lectured on
the moral basis of co-operation, at missionary meetings in which he
showed his intimate familiarity with the gospels by reverently quoting
Christ's words in support of his own plea for mutual forbearance and
tolerance. As late as July 1918 he defined _Swaraj_ as partnership in
the Empire, and war service as the easiest and straightest way to win
_Swaraj_, inviting the people of his own Gujarat country whom he was
addressing to wipe it free of the reproach of effeminacy by contributing
thousands of Sepoys in response to the Viceroy's recent appeal for fresh
recruits for the Indian army at one of the most critical moments during
the war. His comments about the same time on the Montagu-Chelmsford
scheme were by no means unfavourable, and he specifically joined in the
tribute of praise bestowed upon the Indian Civil Service for their
steadfast devotion to duty and great organising ability. Government
itself resorted to his services as the member of a Commission appointed
to inquire into agrarian troubles at Camparan, and his collaboration was
warmly welcomed by his European colleagues. Nor were there any signs of
implacable hostility to British rule in his vigorous protests in the
following year against the anti-Asiatic legislation of the South
African Union which was again stirring up bad feeling in India.

The circumstances which drove him to declare war against British rule
and Western civilisation arose out of the action taken by Government on
the report of the "Sedition Committee," which, under the presidency of
Mr. Justice Rowlatt, a judge of the High Court of King's Bench, sent out
especially to preside over it, had not only carefully explored the
origins and growth of political crime during the great wave of unrest
after the Partition of Bengal, but recommended that in some directions
the hands of the executive and judicial authorities should be
strengthened to cope with any fresh outbreaks of a similar character.
The Committee pointed out that in spite of the preventive legislation of
1911 it had become apparent before the war broke out that the forces of
law and order were still inadequately equipped to cope with the
situation in Bengal. For the duration of the war the Defence of India
Act had conferred upon Government emergency powers which had enabled the
authorities summarily to intern