Surely the fact that many influences are at work systematically striving to estrange these students from England should rouse the English to effort.  It may not be an easy task to gain these men.  It will need patience and zeal.  There must be no touch of patronage in the attempt.  Their deep-rooted belief that no real friendship can exist between the English and the Indian has to be overcome; the much misrepresentation which has made the Indian student misjudge the English character has to be counteracted and set right.  It must be remembered that he is a being far away from home, excessively sensitive, situated in extremely unusual surroundings and in most cases having lost that religious belief without which no Oriental is really happy or able to live and be his best.  He is, in truth, not himself.  Such is the student who is to be won to attachment.  The difficulty of the task should appeal to the English nature.

What is required is not a sudden and indiscriminate rush to seek out and know the Indian student.  That would not last and would lead to much disappointment on both sides.  The great need of the present is workers who know both sides and who will judiciously draw them together.  Connecting links to bring the right Indians into touch with the right English.  They will need very special qualifications, these workers, if they are to succeed.  There is enough to be done to employ the full time of exceptionally energetic men.  Wonders could be worked if England only realized her duty to these men.  The Indian student would return to his home at any rate with no feeling of bitterness.  He would have his chance of seeing the real English, and of being influenced aright.  Misconceptions would be banished.  He would live in an atmosphere better adapted to hard work.  He would attain a higher standard in his studies and examinations.  He would be better fitted to be a useful citizen.  Friendliness would, at any rate, have blunted antagonistic tendencies.  And what a difference it would make to his people!  The father who has spent so much on him would no longer feel that his son has lost and not gained by crossing the seas.  The mother who, though behind the purdah, has eagerly been watching his career, dwelling lovingly on the weekly news, counting the days to his return, would no longer need to weep that it is not well with her son, who has come back so different from all she had hoped.  Whole families would bless the England which had made their member manly, upright, better for his sojourn there, fitted to earn a living honourably, and possessed of grit to strive to do his best.  And he, the student, stirred, by memories of kindness in the West, would win those with whom he comes in contact to a friendlier feeling for the British race.  The seditionist would find no soil here ready for his seed.  Could anything be better worth accomplishing?

NOTE 15

THE VICEROY’S EXECUTIVE COUNCIL.