THE INDIAN EMBASSY.
November 1875-May 1876.
The visit of the Prince of Wales to India, apart from what it brought of personal information or amusement, must be regarded as one of the most important services he has yet rendered to the Empire. This is why we call it an embassy rather than a tour or a journey. It appears that as far back as the year 1858, the idea of a tour in the Eastern possessions of the Crown was suggested by Lord Canning to the Prince Consort, as part of the education of the Heir Apparent. But he was then only seventeen, and the proposal was made merely as an incident of foreign travel. A succession of events, both at home and in the East, caused the scheme to be postponed, nor was it seriously renewed till the Prince had attained an age, and acquired an experience in affairs, which would secure for the expedition high consideration for political and imperial, as well as personal, purposes.
In the beginning of the year 1875 it was rumoured that the project was seriously entertained, and on the 16th of March the Marquis of Salisbury made an official announcement to the Indian Council of the intended visit. Many arrangements, however, had to be made, and many difficulties surmounted, before actual preparations for the journey commenced. All these are recounted in detail by Dr. W. H. Russell, in the introduction to his book on the 'Prince of Wales's Tour,' a reprint in expanded and permanent form of his letters as the special correspondent of the Times. Dr. Russell had the advantage of accompanying the Prince as one of his personal suite, under the title of Honorary Private Secretary. It is fortunate that the journey had such a historian. The work not only gives a Diary of the tour in India, with a full record of the proceedings of the Prince, but is in itself a most interesting and instructive book of travel, full of information, conveyed in the graphic and bright style which has made the author famous as a man of letters. To this book the reader of these pages is referred for the story of the Royal expedition, both in India and in the countries through which he passed on the outward and homeward journey.[A]
[A] 'The Prince of Wales's Tour: a Diary in India, with some accounts of the visits to the Courts of Greece, Egypt, Spain, and Portugal.' By William Howard Russell, LL.D. With illustrations by Sydney P. Hall. Sampson Low & Co.
The Prince was fortunate in the companions of his journey, even to the humbler and useful attendants. It is greatly to the credit of his judgment and his right feeling that the first to whom he expressed a wish to accompany him was Sir Bartle Frere, a wise and good man, and whose Indian experience would be of immense value. In the suite there were, of his own household, Lord Suffield, Sir Dighton Probyn, Colonel Ellis, and Sir Francis Knollys. The Duke of Sutherland, Lord Alfred Paget, Lord Aylesford, Lord Carington, Colonel Owen Williams, Lord Charles Beresford, Captain Fitz George, were invited to join the expedition. Canon Duckworth was selected as chaplain, and Sir Joseph Phayrer as physician; Mr. Albert Grey, secretary to Sir Bartle Frere, Dr. Russell, and Mr. S. P. Hall as artist, completed the list of those who formed the suite of His Royal Highness. Several of these—General Probyn, Colonel Ellis, and Dr. Phayrer—had long Indian experience; and Lord Charles Beresford had accompanied the Duke of Edinburgh in his Indian tour the year before.
The route to be laid down required much consultation, partly from public considerations and partly from questions of climate and care for the Prince's health. The best time of starting had also to be considered. At last all was arranged, and on the 11th of November the Prince started. The route was to be viâ Brindisi, to Greece, Egypt, Bombay, Ceylon, Madras, Calcutta, Lucknow, Delhi, Lahore, Agra, Gwalior, Nepal, Bareilly, Allahabad, Indore, Bombay, and home by Egypt, Malta, Gibraltar, Spain, Portugal. The departure from Lisbon was on the 7th of May, and on the 11th the Serapis anchored off the Isle of Wight, where the Princess of Wales and the children, in the Enchantress yacht, awaited the arrival. "The scene at the landing at Portsmouth," says Dr. Russell, "was a becoming prelude to the greeting which the whole country gave the Prince of Wales on his return from the visit to India, which will be for ever a great landmark in the history of the Empire."
The numerous and diverse events and incidents of the months in India—the sight-seeing, the adventures (some of them strange and perilous), the shooting parties and hunting expeditions, the manifold amusements and excitements of travel—all these were enjoyed by the Prince as much as if he were only the most light-hearted tourist or keenest sportsman. But at the same time, so far as official ceremony and public affairs were concerned, he bore himself all through with a thoughtfulness and dignity worthy of his high position, and of the important mission with which he was entrusted as representing Royalty and the British nation.
There was ceremonial reception at Athens, and again in Egypt in the court of the Khedive, but the first official and formal event of the Prince's mission was the investiture of Prince Tewfik, the Viceroy's eldest son, with the Order of the Star of India. This was done in the palace, with imposing ceremony.
The next official event was the reception of an address from the inhabitants of Aden, which was presented by a Parsee merchant, on behalf of the community. The address of the Parsee showed very clearly how well the object of the Prince's visit was understood throughout the East. The Prince made an appropriate reply, which no doubt was speedily wired to Bombay, and read in the native newspapers all over India.
On arriving at Bombay it was again a Parsee who headed the first deputation and read the first address to the Prince on landing in India. It was from the Corporation of Bombay, the second city in the British Empire, in population if not in wealth. The address set forth in glowing terms the historical and commercial claims of the city to distinction, and expressed the pleasure of seeing among them the heir to the Crown, whom the Queen had sent to become personally acquainted with the people of India. The Prince replied in the following words:—
"It is a great pleasure to me to begin my travels in India at a place so long associated with the Royal Family of England, and to find that during so many generations of British rule this great port has steadily prospered. Your natural advantages would have insured a large amount of commerce under any strong Government, but in your various and industrious population I gladly recognize the traces of a rule which gives shelter to all who obey the laws; which recognizes no invidious distinctions of race; which affords to all perfect liberty in matters of religious opinion and belief; and freedom in the pursuit of trade and of all lawful callings. I note with satisfaction the assurance I derive from your address, that under British rule men of varied creeds and nations live in harmony among themselves, and develop to the utmost those energies which they inherit from widely separate families of mankind, whilst all join in loyal attachment to the British Crown, and take their part, as in my native country, in the management of their own local affairs.
"I shall gladly communicate to Her Majesty what you so loyally and kindly say regarding the pleasure which the people of India derive from Her Majesty's gracious permission to me to visit this part of Her Majesty's Empire. I assure you that the Princess of Wales has never ceased to share my regret that she was unable to accompany me. She has from her earliest years taken the most lively interest in this great country, and the cordiality of your greeting this day will make her yet more regret the impossibility of her sharing in person the pleasure your welcome afforded me."
This reply, so happily conceived, and delivered with quiet earnestness, delighted all who heard it. But the echoes of it would soon reach every part of India, and the chiefs and rulers, and also the leaders of opinion in the native press, would from these words of the Prince receive a lesson of true statesmanship and constitutional government.
The greatest event at Bombay was the reception of the Rulers and Chiefs of Western India, a scene of truly Oriental magnificence, the description of which forms one of the most brilliant chapters in Dr. Russell's book. All the established forms of Indian ceremony were observed. The greatest rulers were saluted with the largest number of guns, the Maharajah of Mysore, for instance, having a salute of twenty-one guns, while others were fifteen-gun chiefs or eleven-gun rajahs, as the case might be, according to the population and wealth of the territories over which they ruled. Their dresses, and jewels, and retinues, and the modes of reception, as well as their personal characteristics, are all duly recorded. The Viceroy of India, Lord Northbrook, was with the Prince of Wales at one grand Durbar, and his position in regard to the Royal Envoy from the Queen, the arrangement of which had caused some difficulty in anticipation, was gracefully managed by the Viceroy and the Prince themselves. The Bombay Durbar passed off admirably. It was the Prince's birthday, the 9th of November, and no such scene as on that day can he expect again to witness. The "Carpet," which takes an important place in Oriental durbars, the nuzzars or gifts of homage, and other points of ceremonial, as well as the number of guns in the salute, had all been arranged by official notices to the political officers attached to the native courts. But the cordial bearing of the Prince, and his kindly words when he was told that any visitors knew the English tongue, gave more satisfaction than the formal ceremonials.
A State banquet was given by the Governor in honour of the Prince's birthday. In returning thanks for his health, proposed by the Governor, the Prince made a short but telling speech. He said:—
"It has long been my earnest wish—the dream of my life—to visit India; and now that my desire has been gratified, I can only say, Sir Philip Wodehouse, how much pleased I am to have spent my thirty-fourth birthday under your roof in Bombay. I shall remember with satisfaction the hospitable reception I have had from the Governor, and all here, as long as I live, and I believe that I may regard what I have experienced in Bombay as a guarantee of the future of my progress through this great Empire, which forms so important a part of the dominions of the Queen."
These last words were a true forecast of the Royal progress throughout India. What has been said of Bombay, must serve to give an idea of what everywhere had to be recorded. But we must refrain from further details of what occurred at other Presidencies, and only add that the crowning public event of the whole tour, the chief ceremony of the mission of the Prince, the holding the Chapter of the Order of the Star of India, came off, at Calcutta, on New Year's Day, 1876, with brilliant éclat.
This only may be said, that no more successful embassy than that undertaken by the Prince ever went forth from England. It may be added that the great ends accomplished by it cost to the British Exchequer less than £60,000; and this, although no expense was spared in carrying out the mission with due display and munificence. Nor ought it to be omitted that the Prince was most generous, as he is at home, in his gifts to useful and charitable institutions, visited by him in the course of his journey. But we must leave the fascinating story of the Indian visit, to resume the record of the humbler, but not less honourable duties, undertaken by the Prince after his return to England.