His Honour, and a Lady

by Sara Jeannette Duncan

It will be observed that Mr. Ancram’s policy was one of exalted expediency. This will be even more evident when it is understood that, in default of the opportunity of coercing the subject Aryan for his highest welfare, Mr. Ancram conciliated him. The Chief Secretary had many distinguished native friends. They were always trying to make him valuable presents. When he returned the presents he did it in such a way that the bond of their mutual regard was cemented rather than otherwise—cemented by the tears of impulsive Bengali affection. He had other native friends who were more influential than distinguished. They spoke English and wrote it, most of them. They created the thing which is quoted in Westminster as “Indian Public Opinion.” They were in the van of progress, and understood all the tricks for moving the wheels. The Government of India in its acknowledged capacity as brake found these gentlemen annoying; but Mr. Ancram, since he could not imprison them, offered them a measure of his sympathy. They quite understood that it was a small measure, but there is a fascination about the friendship of a Chief Secretary, and they often came to see him. They did not bring him presents, however; they knew very much better than that.

Mohendra Lall Chuckerbutty was one of these inconspicuously influential friends. Mohendra was not a maharajah: he was only a baboo, which stands, like “Mr.” for hardly anything at all. To say that he was a graduate of the Calcutta University is to acknowledge very little; he was as clever before he matriculated as he was after he took his degree. But it should not be forgotten that he was the editor and proprietor of the Bengal Free Press; that was the distinction upon which, for the moment, he was insisting himself. The Bengal Free Press was a voice of the people—a particularly aggressive and pertinacious voice. It sold for two pice in the bazar, and was read by University students at the rate of twenty-five to each copy. It was regularly translated for the benefit of the Amir of Afghanistan, the Khan of Kelat, and such other people as were interested in knowing how insolent sedition could be in Bengal with safety; and it lay on the desk of every high official in the Province. Its advertisements were very funny, and its editorial English was more fluent than veracious: but when it threw mud at the Viceroy, and called the Lieutenant-Governor a contemptible tyrant, and reminded the people that their galls were of the yoke of the stranger, there was no mistaking the direction of its sentiment.

Mohendra Lall Chuckerbutty sat in the room the Chief Secretary called his workshop, looking, in a pause of their conversation, at the Chief Secretary. No one familiar with that journal would have discovered in his amiable individuality the incarnation of the Bengal Free Press. On his head he wore a white turban, and on his countenance an expression of benign intelligence just tinged with uncertainty as to what to say next. His person was buttoned up to his perspiring neck in a tight black surtout, which represented his compromise with European fashions, and across its most pronounced rotundity hung a substantial gold watch-chain. From the coat downwards he fell away, so to speak, into Aryanism: the indefinite white draperies of his race were visible, and his brown hairy legs emerged from them bare. He had made progress, however, with his feet, on which he wore patent leather shoes, almost American in their neatness, with three buttons at the sides. He sat leaning forward a little, with his elbows on his knees, and his plump hands, their dimpled fingers spread apart, hanging down between them. Mohendra Lall Chuckerbutty’s attitude expressed his very genuine anxiety to make the most of his visit.

Ancram leaned back in his tilted chair, with his feet on his desk, sharpening a lead pencil. “And that’s my advice to you,” he said, with his eyes on the knife.

“Well, I am grateful foritt! I am very much obliged foritt!” Mohendra paused to relieve his nerves by an amiable, somewhat inconsequent laugh. “It iss my wish offcourse to be guided as far as possible by your opinion.” Mohendra glanced deprecatingly at the matting. “But this is a sirrious grievance. And there are others who are always spikking with me and pushing me——”

“No grievance was ever mended in a day or a night, or a session, Baboo. Government moves slowly. Ref—changes are made by inches, not by ells. If you are wise, you’ll be content with one inch this year and another next. It’s the only way.”

Mohendra smiled in sad agreement, and nodded two or three times, with his head rather on one side. It was an attitude so expressive of submission that the Chief Secretary’s tone seemed unnecessarily decisive.

“The article on that admirable Waterways Bill off yours I hope you recivved. I sent isspecial marked copy.”

“Yes,” replied Ancram, in cordial admission: “I noticed it. Very much to the point. The writer thoroughly grasped my idea. Very grammatical too—and all that.” Mr. Ancram yawned a little. “But you’d better keep my name out of your paper, Baboo—unless you want to abuse me. I’m a modest man, you know. That leader you speak of made me blush, I assure you.”

It required all Mohendra’s agility to arrive at the conclusion that if the Honourable Mr. Ancram really considered the influence of the Bengal Free Press of no importance, he would not take the trouble to say so. He arrived at it safely, though, while apparently he was only shaking his head and respectfully enjoying Mr. Ancram’s humour, and saying, “Oh, no, no! If sometimes we blame, we must also often praise. Oh yess, certainlie. And efery one says it iss a good piece off work.”