a law has been passed to sanction it, instances of such remarriage among Hindus are of rare occurrence. On the other hand, marriage is an obligation which custom imposes on all, and practically all men and women in Bengal marry. This custom has its advantages as well as its disadvantages. All women are cared for and provided for; all women have their well-defined position in society and their work in families; and the aimless lives of old maids is not observable in India. Nor does the universal obligation of marriage produce the results that might be apprehended by theoretical thinkers; and population in Bengal and in India does not increase at a faster rate than in England, or even as fast. The alarm felt by the alleged rapid increase of population in India is dispelled by statistics. When men compare the population of British India in the present day with the population of British India half a century ago, they generally forget that British India now comprises new and large provinces which were outside British India in the forties. And it can be proved by figures that within the same area population does not increase at the saine rate in India as it has done in England. Famines in India are not due to increase in population; they are mainly due to excessive land-assessment, as stated elsewhere.

The rules of caste among the Hindus are being gradually relaxed through the healthy influences of modern education and the requirements of modern civilisation. Boys of all castes receive their education in the same schools, all men travel in the same steamers and railway carriages, work side by side in the same offices, take part in the same social, religious, and political movements, and often have their meals together, as they never did in olden times. The influx of young men to Europe for education has further loosened the hold of caste rules; and the social work of the BrahinoSomaj, the Theistic Hindu Church of Bengal, has fur

thered the cause of social progress. Nevertheless, caste still lives and will live for a long time yet, and inter-caste marriages are rare, except among the limited population who belong to the Brahmo Church. Progress is slow in India; but, all things considered, slow progress is always the safest progress.

RESULTS OF BRITISH RULE IN BENGAL

On the whole the British nation has reason to congratulate itself on the results of British administration in Bengal and in India generally. British rule has maintained peace in the country, and has conferred on the people a fair degree of security in life and property. It has bestowed on a quick and intelligent nation the blessings of Western education and a knowledge of Western civilisation, and it has sown in the country the seeds of Western institutions. On the other hand he is no true friend to England or to India who hesitates to point out the blemishes of British rule in India, while recognising the blessings it has conferred. The first great defect of British administration is its expensiveness, the second great defect is its exclusiveness; and in both these respects the civilised rule of England compares unfavourably with the ruder systems of administration which prevailed in India before the British conquest. The extravagant and ruinous military expenditure of India, and the annual drain on her resources by reason of the "home charges," need to be curtailed and reduced if British rule is meant to be a blessing instead of a curse; and the fetish of unbending despotism in the adininistration of districts and provinces requires to be replaced by some degree of popular control and popular representation if the administration is meant for the good of the people. Administrators who have been trained for generations in the exercise of absolute power believe that an auto

cratic system of rule, which concedes no real share of work to the people, and listens to no word of advice. from the people, is the saving of India. On the other hand, the leaders of the people themselves demand and expect that the rights and privileges now enjoyed by English citizens are to come to them, all at once, like Minerva out of the forehead of Jupiter. The true path of progress lies midway. Progress-slow, cautious, and real progress-is both inevitable and necessary for the purposes of good administration. The statesman who seeks to revolutionise the country by forced progress really throws the people backward in their path of advancement. And the statesman who seeks to block the political advancement of the people by coercive measures and retrograde legislation is preparing the way to violence and disturbance, forcing the people to lawless methods for gaining their purpose, and thus gradually converting peaceful India to what Ireland was, not many generations ago.

ASSAM

By H. LUTTMAN-JOHNSON

(Late Indian Civil Service)

THE north-western frontier of India has always attracted the interest of the English public. The expansion of our Indian Empire in this direction has involved us in bloody and expensive wars-in battle, murder, and sudden death-things which in themselves excite our enthusiasm and our sympathy. Then in the northwest of India we have had some compensation for our sacrifices in the annexation of a populous and rich province, the Punjab. More recently our wars with the Afghan tribes have been fierce and hazardous, and have teemed with thrilling episodes. The idea that when we have to fight our European neighbour, Russia, we shall allow this distant and somewhat inaccessible frontier to become the field of operations has, during the last thirty years, added a new interest to it. So much has the north-west frontier absorbed public attention that the expansion of our Indian Empire in the north-east direction has proceeded almost unnoticed. But the causes which led to expansion in the one direction are equally operative in the other. Just as misgovernment, anarchy, and aggression led to our interference in the Punjab, and later beyond the Indus, so on the north-eastern frontier we could not afford to leave the adjacent valleys of the Brahmaputra and the Surma (or Barak) to barbarism or the Burmese. Having occupied the valleys, we found ourselves compelled to

interfere also with the wild tribes which surrounded them. Similarly our great competitor, Russia, driven by similar causes and with similar, motives, has spread herself over the whole of northern Asia. It is my object in this paper to describe as briefly as possible the expansion of our Indian Empire in the north-east direction.

DESCRIPTION OF THE NORTH-EASTERN TRACT

When the English, in the year 1765, obtained full control of the huge province of Lower Bengal, that is, of the districts forming the delta of the Ganges and Brahmaputra rivers, a large tract to the north and east of the delta, bounded on the north by the Himalayan mountains and on the east by Burmah, remained unexplored and unannexed. This tract comprises the Brahmaputra valley on the north, running some 450 miles east to west at the foot of the Himalayas; the Surma, or Barak valley, on the south, parallel to the northern valley, but only some 150 miles long; and a central zone of mountainous country some 4000 feet high, lying between the two valleys. The two valleys debouch at their western extremities on the fertile delta of Bengal. Much of the southern valley is but a continuation of that delta, and owes its fertility to the deposit of silt. The tide of the Bay of Bengal extends to it in the dry season of the year. Besides this there is an extensive mountainous tract running from north-cast, where it branches off from the Himalayas at the eastern end of the Brahmaputra valley, to south-west, along the borders of Burinah. From this tract the central zone above noticed gives off on the

west.

The area of this north-eastern tract is some 45,000 square miles. The climate is exceedingly damp. The rainfall on the southern face of the central range