I am now going to take you, if you will allow me, for a moment, to a point of immediate and, I can almost say, personal interest.  Everybody will agree, as I say, that we have fulfilled within the last six or eight months the pledges that were given by the Sovereign in November.  An Indian gentleman has been placed on the Council of the Viceroy—­not an everyday transaction.  It needed some courage to do it, but it was done.  Before that, two Indians were placed on the Council of India that sits in my own office at Whitehall.  We have passed through Parliament, as I have already described to you, the Councils Act.

Those are great things.  But I am told great uneasiness is growing in the House of Commons as to the matter of deportation.  You know what deportation means.  It means that nine Indian gentlemen on December 13 last were arrested and are now detained—­arrested under a law which is as good a law as any law on our own statute-book.  You will forgive me for detaining you with this, but it is an actual and pressing point.  Some of the most respected members of my own party write a letter to the Prime Minister protesting.  A Bill has been brought in, and the first reading of it was carried two or three days ago, of which I can only say—­with all responsibility for what I am saying—­that it is nothing less, if you consider the source from which it comes, and if you consider the arguments by which it is supported, than a vote of distinct censure on me and Lord Minto.  The Bill is also supported by a very clever and rising member of the Opposition.  Now words of an extraordinary character have been used in support of this severe criticism of the policy of myself and Lord Minto.  In a motion, not in connection with the Bill, but earlier in the Session, words were read from Magna Charta, with the insinuation that the present Secretary of State is as dubious a character as the Sovereign against whom Magna Charta was directed.  Gloomy references were actually made to King Charles I., and it was shown that we were exercising powers that, when attempted to be exercised by Charles I., led to the Civil War and cost Charles I. his head.  This was at the beginning of the present Session.  I doubt if they will get through to the end of the Session, whenever that may be, without comparisons being instituted between the Secretary of State, for example, and Strafford or even Cromwell in his worst moments, as they would think.  If Cromwell is mentioned, I shall know where to point out how Cromwell was troubled by Fifth Monarchy men, Praise-God Barebones, Venner, Saxby, and others.  In historical parallels I am fairly prepared for the worst.  I will take my chance.