I cannot conclude this short notice of a great subject without commenting on what, at first sight, seems the remarkable fact, that the Government in India, as represented by the Viceroy, and those merchants who are represented by Mr. Mackay, President of the Currency Association, have admitted that a low exchange has been a stimulus to the progress of India, and that producers have gained by it.  It is true that the Viceroy declared in his speech in Council of June 26th, 1893, that “to leave matters as they were meant for the country as a whole a fatal and stunting arrestation [sic, probably a misprint for arrestment] of its development."[69] But the cat escapes later on in the speech when a hope is expressed that one of the effects of the measure will be “that capital will flow more freely into the country without the adventitious stimulus which we have hitherto been unable to refuse.”  The Viceroy thus admits, what everyone knows, that a low exchange has acted as a stimulus to the progress of India, and in doing so has given away the whole case for the Government.  But no one has ever denied the admission in question except Mr. Mackay; and his absolute denial, when questioned on the subject, that the producers of India would be affected by the measure, was subsequently eaten up by himself in cross-examination towards the close of his evidence given before the Currency Committee.  But it is of course the rule, to which there are few exceptions, that those who are engaged in the unfortunate business of bolstering up an indefensible case, invariably let out something which is absolutely destructive to the cause they are advocating; and we find another instance of this at p. 191, Appendix I. of the “Report of the Currency Committee.”  And if Mr. Mackay has given away the whole case in London, one of his followers equally did so in Calcutta when a deputation, headed by Mr. Mackay, was received by the Viceroy.  And on this occasion Mr. W. O. Bell Irving, as representing over 3,300 square miles of land in Lower Bengal, stated that he “was not prepared to contend that in certain respects the ryots and zemindars have not benefited from the depreciation of the rupee.”  We thus see that both the Government, as represented by the Viceroy, and the most active supporters of the present monetary policy, have admitted that the measure would have injurious effects on the producers of India—­in other words, on those on whom the financial stability of the empire entirely rests.

And the producers of India have as little reason to be satisfied with the action of the Currency Committee which was presided over by Lord Herschell as they have with the Government in our Eastern Empire.  A glance at the first page of the Report, and at the professions of the witnesses examined, will show that this is the case.  The Committee was requested by Mr. Gladstone’s Government to form, inter alia, “a just estimate of the effect of a varying, and possibly much lower exchange, upon the