Do not, however, let us throw the blame wholly upon the Congress.  For, like Mr. Telang, it has been induced to put its trust in “the friends amongst the garrison”—­Englishmen often of widely different types and characters, like Bradlaugh and Hume and Webb and Sir William Wedderburn, and in more recent days Sir Henry Cotton and Mr. Mackarness—­and upon them must rest no small responsibility for the diversion of many of the best talents and energies of educated India from the thorny path of social reform into the more popular field of political agitation.

What has been the result?  A self-constituted body of Indian gentlemen who have no title to represent the people and a very slender title to represent the upper classes of Indian society, but who, as I have already said, doubtless represent to some extent a considerable and influential section of Western educated opinion, might have given very useful assistance to Anglo-Indian legislators and administrators had they devoted themselves to the study of those social problems in the solution of which it is peculiarly difficult and dangerous for an alien Government to take any initiative.  Instead of that, they set before themselves a task that was impossible because they had no status to perform it.  They were fighting all the time in the air, and their proceedings therefore lacked reality.  The Congress was not only an irresponsible body, but it was never steadied by a healthy divergency of opinions and the presentation of conflicting arguments.  It was not even a debating society, for all represented practically the same interests, held the same views, made the same speeches, which there was no one to question or to refute.  Hence the monotony of the proceedings, the sameness of the speeches, sometimes marked with great ability, and generally delivered with much eloquence and fervour, at the short annual sessions.  The proceedings were usually controlled by a small caucus who drew up long-winded resolutions, often embodying half a score of resolutions carried in previous sessions.  Some one delivered a soul-stirring oration, and then the “omnibus” resolution, which was not even always read out, was put to the vote and passed unanimously.  Every one knew beforehand that every speaker would attack the policy of Government, whether he dealt with the ancient stock grievances or with some new question raised by the legislative and administrative measures of the current year; and every one knew also that all the others would applaud.  There was no other way of bidding for popularity and making a mark than by achieving pre-eminence in the arts of pungent criticism and exuberant rhetoric.  Behind the scenes there were, doubtless, often fierce fights and jealousies, and the struggles in camera are reported to have been sometimes very violent and bitter.  But an unbroken front was maintained to the outside world, and the divisions which ultimately almost shipwrecked the Congress very rarely showed themselves on the surface of its proceedings till nearly 20 years after its birth.