The whole question is one that cannot be allowed to drag on indefinitely without grave danger to the Empire.  It evidently cannot be solved without the co-operation of the Colonies.  Next year the Imperial Conference meets again in the capital of the Empire.  If, in the meantime, the Imperial Government were to enter into communication with the Government of India and with the Crown Colonies, so many of whom are closely interested in Indian labour, they should be in a position to lay before the representatives of the Dominions assembled in London next March considered proposals which would afford a basis for discussion and, one may hope, for a definite agreement.  A recognition of the right of Colonial Governments to regulate the conditions on which British Indians may be allowed admission as indentured labourers or for permanent residence ought to secure guarantees for the equitable and humane treatment of those who have been already admitted, or shall hereafter be admitted, and also an undertaking that Indians of good position armed with specified credentials from the Government of India, travelling either for pleasure or for purposes of scientific study or on business or with other legitimate motives, would be allowed to enter and travel about for a reasonable period without let or hindrance of any sort.  That is the minimum which would, I believe, satisfy the best Indian opinion, and it is inconceivable that if the situation were freely and frankly explained to our Colonial kinsmen they would reject a settlement so essential to the interests and to the credit of the whole Empire in relation to India.

CHAPTER XXV.

SOCIAL AND OFFICIAL RELATIONS.

On few subjects are more ignorant or malevolent statements made than on the attitude of Englishmen in India towards the natives of the country.  That social relations between Englishmen and Indians seldom grow intimate is true enough, but not that the fault lies mainly with Englishmen.  At the risk of being trite, I must recall a few elementary considerations.

The bedrock difficulty is that Indian customs prevent any kind of intimacy between English and Indian families.  Even in England the relations between men who are excluded from acquaintance with each other’s families can rarely be called intimate, and except in the very few cases of Indian families that are altogether Westernized, Indian habits rigidly exclude Englishmen from admission into the homes of Indian gentlemen, whether Hindu or Mahomedan.  Intercourse between Indian and English ladies is in the same way almost entirely confined to formal visits paid by the latter to the zenana and the harem, and to so-called Purdah parties, given in English houses, in which Indian ladies are entertained as far as possible under the same conditions that prevail in their own homes—­i.e., to the total exclusion of all males.  So long as Indian ladies are condemned