It is a far cry in every sense from the Deccan to Bengal.  There is a greater diversity of races, languages, social customs, physical conditions, &c., between the different provinces of India than is often to be found between the different countries of Europe.  Few differ more widely than the Deccan and Bengal—­the Deccan, a great table-land raised on an average over 2,000ft. above sea level, broken by many deep-cut river valleys and throwing up lofty ridges of bare rock, entirely dependent for its rainfall upon the south-west monsoon, which alone and in varying degrees of abundancy relieves the thirst of a thin soil parched during the rest of the year by a fierce dry heat—­Bengal, a vast alluvial plain, with a hot, damp climate, watered and fertilized by great rivers like the Ganges and the Brahmaputra, which drain the greater part of the Himalayas.  The Deccan is thinly populated; it has no great waterways; there are few large cities and few natural facilities of communication between them, but the population, chiefly Mahratta Hindus, with a fair sprinkling of Mahomedans, survivors of the Moghul Empire, are a virile race, wiry rather than sturdy, with tenacious customs and traditions and a language—­Marathi—­which has a copious popular literature.  Maharashtra, moreover, has historical traditions, by no means inglorious, of its own.  It has played, and is conscious of having played, a conspicuous part in the history of India down to relatively recent times; and the Brahmans of Maharashtra, who were once its rulers, have preserved to the present day the instincts and the aspirations of a ruling race, combined with great force and subtleness of intellect.  In Bengal, on the other hand, there is a dense population, concentrated in part in large towns and cities along the great waterways, but also spread over the whole surface of the rich plains and deltas.  The Bengalees are a quick-witted, imaginative, and warm-hearted people who have been the victims rather than the makers of history.  The tide of conquest has swept over them again and again from times immemorial, but generally without leaving any lasting impression upon their elastic and rather timid temperament.  With all his receptive qualities, his love of novelty and readiness to learn, his retentive memory, his luxuriant imagination, his gift of facile eloquence, the Bengalee has seldom shown himself to be a born ruler of men.

All these differences are reflected in the unrest in Bengal, though on the surface it presents a close resemblance to the unrest in the Deccan, and there have been constant contact and co-operation between the leaders.  Except as a geographical expression, Bengal is practically a creation of British rule and of Western education.  The claim of the modern Bengalees to be regarded as a “nation” has no historical basis.  The inhabitants of Bengal are of mixed Dravidian, Mongolian, and Aryan origin, and in no other speech of India, writes Sir H. Risley, is the literary language cultivated by the educated