His slyle as a writer. 133 none equalled him." During a great part of his life he was fond of burlesque and light composition, but then reflected that a tongue, which could repeat the sublimest productions, ought not to bestow trouble on frivolous verses, and that a heart, elevated to nobler conceptions, should not occupy itself with mean and despicable fancies. He left behind him a collection of odes which he had composed, and some musical airs which were said to have shewn considerable taste and skill. The style of his prose writings is admirable, for he preferred elegance and simplicity to the tawdry inflated mannerism of his contemporaries both Oriental and European, and we strongly commend his advice in this matter to the literary aspirants of Young India. In a letter addressed to Humáyun he writes thus: "You certainly do not excel in letter writing, and fail chiefly because you have too great a desire to shew your acquirements. For the future you should write unaffectedly, with clearness, using plain words, which would cost less trouble both to the writer and reader." The letter from which we have extracted this passage is distinguished for judicious criticism, sound advice, and elevated principles, which have been rarely surpassed by any father's letters to his son. But Báber's great charm, which makes him stand out in such relief from other oriental writers is his truthfulness. Eagerly pursuing truth in conversation, literature, and art, he was an ardent lover of nature, and in his writings passages of great force are set off by others of picturesque beauty. His descriptions are lively, minute, accurate, and derived from keen and close observation. Rural scenery was his delight. He writes with enthusiasm of the hills and vallies over which he roamed, communicates to us the sentiments which fountains and streams suggested, and represents himself as seated by waterfalls, with the pleasant murmurs of which the harmony of his musicians mingled. The charms of Kábul were engraved on his heart, and we cannot fail to be interested in the following account of his reminiscences, although the fanciful connexion between creature comforts and romance must excite a smile. "How is it possible," he asks," that the delights of those lands should be ever erased from the beart? Above all, how is it possible for one like me who have made a vow of abstinence from wine, and of purity of life, to forget the delicious melons and grapes of that pleasant region? They recently brought me a single musk-melon. While cutting it up I felt myself affected with a strong feeling of loneliness, and a sense of my exile from my native country; and I could not help shedding tears while I was eating it." (Memoirs, p. 401.) With this we may couple his decision on two questions which are discussed at the tables of Europeans, viz. the superior flavour of the mango as compared with other fruits, and the artistic method of eating it. "Of the vegetable productions peculiar to Hindustan, one is the mango (amba). The natives of Hindustán generally pronounce the b in it, as if no vowel followed; but as this makes the word difficult to articulate, it is sometimes called naghzak, as Khwája Khosrú says— My fair (naghzak) is the embellisher of the garden, Such mangoes as are good are excellent. Many are eaten, but few are good of their kind. They pluck most of them unripe, and ripen them in the house. The unripe mango makes excellent tarts, and extremely good marmalade. In short this is the best fruit of Hindustán. The tree bears a great weight of fruit. Many praise the mango so highly as to give it the preference to every kind of fruit, the musk-melon excepted; but it does not appear to me to justify their praises. It resembles the kardi-peach and ripens in the rains. There are two kinds of it. One kind they squeeze and soften in the hand, and then, making a hole in its side, press it and suck the juice. The other is like the kardi-peach. They take off its skin and eat it. Its leaf somewhat resembles that of the peach. Its trunk is ill-looking and ill-shaped. In Bengal and Gujrat the mangoes are excellent." (Memoirs, p. 324.) Báber's large heart embraced the grandest and most insignificant objects in nature. He was the very opposite of Wordsworth's hard, unromantic Peter Bell, and could find attractions even in a single apple-tree, when the winds of autumn had denuded it of nearly all its leaves. "On some branches five or six scattered leaves still remained," he says, " and exhibited a beauty, which the painter, with all his skill, might attempt in vain to portray." All branches of natural history-including botany, zoology, and atmospheric phenomena-were his study; trees, birds, and animals were all faithfully described. In addition to these pursuits he found time in the course of his active, stirring life to write a treatise on Law, which was much approved, a tract on Túrki Prosody, and a versified edition of a work by Hazret Ishan on mystical Divinity. In brief, he had the tastes and acquirements of a still wiser Monarch, who " spoke three hundred proverbs, and his songs were a thousand and five. And he spoke of trees, from the cedar tree that is in Lebanon, even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall; he spoke also of beasts, and of fowl, and of creeping things, and of fishes." We may sum up all that we have said of Báber in a few words. He was the most engaging of men, and one of the noblest that have ever entered India. The stains of vices which disgraced his youth were wiped away in the eyes of men by the moral fortitude which enabled him to overcome them, and to become distinguished for the purity of his life. He was an obedient son, kind father and brother, generous friend, and placable enemy. He worshipped his Maker Rules for Examination of Junior Civil Servants. 135 sincerely, according to the light which nature and a spurious creed had shed upon him. He was bold, frank, open-handed and highsouled, scorning the national love of intrigue, and above all kinds of pettiness. His tastes were refined, his mind cultivated, his knowledge extensive. Compared, indeed, with the world's greatest Monarchs and Commanders he may but hold the second rank; but what we maintain of him is this: If he were not "fellow with the best King," he was at least "the best King of good fellows"; and, considering the circumstances of his birth and training, it is to his immortal honour that his life was "Like rivers that water the woodlands, "Darkened by shadows of earth, but reflecting an image of heaven." ART. IV.-RULES FOR EXAMINATION OF JUNIOR CIVIL SERVANTS. VERNACULAR LANGUAGES. By Order of the Right Honorable the Governor in Council, Officiating Chief Secretary to Government. Bombay Castle, 13th September, 1854. FROM every quarter of our Indian Empire one universal cry arises, "Reform our Civil Administration." The unanmity with which the appeal is urged, and the half measures that have been adopted to allay its virulence, affords satisfactory evidence, that some pressing want is generally felt and restlessly acknowledged. It must be fully satisfied too, we predict, for men, even Anglo-Indian men, are becoming weary of the patch work system pursued by former Governments, and while they clamour for a new policy, demand the absolute removal of all old decaying lumber. Alas! there has been more angry clamour for redress, than dispassionate inquiry into existing evils; more narrow party feeling than earnest search for truth; more active struggle for the interest of class, than stern resolve to detect and expose error; more antagonism and ill-feeling between Christians of opposite political views, than pure unalloyed effort for the welfare of a helpless race. What a chaos of contradictory views do men hold on the question of Indian Government! What conflicting schemes have been urged upon an astonished British public! The conservative body, viewing Anglo-Indian State craft with stolid complacency, deny contemptuously the existence of evil, and deprecate all efforts at reform. The factious class, abominating a system that debars all but a privileged minority from a share of the loaves and fishes, loudly denounce the Civil administration of the land, hurl defiance at their opponents, or weep over the barbarities practised upon unhappy millions." Meanwhile, from the midst of this jarring element of discord, crawl forth into the pure light of day gibbering Hindu Harbingers, and staggering Associations; grasping eagerly at the air, if perchance they may capture sunbeams;-stuttering melancholy puerilities, or petitioning madly for inconsistencies; raising in the minds of all men a grave suspicion, that we have only touched the threshold of Indian progress, and are still searching for the charm which shall throw aside the opposing barriers. Yet far above the chaotic tumult clear voices ring, urging us to hearken, and through the dim obscurity pure bright rays play invitingly on the path to progress. The remonstrances of reason, when worldly interest, blind selfishness, and party feeling have dissolved beneath her holy influence, warn us that extreme deductions must be by laws of Nature grounded on unsound premises;-that the self-sufficient conservative, and the crude declaimer against existing Governments, have alike wildly deviated from the goal of truth; that throughout India and the Indian Press there is a piteous cry to deafen, but alas! so little wool to recompense. By throwing open the Civil Service to public competition, the first great step towards Reform will have, no doubt, been taken; provided we insist on the measure being carried out in its integrity. Men must be fully satisfied that those to whom is to be entrusted the administration of the laws, are selected not by patronage, but by merit. Alas! here lies the question after all. What is merit? who shall define it? and how shall A prove himself in all our eyes a worthier man than B? When we have solved this problem, we shall have fairly started on our road, a long and wearisome one no doubt, but still a road which may lead eventually to the realization of our hopes. We shall not stop here to enquire, whether a system of competition is preferable to one of patronage, because we hold it to be one of those truths which may be disposed of as indisputable. Not but indeed many are to be found who will angrily dispute it; though we, for our part, are contented to fall back on the position, that admitting one of extraordinary acquirements who in youth would have never stood the test of competition, may possibly, under the opposite system, rise to fame and honours; still, we contend, that a country like India will be better governed by the sound practical knowledge of twenty, than the brilliant genius of one. Those who Requisites for an Indian Official. 137 have had an opportunity of forming a correct estimate of Native character, will be at no loss to determine what style of man is best adapted for the duties of Indian Satraps. He must have sound strong sense, with moderate passions, or at least the will and power to curb them. In combination with common sense, he should possess great firmness of character-by which we mean a lenient, kind, and forgiving spirit; but no show of wavering or indecision, so that he may be prepared to award punishments tardily, but his fiat once issued, to take care that no man, directly or indirectly, plead or "represent." This should be combined with a suavity of manner, a readiness to receive and converse with Natives-not at all hours, which indulgence is sure to be abused, but at certain given periods, sufficiently often to confer a boon on others at the expense of a little self-denial. This, with a kindliness of tone and a certain degree of interest in the concerns of his subordinates, will render the Indian Satrap as despotic as the Czar, and worshipped with almost equal fervour. But stay. Have we really fully described our pattern Administrator? Has nothing been omitted? Indeed, all the qualifications we have mentioned are as nothing, where a thorough acquaintance with the vernacular language of the district is wanting. Here is a great desideratum, which somehow or other must be filled up. But where shall we search for our pattern Indian Administrator? Hardly in Bombay, we take it,-possibly in Bengal or the NorthWestern Provinces ! Let us be completely selfish however, and limit our hopes of reform to our little Presidency. Where, we repeat, should we look for this model ?-In Sind? Be it so, and now reflect what incalculable benefits might be conferred upon the people of this country, had we only thirty or forty statesmen moulded in the Frere stamp scattered over Western India! Leaving, therefore, aside much that we conceive essential in the formation of a sound Indian Official, we shall in the present article confine ourselves to the consideration of what we fearlessly assert to be indispensable to every good public servant, and that is, a sound knowledge of one or more of the Eastern languages. A man of varied acquirements, and powerful intellect, will of course make a good servant; but we contend that one of ordinary abilities and a thorough knowledge of the vernacular, will make a better. The former is in his proper element as Governor, Member of Council, or Legislator; in all subordinate situations, such as those of Judge, Collector, &c. &c. by all means let us have the latter. Few can have perused the Rules for the Examination of Junior Civil Servants which we have undertaken to review in the present article, without freely according to the Government of Bombay all the merit which is distinctly their due. Aroused at last from a lengthened VOL. I.-NO. I. 18 |