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 o