in the case of the _Yugantar_. The
Government translator confessed in the High Court that he had never
before read, in Bengali, language so lofty, so pathetic, and so
stirring, that it was impossible to convey it in an English translation.
Yet, the writers had never learnt to write Bengali in their school-days,
and the organ tone of Milton, which was distinctly audible in the
Bengali, betrayed their English education. The sale was unbounded. The
circulation of the _Yugantar_ rose to over 50,000, a figure never
attained before by any Indian newspaper, and sometimes when there was a
special run upon a number the Calcutta newsboys would get a rupee for a
single copy before the issue was exhausted. So great indeed was the
demand that the principal articles, forming a complete gospel of
revolution, were republished in a small volume, entitled _Mukti con
pathe_: "Which way does salvation lie?" Not only were these appeals to
racial and religious passion reflected in many other papers all over
Bengal, but the most lamentable fact of all was that scarcely any native
paper, even amongst those of an avowedly moderate complexion, attempted
to counteract, or ventured to protest against, either the matter or the
tone of these publications. Their success, on the other hand, induced
not a few to follow suit. What is forgotten in England by the
uncompromising champions of the freedom of the Press is that in a
country like ours, with its party system fully represented in the public
Press, even the newspapers which either party may consider most
mischievous find their corrective in the newspapers of the other party.
In India that is not the case. There is no healthy play of public
opinion. The classes whose confidence in the British _Raj_ is still
unshaken are practically unrepresented in the Press, which is mostly in
the hands of the intellectuals, of whom the majority are drifting into
increasing estrangement, while the minority are generally too timid to
try to stem the flowing tide. Nor, if the "moderates" in Bengal were
overawed by the violence of the new creed, can the whole blame be laid
upon their shoulders when one remembers how little was being done by
Government, and how ineffective that little was to check this
incendiarism. Though there were many Press prosecutions, and action was
repeatedly taken against the _Yugantar_ in respect of particular
articles, the limited powers possessed by Government were totally
inadequate, and