iously despises all that
separates the Englishman of to-day from his painted ancestor--this is
the mistake of critics who cannot distinguish the cant of progress from
its reality.

We shall be driven more particularly to consider Mr Kipling's atavism
in discussing his tales of the British Army. For the present we are
dealing only with India and the "Imperialism" which some of Mr
Kipling's critics have taken for an offensive proof of his political
prejudice. Mr Kipling's treatment of the Anglo-Indian, and of the
dealing of the Anglo-Indian with the Indian Empire, has nothing to do
with the Yellows and the Blues. The real motive of Mr Kipling's
attitude towards the men on the frontier, in places where deadly things
are encountered and there is work to be done, is no more a matter of
politics, "progressive" or "reactionary," than is his celebration of
the Maltese Cat or of .007. "The White Man's Burden" is the burden of
every creature in whom there lives the pride of unrewarded labour, of
endurance and courage. In India this pride has to be wholesomely
tempered with humility; for India is old and vast and incomprehensible,
to be handled with care, to be approached as a country which, though it
shows an inscrutably smiling face to the modern world, has the power
suddenly to baffle its modern rulers by opening to them glimpses of an
intricate and unassailable life which cannot be ruffled by Orders in
Council or disturbed by the weak ploughing of teachers from the West.
The task of the Anglo-Indian administrator is, indeed, the finest
opportunity for that heroic life to the celebration of which Mr Kipling
has devoted so many of his tales. This hero has a task which taxes all
his ability, which promises little riches and little fame, and is known
to be tolerably hopeless. It offers to him a supreme test of his
virtue--a test in which the hero is accountable only to his personal
will; whose best work is its own reward and comfort.

"Gentlemen come from England," writes Mr Kipling in one of his Indian
tales, "spend a few weeks in India, walk round this great sphinx of the
Plains, and write books upon its ways and its work, denouncing or
praising it as their ignorance prompts. Consequently all the world
knows how the Supreme Government conducts itself. But no one, not even
the Supreme Government, knows everything about the administration of
the Empire. Year by year England sends out fresh drafts for the first
fighti