B

_Proclamation by the Queen in Council, to the Princes, Chiefs, and
People of India, November_ 1, 1858.[1]

[Footnote 1: This memorable instrument, justly called the Magna Charta
of India, was framed in August, 1838, by the Earl of Derby, then the
head of the Government. His son, Lord Stanley, the first Secretary of
State for India, had drafted a Proclamation, and it was circulated to
the Cabinet. It reached the Queen in Germany. She went through the
draft with the Prince Consort, who made copious notes on the margin.
The Queen did not like it, and wrote to Lord Derby that she "would
be glad if he would write himself in his excellent language." The
specific criticisms are to be found in Martin's _Life of the Prince
Consort_ (iv 284-5). Lord Derby thereupon consulted Stanley; saw the
remarks of some of the Cabinet, as well as of Lord Ellenborough, upon
Stanley's draft; and then wrote and re-wrote a draft of his own, and
sent it to the Queen. It was wholly different in scope and conception
from the first draft. The Prince Consort enters in his journal that it
was now "_recht gut_." One or two further suggested amendments were
accepted by Lord Derby and the Secretary of State; experts assured
them that it contained nothing difficult to render in the native
languages; and the Proclamation was launched in the form in which it
now stands. One question gave trouble--the retention of the Queen's
title of Defender of the Faith. Its omission might provoke remark,
but on the other hand Lord Derby regarded it as a doubtful title,
"considering its origin" [conferred by the Pope on Henry VIII] and as
applied to a Proclamation to India. He was in hopes that in the Indian
translation it would appear as "Protectress of Religion" generally,
but he was told by experts in vernacular that it was just the title to
convey to the Indian mind, the idea of the special Head and Champion
of a creed antagonistic to the creeds of the country. Lord Derby was
inclined to omit, but he sought the Queen's own opinion. This went the
other way. The last sentence of the Proclamation was the Queen's. The
three drafts are all in the records at Windsor.]

Victoria, by the Grace of God of the United Kingdom of Great Britain
and Ireland, and of the Colonies and Dependencies thereof in Europe,
Asia, Africa, America, and Australasia, Queen, Defender of the Faith.

Whereas, for divers weighty reasons, we have resolved, by and with the
advice and conse