Page:The Indian Civil Service as a profession.djvu/31

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As a Profession
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ments which await officers who possess the double qualification of seniority and merit. Even after retirement, the official career of the Indian Civil Servant is not necessarily closed. He may, if sufficiently favoured by fortune, become a member of the Council which assists the Secretary of State for India, or one of the Secretaries at the Indian Office. In either of these cases he has the satisfaction of drawing both pension and active pay at the same time. Retired members of the Indian Civil Service are also to a limited extent in demand for administrative appointments unconnected with India. At the present moment two of the principal officials of the London police are Indian Civil Service annuitants.

When all these certainties, probabilities, and possibilities are considered, I think that the assertion is justified that no other official Service in the world, with perhaps the exception of the Royal Engineers, offers to an energetic young man of good abilities so many openings for the attainment of