ately and uses so sparingly that his financial statements are singularly lucid and unencumbered, each set of figures being the evidence of some solid argument. By dint of great perseverance, the country has at last, in some measure, been got to realize that India is as near as possible a sucked orange; and that, if we do not retrace our steps and repent us of the evil we have been doing, the "brightest gem in her Majesty's diadem" will speedily be in pawn. At this moment an Indian bankruptcy stares us in the face, with all its terrible consequences. The limit of taxation has been reached, while the expenditure of the administration is unlimited as ever. To Mr. Fawcett, more than to any other man or half-dozen of men, do we owe our knowledge of the appalling condition of the "brightest gem," which, if one could imagine a gem being so ill-behaved, may explode any day with such violence as to shake to its foundations the throne not merely of the "Empress of India," but that of the Queen of England also. In this grave relation the voice of Henry Fawcett has been as the voice of one crying in the wilderness. If the British people have not made their paths straight, it has not been his fault. The Indian people are frequently taxed by Anglo-Indians with ingratitude. I may mention, by the way, that Mr. Fawcett has not found it so. Some time previous to the last general election, a great number of very poor Hindoos subscribed a sum sufficient to defray the cost of his return for Hackney. The fund was invested for the purpose in the names of Sir Charles Dilke, Professor Cowell, and Mr. Dacosta.
Mr. Fawcett is not merely an excellent platform speaker and a trenchant parliamentary debater, but he is a political economist of no mean order. His "Man-
