about to retire. Evidently the Lion was fast becoming domesticated.
The effect of this demoralised Bombay public atmosphere on Indian politics was indeed unfortunate. The leaders of other Provinces had the greatest respect for Ranade and Mehta and implicitly followed them; and when Mehta himself was losing his old fire, need we wonder that a change for the worse came over the Congress Party?
This weakening of spirit came precisely when the Bureaucracy and the Nation had just begun their struggle. Ever since 1896 Mr. Tilak had been trying hard to induce the Congress to change its time-honoured methods and show a little more grit. While the nucleus of the New Party in the Congress was being formed the patriarches of the Congress showed unmistakable signs of a reactionary spirit; so much so that when at the Lucknow Congress (1899) Mr. Tilak wanted to move a resolution condemning the regime of Lord Sandhurst, a storm of opposition was raised. Mr. Tilak challenged a single delegate of the Congress to prove that His Lordship's tenure of office had not been ruinous to the people of the Bombay Presidency. None dared take up the challenge. He quoted the misdeeds of the Bureaucracy one by one and asked his opponents to say where he was exaggerating our grievances, and yet Mr. R. C. Dutt, the President and many other delegates were violently against Mr. Tilak's proposition. One clever person hinted that the subject was one of the Provincial interest only, and so the Congress could not be expected to take it up. Mr. Tilak quoted a number of cases where provincial matters had occupied
