RESTRICTIONS ON THE ALIENATION OF LANDS. 213 



fiist, that a strong case seemed to have been made out for prohibiting 

 all permanent alienations of agricultural land, except with the sanction 

 of some duly empowered He venue-officer ; and, second, that the legis- 

 lation for giving effect to this view should be general and not 

 partial in its character, in contradistinction to the proposal of SIR 

 DENNIS FITZPATRICK. I was invited to summon a Committee of 

 selected officers to advise me in framing my conclusions upon the 

 scheme of the Government of India, and this I did after circulating 

 to selected officials and non-officials a series of questions f ramed on its 

 proposals, and submitted the resolutions of the Committee with my 

 own opinion, not quite so soon as I was asked, but still within four 

 months of the date of the letter calling for it. The proceedings were 

 conducted at high pressure, but the subject was familiar to all of us, 

 and my own opinion, which had been formulated and recorded nine 

 years previously, had not changed since that time in any material 

 degree ; and, had I felt myself at liberty to do so, I should have 

 reiterated my former views and advocated resort to the less drastic 

 measures proposed by MR. ELSMIE and myself as Financial Commis- 

 sioners in 1889, and amplified by the then Lieutenant-Governor, SIR 

 JAMES LYALL. But there were two reasons against my taking this 

 course. The first was that the Government of India with those 

 opinions and many more before it had committed itself to a definite 

 preference for interfering with the right of alienation, and, although 

 I was freely invited to express my opinion, I felt I should only be 

 justified in placing myself in opposition to its views if absolutely 

 sure that the policy was mistaken, and that the measure could not be 

 adapted to the Province in any form without serious risk. I was not 

 prepared to go so far as this. In stating my second reason I have to 

 make an admission. The officers whom I nominated to the Committee 

 represented the best experience available, and a very strong embodi- 

 ment of it. I did not pack my jury, but just took the best officers 

 I could bring together. And they were unanimous in accepting the 

 main features of the Government of India scheme. Under these 

 circumstances, while giving full expression to my personal doubts as 

 to the wisdom of the measure, I considered it the more important 

 part of my duty to give it the best shape possible, and this was what 

 I endeavoured to do in conducting the proceedings of the Committee, 

 an<l in drafting the opinion which I submitted to the Government of 

 India. I regret that that opinion has not been formally placed before 

 the Members of Your Excellency's Council. It would have rendered 



