4 LIFE AND WORK OF SIR JAGADIS C. BOSE 



they develop more or less of that type of people described 

 by an old traveller as ' difficult and dangerous to deal with ; 

 for when you attack them they defend themselves/ Modern 

 government, with its magistracy and police, has long abated 

 this defensive necessity ; yet its best instruments for main- 

 taining security are obviously the picked local men who 

 in earlier times were such village defenders ; while the best 

 of local magistrates is the man who would have been their 

 leader, at once by natural and acquired qualities. 



Here then in this Faridpur district we see, though in 

 too scanty outline, other main factors, besides those of 

 Vikrampur, in the child Jagadis' early surroundings and 

 upbringing. These factors were operative in eliciting that 

 note of strenuous and persistent courage in facing dangers 

 and adversities, and of untiring combativeness against every 

 difficulty, which we shall find throughout his youthful and 

 maturing years. 



For Bose's father Bhagaban Chunder Bose, Deputy 

 Magistrate of Faridpur was the active defender, not only 

 of the townlet, but of the scores of villages around as well. 

 The modern magistrate is mainly settled between his court- 

 house and his home ; but here in those days a man was 

 needed, picked not only for judicial capacity, intelligence 

 and local knowledge, but for active initiative and courage, 

 and thus prepared at any moment to assume command of 

 his own police and his people as well, and be ready even 

 to raid the raiders. Of this readiness various stories might 

 be told. As a single example, hearing of a gang of 

 dacoits in his neighbourhood, Mr. Bose mounted an elephant 

 and, with the very few police available, rode straight into 

 the very heart of the dacoits' camp. Taken by surprise, 

 they broke and scattered ; the ready magistrate dropped 

 down, captured the leader with his own hands, and took 

 him back for trial. 



Such vigour of action, with total freedom from those 

 elements ~of ~!acit compromise between police and crime 

 which had sometimes existed before (and are said even now 



