222 FOREST LIFE AND SPORT IN INDIA 
to another class which desires to rule in the future. 
But Council Reform had not then been introduced, 
and Simla was still engaged in writing, and in this 
occupation I found my work. I came to it not only 
with experience of the requirements of Indian State 
Forests, but with the conviction that emoluments in 
the Forest Department were, as regarded Europeans, 
disproportionate to the value of work demanded 
and accomplished, and, as regarded Indians, fre- 
quently insufficient to meet the expenses of official 
life in the East. 
The efficiency of any Service is based on various 
conditions, and perhaps the most important of these 
is the maintenance of a high moral standard ; but it 
becomes difficult to insist on this standard unless 
adequate protection is afforded at least against 
lapses that are directly referable to unavoidable 
financial distress ; and if such protection is withheld, 
relaxations of principle may occur that constitute a 
danger to official prestige, and easily lead to felonies 
punishable by the law. The grant of a salary 
calculated to meet the expenses of a public officer 
who is forced to live up to a certain social status 
should be therefore a primary consideration with his 
employers, but when taking steps to insure the pay- 
ment of such salaries other points of interest are 
speedily brought to notice. 
Weare, for instance, often too ready with accusa- 
tions of corruption and expressions of abhorrence 
with regard to the acceptance of illegal gratifications 
by Indians, without considering the difference 
between the standard of probity created by the 
British Government and that customary in the 
country before its arrival. With us, so-called 
