570 Reviews of Books do much to clarify the subject, for both are by men who know whereof they write. Mr. Bruce was the assistant and right-hand man of Sir Rob- ert Sandeman and his book is, therefore, in great part a record of events already made familiar in Thornton's Life of Sandeman. The story of Mr. Bruce' s life in India from 1862 to 1S96 is one full of adventure and rich in political experience. Tribal management on the lines laid down by Sir Robert Sandeman was unknown when Bruce was first appointed to a frontier district at Dera Ghazi Khan under the Punjab government. The system then in force was that of Lord Lawrence ; the main idea was that British officers were never to cross the border on official business, that they were to avoid every step tending to extend the frontier and that in the event of disturbance beyond British jurisdiction a punitive expedi- tion was to be made if the case demanded. It has been called the Close- Border system, for non-intervention beyond the frontier was the maxim. In the Punjab a conciliatory policy modified the stringency of these rules but in Sind the protection of the frontier depended to a great extent upon a military force. Sandeman ended this in Baluchistan by his suc- cess in negotiating a treaty with the Khan of Khelat in 1876. His pol- icy has been described as a "system of conciliatory intervention tem- pered by lucrative employment and light taxation. ' ' Mr. Bruce defends this plan as a policy of civilization and as the true and just method of stopping local frontier disorder and of protecting India when the great day of invasion threatens. He describes in detail the workings of the system, being so enthusiastic as to claim that it could be enforced among tribes other than Baliich ; and, in fact, he denies that there is any essen- tial difference between Baliich and Patan and says they are both " open and amenable to the same influences" (p. 19). It has usually been held by other writers that there is a sharp distinction to be drawn between the two, that the Baliich is aristocratic, bowing to the decision of his chief, rarely influenced by religious bigotry, and not apt to join in fanatic outbreaks, and, on the other hand, that the Patan is more democratic, often refusing to obey his chief, who at best is only the head of the domi- nant faction in the tribe, and listening to priestly incitement to Jihad, the Mullah being often more powerful than the chief. The council or Jirga of the tribe in Patan territory is therefore a more factional body than in Baliichistan. Mr. Bruce bases his belief upon personal experi- ence, but the weight of authority is against him. During the years 1876 to 1888, when Mr. Bruce was with Sir Robert Sandeman in Baliichistan he assisted in the pacification of the Khanate of Khelat, in the opening of trade routes long closed but which were now to be guarded by former plunderers, in the creation of Quetta as an out- post of empire, and in the administration of Baliichistan, then enjoying its first decade of law and order. The last eight years of his service Mr. Bruce spent as Commissioner in Derajat division under the Punjab gov- ernment. He had opportunity, therefore, to judge frontier affairs from all sides, and his conclusions in the larger political issues are the more interesting when we examine the opinions of another writer serving on
