its authority and to bring it into hatred and contempt among all classes of Her Majesty's subjects' — a degree of licence which it was impossible, in the existing condition of India, to concede.
The next complaint referred to a measure passed in September, 1857, necessitating a licence to carry arms and ammunition. 'Notwithstanding the broad line of distinction,' the petitioners urged, 'which was afforded to the Legislature by the fact of the present movement being avowedly one of race and religion, the Governor-General and his Council refused to make any such distinction, and the Act was made applicable to the Christian as well as the native races.' This the petitioners stigmatised as 'highly offensive and dangerous.' The Government replied that the mutineers formed but a small class of the native population, the great bulk of which continued loyal: that any general distinction, grounded on race, would be unjust and invidious; and that all necessary relaxation could be effected by the power of exempting individuals or classes, for which the Act provided.
The next topic of complaint was a measure which, now that we can look at the subject in cold blood, stands among Lord Canning's strongest claims to respect. During the early months of the Mutiny it had been necessary to invest various civil officers and 'commissions' — often, in fact, consisting of a single individual, selected by the local authority and offering no adequate guarantee of experience or self-restraint — with summary powers of trying and sentencing
