Page images
PDF
EPUB

66

Elsewhere he writes:

A great many prejudices in many directions have disappeared in the face of the stern realities of life.... We may therefore proceed further and fare no worse, King Canute was no more able to bid the waves of the sea roll back than we at the present time are to arrest the changes which Time produces and which we all accept as inevitable in Kaliyug.”

It was this conservatism that had, in 1873, stood in the way of a voyage to England. In 1873 he was invited by the Madras Government to proceed to England at the public cost to give evidence before the Committee of the House of Commons on Indian finance. In sending the invitation to Sashiah, the Resident, Mr. G. A. Ballard, wrote:

I received the enclosed by to-day's post. It will speak for itself, and conveys to you what I am sure will be very gratifying intelligence, viz., that the Madras Government would be glad to name you as one well qualified to be sent home at the Government expense to give evidence before the Committee of the House of Commons.

On getting Mr. Hudleston's note covering the enclosure I wrote to the Maharajah for an expression of his sentiments and His Highness cordially concurs in the opinion. that your services in Travancore may be temporarily spared for the important duty proposed and expresses very kindly his sincere wishes for your successful mission. His Highness has asked me to communicate with you; and it now remains for you to decide whether your name shall go up

or not.

As an old friend of your own and a well-wisher of your countrymen let me add a few words :

Personally, your going on such mission cannot fail to be very honourable to you-whilst in performance I believe you would find it most agreeable and instructive. Publicly, your varied experience in the service of Government, with the finishing touch of experience in a Native State-and I may frankly say-your ability and the character you have achieved qualify you in no ordinary way to give valuable evidence as to the position and wants of Southern India and the views of your thinking countrymen on public topics. I sincerely hope you will decide to accept the offer and with all good wishes for a useful, honourable, and pleasant trip if you do go and a happy return to Travancore afterwards,

I remain,
Yours very sincerely,

G. A. BALLARD.

Sir William Robinson, Chief Member of Government, had also written to Sashiah :

"Can you help us? I am anxious to see India respond to the call of England.

It really belongs to you, prominent men, and will be sad if it be not responded to. I sympathise heartily in your social difficulties. Are they impossible obstructions?”

Sashiah wrote back to the Resident :

"I fully appreciate, though I cannot adequately express, my thankfulness for the very generous, sincere and cordial sentiments which pervade every line of your note and confess to having experienced a hard mental struggle in deciding on the course I should adopt in such a momentous matter. The result of this struggle is conveyed in the enclosed reply to the Chief Secretary's note.

[ocr errors]

The reply to the Chief Secretary runs thus:

“While thankful for and proud of the honour which the Government propose conferring on me, I very much regret that the state of my health and the necessities of my social position as a Brahman are such as absolutely preclude the possibility of my undertaking a trip to England for the purpose indicated in your letter-a purpose which I certainly esteem as a duty I owe no less to my country than to my Government—and for the performance of which I should willingly travel many thousands of miles if on land, and to a more genial climate."

It is this fondness for old ways that has been taken by young India for want of sympathy. He has always had a good word to say of the legitimate aspirations of the younger generation but their methods seem to him to now and then partake of blatancy and bluster. Here is, for instance, what he writes of the Congress to an intimate friend :

"Are you not a little too hard on the Congress? Of course we old people cannot go so fast; but still even the Congresswallahs are sobering down and the noise they make is such a big chorus that it has some influence upon the nation of rulers, if not on the rulers direct. The periodical meeting of so many people from distant provinces for a common purpose is itself a preliminary step in political education and money collected and spent on it is not altogether thrown away. I should think the enlargement of the Legislative Councils and the right of interpellation is not a bad fruit of the Congress movement. Of course there will

be some blundering at first but it will not prevent eventual success."

Sashiah's engagement with the Maharajah was for five years and was coming to a close in May 1877. During these five years he had been pulling on well enough with the ruler. A few points of difference had now and then cropped up and created a slight misunderstanding between the king and the minister. One of these was with regard to the patronage of appointments. Sashiah had taken objection to a few appointments proposed by His Highness and the Maharajah had taken the attitude of his minister with no very good grace. On one occasion the Maharajah wrote thus to the Dewan :

"Whatever may be the excellence of your motives, this is a spirit of Madhava Rao and when I see such a spirit my feelings will be in the same manner irritated. ..... I would therefore give up making any such proposal in future..... I will be quite content with the palace appointments I have my exclusive control as I was during the time of the late Dewan and shall make no pretension to having anything to do with the public service."

in

These were but fleeting clouds which passed swiftly away and left a brighter love and understanding between the king and his Dewan.

The year 1877, the last year of the period of engagement, dawned inauspiciously for Sashiah. A great domestic affliction fell on him a few weeks

after the year had opened. Sashiah thus writes of it :

"Your Highness will be sorry to hear of a very deep domestic affliction which has befallen me. It has pleased God to inflict the life-long curse of widowhood on a young niece of mine, just budding into womanhood, who was the centre of my affections, being an orphan brought up by us from the third day of her existence. I have been weeping all day and shall have to weep all my life for the poor creature to whom God has been so cruel."

The relation between the ruler and the Dewan was getting a little strained. Sashiah submitted a revised scheme of salaries, which should complete the good work he had inaugurated at the commencement of his regime. His Highness thought that the Dewan was for showing a profuse liberality at his expense. He was at no pains to conceal his displeasure.

But Sashiah was one

66

Who, if he rise to station of command,
Rises by open means; and there will stand
On honourable terms or else retire

And in himself possess his own desire."

His reply is worthy of record :—

"I beg to be pardoned for giving this trouble-but as I have no duplicates with me, I am constrained to beg of your Highness to return the figured statements embracing the revised scheme of salaries, if they are no longer or immediately required in the palace. They will be duly submitted again—with a few notes which are required to do the sub

« PreviousContinue »