That in India the British Government has found the centres of active
disaffection located in the Maratha country and in Lower Bengal, is a
phenomenon which can be to a large extent accounted for by reference to
Anglo-Indian history. The fact that Poona is one focus of sedition has
been attributed in this volume to the survival among the Maratha
Brahmins of the recollection that "far into the eighteenth century Poona
was the capital of a theocratic State in which behind the Throne of the
Peshwas both spiritual and secular authority were concentrated in the
hands of the Brahmins." The Peshwas, as their title implies, had been
hereditary Ministers who governed in the name of the reigning dynasty
founded by the famous Maratha leader Sivajee, whose successors they set
aside. But before the end of the eighteenth century the secular
authority of the Peshwas had become almost nominal, and the real power
in the State had passed into the grasp of a confederation of chiefs of
predatory armies, whose violence drove the last Peshwa, more than a
century ago, to seek refuge in a British camp. The political sovereignty
of the Brahmins had disappeared from the time when he placed himself
under British protection; and the Maratha chiefs (who were not Brahmins)
only acknowledged our supremacy after some fiercely contested battles;
with the result that they were confined to and confirmed in the
possession of the territories now governed by their descendants. But it
is quite true that to the memory of a time when for once, and once only,
in Indian history, their caste established a great secular dominion, may
be ascribed the tendency to disloyalty among the Maratha Brahmins.

The case of Bengal is very different. Poona and Calcutta are separated
geographically almost by the whole breadth of India between two seas;
yet the historical antecedents of the Bengalees and Marathas are even
further apart. The Marathas were the leaders of revolt against the
Moghal Empire; they were formidable opponents to the rise of the British