is "un-English"; that it "isn't done, you know, old top"; and the surest
way of heaping public scorn and indignation on the enemies of England
is to convict them, correctly or otherwise, of spying on England secretly.
So it would be manifestly libelous, ungentlemanly and proof conclusive
of crass ignorance to assert that Samson in his capacity of commissioner
employed spies to watch Gungadhura Singh. He had no public fund
from which to pay spies. If you don't believe that, then ponder over a
copy of the Indian Estimates. Every rupee is accounted for.

The members of the maharajah's household who came to see Samson
at more or less frequent intervals were individuals of the native community
whom he encouraged to intimacy for ethnological and social reasons.
When they gave him information about Gungadhura's doings, that was
merely because they were incurably addicted to gossip; as a gentleman,
and in some sense a representative of His Majesty the King, he would
not dream, of course, of paying attention to any such stuff; but one
could not, of course, be so rude and high-handed as to stop their talking
even if it did tend toward an accurate foreknowledge of the maharajah's
doings that was hardly "cricket."

As for money, certainly none changed hands. The indisputable fact
that certain friends and relatives of certain members of the maharajah's
household enjoyed rather profitable contracts on British administered
territory was coincidence. Everybody knows how long is the arm of
coincidence. Well, then, so are its ears, and its tongue.

As for the maharajah, the rascal went the length of paying spies in British
government offices. There was never any knowing who was a spy of
his and who wasn't. People were everlastingly crossing the river from
the native state to seek employment in some government department