power in the Punjab. Nor is the hostility between them at an end at the present day, and the Sikh warriors, in 1857, followed the call of the English to Delhi and Lucknow, to avenge their slaughtered prophets and co-religionists of days long past. The stern measures of repression which the Moslem governors employed against the Sikhs were in some measure justified by the turbulent character of these sectaries who lived by plunder and levied contributions upon all who were not of their persuasion. But the fierceness of their hatred of Mohammedanism and its steady flame were due to the religious bigotry of the Emperor Aurung-Zeb, who considered it a sacred duty to destroy all who would not accept Islam, and whose savage fanaticism hastened the decay of the Mogul power. No creed endures the foundation-stones of which have not been cemented with blood; and the persecutions of Aurung-Zeb only united the Sikhs more closely in resistance to his rule, until at last a man arose among them who possessed spiritual authority and organizing power, and who changed the whole complexion of the Sikh creed. This was Govind Singh, the tenth and last Guru, who, on the martyrdom of his father, became leader of the sect till his death in 1708. The changes introduced by Govind, though fundamental, were not doctrinal. He was, indeed, no quietist like Nanak, but a man of action, animated by the passion of revenge. The monotheistic theory he did not dispute; but his

patron saint, so to speak, was the fierce goddess Durga, to whom he is said to have offered a human sacrifice to inaugurate his mission. He formed the Sikhs into a military brotherhood under the name of the Khalsa. He abolished caste altogether, which Nanak had never ventured to do; and, although this offended many of the better classes, it was received with enthusiasm by the lower orders, who flocked to his standard. He instituted an initiatory rite of baptism, known as the pahul, a feast of communion, and a distinctive dress to distinguish his disciples from other Hindus. Sikhs were forbidden to cut their hair or beard, to gamble, or to smoke tobacco; but intoxicating liquors were allowed, and the richer classes have always been hard drinkers, though the peasants are temperate enough. No regard was to be paid to Vedas, Shastras, or the Koran, neither to Hindu priests or Mohammedan mullahs; visits to temples and shrines and the observance of Hindu ceremonies at birth, marriage, and death were alike forbidden. The mild law of Nanak was transformed into a gospel of intolerance and hate, directed not only against his bitter enemies, the Mohammedans, but against the members of all alien creeds and non-conforming Sikh sects, of which several had arisen. But the Mohammedans were the chief objects of Sikh hatred. To salute one of the accursed race was a crime worthy of hell, and the lifelong duty of the Sikh was to slay Mohammedans and wage constant war upon them. The

results of this teaching and practice turned the Punjab, for a hundred years, into an arena of bloodshed. Mohammedan conquerors from central Asia and Afghanistan swooped down upon the dying Mogul Empire, and occupied the northern capital, Lahore, and established viceroys and governors. But, with varying fortunes, the conflict with the Sikhs always continued, until it was finally decided by the gradual conquest of the Punjab by Maharaja Runjit Singh.

Of all the men who carved principalities out of the inheritance of the emperors of Delhi, the most remarkable was Runjit Singh. He possessed the genius both of war and of government. The son of the chief of one of the smaller Sikh military confederacies, he attacked and overcame all rivals and competitors of his own faith, and then turned his sword against the Mohammedans, annexing in turn the Afghan provinces of Multan, Kashmir, Peshawur, and the Derajat, which is the name of the long strip of plain country that lies between the Indus and the mountains on the northwestern frontier of Hindostan. In the Afghans he met an enemy equal to the Sikhs in bravery and fanaticism; the contest was for many years undecided, and cost the Maharaja heavily, both in men and treasure. But the discipline and arms of the Sikhs gave Runjit Singh the final advantage; and, at his death in 1839, he was the undisputed ruler of the Punjab and Kashmir.

Those who care to know in more detail my es

timate of Runjit Singh, his character, his mode of government, his counsellors, his army, and his conquests, may find it in his biography, which I wrote in 1892 for the University of Oxford. There is only space here to note the influence of his reign on the religious side of Sikhism. This was partly good and partly evil. The fierce intolerance of Govind Singh was abandoned by the Maharaja for an absolute indifference to religion, further than was necessary to retain the allegiance of the Sikhs and secure the personal adherence of their religious guides, Babas and Bhais, whom he largely subsidized and treated with every outward mark of respect. But in his eyes the creed of his servants mattered nothing, so long as they served him well. Several of his most trusted and capable ministers were Mohammedans, and many were Brahmins, whose employment Govind Singh had distinctly forbidden. The Sikhs, chiefs and people, were plain soldiers, utterly illiterate; and no place could be found for them in a system of government so complicated as that of the Maharaja, where Brahmins and Mohammedans of education, experienced through long generations in all the arts of government, were necessary to the maintenance of his position. Even in the army, the same spirit of tolerance was found. Diwan Mokham Chand, a Khattri Hindu, was probably his best general; and Irish, Italian, and French officers trained and led important divisions of his forces.

This tolerance in matters of religious belief

removed the darkest blot from the ferocious creed of Govind, and allowed the Sikhs to enter the community of reasonable and civilized men; for, during the eighteenth century, their hand was against every man, and plunder and slaughter were the law of their being. This reform, selfish though it was in its origin, so modified and elevated the Sikh polity and character that its advantage far outweighed the injury to public decency and morality which may have resulted from the violent and treacherous character of the monarch or the drunkenness and profligacy of his life. Morality is conventional, and conduct must be judged by the standard of the age and the environment of the individual. Maharaja Runjit Singh, in spite of his faults, was a really great monarch, and, like Peter the Great of Russia, who was far more coarse and cruel, he created a state and a nation. The ignorant and brutal Sikh peasants became, by the inspiration of his genius, the most formidable armed force that India had seen during the nineteenth century. Every adult male was a soldier; and, if the religious fervor was not so keen as in the days of Govind Singh, a strong national spirit, almost unknown in India before, had succeeded and supplemented it. Had the great Maharaja lived in other days, the warlike Sikhs, with such a leader and inspired by so high a spirit, might well have founded an empire co-extensive with that of the Moguls. But the time was inauspicious; the Maharaja died prematurely, ex