32 + This news opinion of the Colonial Office would not have been deemed complimentary even by the inhabitants of the old "Penal Colony", much less by idealists of present day.
The office of the Governor of a Colony is more than the training of a General in the command and organization of regiments and garrisons. On this point, I would observe that within my own recollection, a complete change has come over the spirit of the Colonial Office on this subject. I well remember that when I first entered the Colonial Service more than 35 years ago, the notion of a Civil Governor was generally decried in Downing Street, except by Mr. Merivale, then the Permanent Under Secretary of State. It was then the general fashion to extol Military Governors as "alone accustomed to command and rule men"; as "sure to obey their orders from Downing Street, and not to be swayed, as Civilians might be, by the foolish notion that Englishmen in Canada or Australia had the same right to self-Government as Englishmen in the United Kingdom", with much more to the same effect.
My long practical experience tends to choose the mean between the extreme opinions held by the Colonial Secretary
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