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the repeal of the Act, but urged its more liberal administration, recommending that all persons who were certified by local and municipal authorities should be authorized to carry arms. A heated discussion took place, in which I took part. I opposed the amendment. The original proposition was carried, subject to the modification that a person or a class might be debarred from the right of carrying arms by Government for reasons to be recorded in writing. The attitude of the Congress with regard to the Arms Act has undergone a modification. The Congress no longer calls for the absolute repeal of the Act, but a modification of it so that all racial disabilities should disappear. Lord Chelmsford, when Viceroy, recognized this principle, and it has in substance been given effect to.

The Congress of 1887, which assembled in Madras, was the third of its kind. The constitution of the Congress was yet in the making. Conventions and rules of procedure were being developed as the result of experience. In this formative period, a question of great difficulty and delicacy was started. Raja Sashi Sekhareswar Roy of Tahirpore in Bengal gave notice of a resolution urging the prohibition of cow-slaughter. At any time, in any circumstances, a resolution of this kind in a mixed gathering of Hindus and Moha- medans would have been inopportune. It was especially so then. The Mohamedan community, under the leadership of Sir Syed Ahmed, had held aloof from the Congress. They were working under the auspices of the Patriotic Association in direct opposition to the national movement. Our critics regarded the National Congress as a Hindu Congress, and the opposition papers described it as such. We were straining every nerve to secure the co-operation of our Mohamedan fellow-countrymen in this great national work. We sometimes paid the fares of Mohamedan delegates and offered them other facilities.

The resolution therefore served to add to the difficulties of our position. What was to be done? We found a solution that was fair to all interests, was accepted by all parties, and has since been the recognized convention of the Congress. We decided that if any resolution affecting a particular class or community was objected to by the delegates representing that community, even if they were in a minority, it should not be considered by the Congress. The only other case in which I remember this rule being enforced was in relation to the Punjab Land Alienation Act, which was raised at a meeting of the Congress held at Lahore.