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Reviews of Books
moon [ammavasya], full moon [pumima], quarter
moon [ekadasi]), the colonial state introduced the
concept of Sunday as a day off from instruction. With
this simple yet profound change, the school was
brought in line with the functioning of the state and its
bureaucratic work.
This development is particularly important in the
early twentieth century, when not only institutions
teaching Western sciences and languages but also
those offering instruction in Sanskrit and other indigenous languages developed curricula and pedagogies
influenced by the new spatial and temporal arrangements. Here the role of Annie Besant is key. Founder
of the Central Hindu College in Banaras, she adapted
the literary anthologies that were appearing in England for the teaching of Christianity and British cultural ideals to the purposes of a modern Hindu
education, replacing biblical instruction with textual
readings in the Vedas. In addition, she introduced
rituals, like the evening prayer (safldhya), into boarding school life and unified Hinduism through the
institution of the school, or what Besant termed a
"brotherhood," with its implication of the school as the
focal point of spiritual and cultural ties. Hinduism was
redrawn to modernize Indians, employing the institutional supports of Western schooling while at the same
time investing religion with a cultural content that
could be transmitted through syllabi and textbooks.
Matthew Arnold's influence is evident in Besant's
preference for a notion of culture as possession, to be
clutched as one's own in the midst of chaotic and
overwhelming change.
Despite the obvious differences from region to
region, there were three common responses to colonial
education. The first involved a rejection of the new
system altogether and persistence in the old. The
second also repudiated colonial education, but in this
case there was serious rethinking and refashioning of
indigenous learning for current conditions. The third
accepted the new learning, but with a degree of
selectivity to suit individual ideals and goals. The
nature of the response was determined, to a large
degree, by the relative cohesiveness of the cultures in
the regions. In this regard, Banaras offers an interesting contrast to Bengal. Whereas English education
made swifter inroads in Bengal, because of the absence
of a unified or shared culture strong enough to resist
the cultural incursions of the West, Western learning
was slower to take hold in Banaras. Kumar accounts
for this difference by noting that the stiffer hegemonic
hold of upper castes in Banaras never allowed a
self-questioning intelligentsia to emerge, as was the
case in Bengal, where looser cultural ties gave room
for greater critical introspection.
Kumar offers other examples: Delhi and Lucknow
went through the mutiny of 1857, but Banaras did not.
The violent clash of two competing cultures defined
the fate of Urdu in the mutiny-affected cities. However, Banaras underwent a different experience, and
older systems of learning persisted longer in the
AMERICAN HISTORICAL REVIEW
absence of such immediate threats. This is a compelling argument, but it might have been more persuasive
if one had evidence of the Banaras experience in other
cities as well, especially in south India. Perhaps less
open to dispute is that the cumulative effect of Banaras's many educational experiments-from the
closed systems of Hindu education to the feeble fusion
of Hinduism and modern science-was the separation
of education from lived realities.
Kumar's dream of schools in the future as icons of a
vibrant hybridity seems an unlikely one if, as the book
is at pains to show, schools are also power constructions, presenting a curricular version of social reality
that bears little resemblance to the world of lived
experience. Few readers, however, will begrudge Kumar's hopefulness. Her sobering appraisal of the imperfect synthesis of indigenous and colonial education
does not prevent her from concluding, with passion
and conviction, that only an ability to inhabit different
worlds and merge values will equip young people to
cope with the challenges of modernization. And, as
Kumar reminds us with such perspicacity, there is no
firmer foundation for a secular society than the learning of this skill.
GAURI VISWANATHAN
Columbia University
CANADA AND THE UNITED STATES
M. CARROLL. A Good and Wise Measure: The
Search for the Canadian-American Boundary, 17831842. Buffalo, N.Y.: University of Toronto Press. 2001.
Pp. xxi, 462. Cloth $70.00, paper $29.95.
FRANCIS
Even outside of studies of the War of 1812, the
relationship between the United States and British
North America from the Revolution to the midnineteenth century has attracted more than its share of
historians. Boundary questions, and the negotiations
leading to the Webster-Ashburton Treaty (1842), have
been treated (either centrally or tangentially) in a
succession of works before and after the publication of
Howard Jones's important To the Webster-Ashburton
Treaty: A Study in AnglO-American Relations, 17831843 (1977). Francis M. Carroll's book, however, is
much more than just another addition to the literature.
Carroll offers a meticulous account not only of
negotiations per se but also of efforts to find effective
arbitration, and of the accompanying search on the
ground for relevant landmarks. Ultimately, the book
argues, the settlement of 1842 was not only true to the
original provisions of the second Treaty of Paris (1783)
but also represented the triumph of peaceful compromise over the bellicosity of the likes of Lord Palmerston and the resulting threat of a new Anglo-American
war that had persisted from 1839 to 1841.
In part, it is the sheer weight of detail that gives
force to Carroll's analysis. Although this is neither a
finicky nor a slow-moving book, the author portrays
thoroughly the intricacies of the border question.
OCTOBER
2002
Canada and the United States
Argument and counter-argument are placed effectively in geographical and political contexts. There is
an understandable focus on "the two most obscure
parts of the boundary (today's Maine-New Brunswick
and Minnesota-Ontario borders)" (p. 13), but the
entire boundary issue is delineated in extended discussions of the consequences of the Treaty of Ghent
(1814), the subsequent failure of arbitration by the
king of the Netherlands, and the final search for a
solution during the early 1840s. There is no shortage of
substance in any of this.
Also impressive is the attention given to the surveying efforts that were crucial to the negotiations at
every stage. Carroll brings out both the frailties and
the achievements of the surveyors, and at times-as in
the case of the British geologist George William
Featherstonhaugh and his relationship with Palmerston-the strong personal influence they could wield.
The quest for landmarks was, of course, far from the
objective enquiry that its participants might have liked
to suppose, but no previous author has established how
direct were the linkages between the labors of those in
the field and the more rarefied poring over maps and
reports that followed in committee rooms.
Not so satisfying is the author's portrayal of the
Aboriginal dimensions of the boundary question. The
occasional error, as in referring to "Micmacs from the
Passamaquoddy and Machias bands" (p. 15)-who, in
reality, were quite distinct from the Mi'kmaq-is less
significant than the book's inattention to the wider
Aboriginal interests that were at stake. It is undoubtedly true that "the documents do not tell much about
what Native people thought about the question of the
boundary" (p. 123), and yet more broadly based analysis of Aboriginal diplomatic and strategic aspirations
might have allowed greater depth in assessing the
influence of those nations on the surveyors in border
areas that were frequently still only under the loosest
of non-Native control.
That caveat noted, however, this remains an important and successful book. The author's judgment that
"the Webster-Ashburton Treaty was a monumental
accomplishment for all parties and a major step in
normalizing relations between British North America
and the United States along 2,540 miles on the eastern
half of the continent" (p. 286) carries weight and
conviction because of the depth of the preceding
analysis. Many years ago, the then-doyen of Canadian
military historians, C. P. Stacey, pointed out the
historically mythological character of "The Undefended Border" (The Undefended Border: The Myth and
the Reality [1967]). Carroll, however, makes an able
case for seeing the 1783-1842 efforts at boundary
resolution as preparing the way for a later era in which
the notion of the undefended border at least had
"more than a grain of truth" (p. xiii).
JOHN G. REID
Saint Mary's University
AMERICAN HISTORICAL REVIEW
1215
DAVID MASSELL. Amassing Power: J. B. Duke and the
Saguenay River, 1897-1927. (McGill-Queen's Studies
on the History of Quebec.) Montreal: McGill-Queen's
University Press, in association with the Forest History
Society, Inc., Durham, N.C. 2000. Pp. ix, 301. $49.95.
When one thinks of hydroelectric development in
Quebec, one usually thinks of the massive James Bay
projects sponsored by Premier Robert Bourassa in the
1970s. David Massell, however, demonstrates that
interest in big power projects in Quebec predated
Bourassa by at least fifty years. He also demonstrates
that the earlier Quebec governments were as dedicated to utilizing the province's hydroelectric resources for the benefit of the people of Quebec as was
Bourassa. The pivotal difference between Bourassa's
government of the 1970s and that of his predecessors
was that Bourassa preferred to use the state as an
engine of development rather than private enterprise.
The focus of Massell's book is the development of
the Saguenay River between 1897 and 1927, paying
particular attention to the role played by J. B. Duke,
finance capitalist and president of the American Tobacco Company. Thomas Willson, a Canadian inventor
and businessman, was the first to try to develop the
Saguenay's power by building a hydroelectric dam at
Shipsaw, but he needed customers for his power and
more financing; this led him into a partnership with the
Interstate Chemical Corporation (ICC), an American
company that insisted on bringing Duke into the
arrangement. Duke toured the Shipsaw dam in 1912
and was initially unimpressed. He did, however, strike
a hard bargain with both Willson and the ICC, leaving
all the development with his partners and agreeing to
lend them the necessary money to undertake the
project. Both partners were financially strapped, and
when bankruptcy loomed, Duke finagled his way into
owning the water powers of the lower Saguenay,
including Shipsaw.
Duke also negotiated a deal with another Canadian
businessman, Colonel Benjamin Scott, who owned the
power rights to the upper Saguenay. Scott, too, fared
badly against Duke. In this partnership, Duke had
agreed to finance the development of water powers on
the upper Saguenay, providing Scott could get clear
title to those powers. At this time, around 1910, the
Quebec government was developing a professional
civil service dedicated to protecting and promoting the
interests of the Quebec people. Consequently, when
Scott opened negotiations to secure title to the water
powers, the government, as represented by Arthur
Amos, chief engineer of the newly formed Hydraulic
Service Department, agreed to sell the upper river
power sites, but only for a price that Duke refused to
pay. As a result, Duke denied Scott his "fee for
services rendered." Scott sued and received partial
compensation for his efforts; however, Duke had
gained control of the entire Saguenay water powers.
All he needed was the right to develop them. This he
acquired during the Depression that followed World
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2002