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administration are, as has been stated, filled from
this service. The offices of governor-general and
governor of Madras and Bombay have been sometimes
 held by members of this service, but are
more often reserved for politicians appointed direct
by the Crown. The chief justices of the four high
courts are usually selected and appointed by the
Crown from the English bar. The lieutenantgovernors,
 chief commissioners, councillors, a third
of the judges of the high courts, two of the three
judges of the chief court, the civil secretaries, and
the heads of most of the civil departments, are covenanted
 civilians. The divisional and district
officers are, in regulation provinces, wholly, and in
non-regulation provinces largely, filled by members
of this service.

The constant aim of the government, since the
establishment of a proper system of administration
under Lord Cornwallis, has been to improve the
Indian civil service, and thus to ensure good district
 administration.

* Unless the district administration be good,
no amount of efficiency in the governors, and the
upper grades of the public service, will avail to
make the British Government in India a properlyfulfilled
 trust, and a blessing to the people ; while,
on the other hand, if the staff of district officers is

* Chesney's Indian Polity, p. 210.