Ruling With a Stony British Stare

IN MODERN Britain, it is bad form to speak too highly of the British empire. Yet beneath such squeamishness, an undercurrent of relative pride still pulses, defiantly. Of course, today’s educated Briton murmurs, the empire was wrong. But at least the British learned the languages, schooled the sons of native chiefs and tried to do some good, didn’t they? Surely, other imperialists were worse, the British tell themselves: those savage Germans or outright villains such as King Leopold II, running the Congo not as a Belgian colony but his own private property, unaccountable to any parliament back home?