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The empire, rolling from war to war, painting Africa as well as Asia red, now seemed to be in the hands of men like Lord Salisbury and Cecil Rhodes,
這個東征西戰的帝國，曾血染亞非大陸，如今似乎落入了索爾茲伯里勛爵和塞西爾·羅茲等人的手中，
who made no bones about ruling by the sword, making it clear to westernised natives that if they thought they'd have an equal share in law and legislation, they could think again.
他們毫不崇尚武力，向已歐化的當地人表明若他們曾要求法律和立法方面的平等，此想法可再度提上日程。
It was no wonder, then, that those who in an earlier generation would still have hoped to see the Liberal dream realised, now turn their backs on it as a bankrupt fraud.
毫無疑問，上一代那些企盼自由主義夢想得以實現的人們，如今早將此視為一場毫無新意的騙局。
The Tories wouldn't give them prosperity, and the Liberals couldn't give them justice and self-government. It was time to fend for themselves.
托利黨無法保證繁榮，自由黨又不能實現公正與自治。他們只能自食其力。
In Britain, the working class finally had had enough of hand-me-downs from the conscience-stricken middle-class liberals. They created their own Labour Party.
在英國，工人階級終于從良心不安的中產階級自由主義者手中得到了足夠的精神傳承。創建了屬于自己的勞工黨。
In India, the writing was on the wall when militant Hindu nationalists adopted a campaign and a word that had begun its life in Ireland -- the boycott.
在印度，抗議已不可避免，激進的印度教民族主義者爆發了一場運動，繼承了在愛爾蘭生根發芽的"聯合抵制"一詞。
The entire premise of the Macaulay vision had been that subject peoples would yearn to join the world of the British consumer, and here they were saying "No thanks" to the travelling salesmen of the workshop of the world.
麥考萊設想的大前提是殖民地人民渴望成為英國產品的消費者，但如今，他們卻不肯接納來自世界工廠英國的巡回推銷員。
Self-sufficient handcrafts would challenge imperial commerce. That's why Gandhi put the spinning wheel at the centre of the Indian flag.
自給自足的手工業將對帝國商業造成威脅。正因如此，甘地才將紡車置于印度國旗的中央。
You wouldn't know this, perhaps, if you got a good seat at the last of the great durbars in 1911,
如果1911年你在最后一次接見典禮占據一席，或許你對此就知之甚少，
actually featuring a King Emperor, George V, present and in person, held yet again on the dusty Delhi Ridge where the martyrs of the mutiny had held out.
帝國元首、國王喬治五世親自出席，典禮在落滿灰塵的德里山脈再次舉行，印度暴動的遇難者曾在這里堅守。
Three years later, the empire would ask its loyal subjects to line up for king and country. Millions did from Ireland and from India.
三年后，帝國將會要求其忠實臣民為國王及國家參軍入伍。愛爾蘭與印度有數百萬人應征。
Out of the carnage of world war came a reborn Islamic militancy.
在世界大戰大屠殺影響下，伊斯蘭好戰主義再露端倪。
And a revolutionary Irish republicanism, eager to escape the clutches of empire.
急于逃離帝國魔爪的愛爾蘭共和主義革命黨也應運而生。
This is the Ozymandias of the Raj.
這里是統治者奧茲曼迪斯。
In 1947, when India became independent, all New Delhi's statues of the King Emperors and viceroys and generals, the great and the good and the not so good, were rounded up and taken here,
1947年印度獨立時，所有新德里市內為國王、總督、將軍、偉人、完人及非完人所立的雕像都被搬到了這里，
to the empire's theme park, the Durbar Field, where they were interned like so many forlorn hostages to that old joker, history.
即帝國主題公園，接見地，歷史塵封了歷代逝者，他們也只能被禁錮在這里。
Was that it, then? Were Macaulay and Gladstone and the other high priests of the great Victorian mission kidding not just the natives but themselves?
就這樣了嗎？麥考萊、格拉斯頓和其它維多利亞時代偉大運動的領袖只是在騙人騙己嗎？
In the end, were they just window dressers of a regime that was really all about money and power, and when both gave out, just cut their losses and slunk home?
到頭來，對于一個金錢與權力至上的政權，他們不過用于裝點門面，做夠了戲就可以回家了？
Maybe, but before we write their ideals off completely, we should take note of what rose from their defeat -- cycles of religious hatred, sectarian wars and massacres, epidemics and destitution.
或許吧，但在我們全盤否認他們的思想之前，應該先看到這些失敗所帶來的后果，宗教仇恨、宗派戰爭、大屠殺、流行病與窮困輪番上演。
Not all them, I think, exclusively our fault.
我想，這并不全是我們一方的過錯。
Perhaps the last word on the British Empire hasn't been written, after all, at least if that empire is thought of, not in terms of scarlet tunics and flashing sabres, but language, law and liberal democracy.
或許對于大英帝國一切尚未蓋棺定論，至少對這個帝國的審視角度，不再是紅色制服與閃光軍刀，而是語言、法律和自由民主。
So perhaps the marriage of east and west does have a future if we're prepared to fight for it, not just in Calcutta and Karachi, but also in Leicester, Oldham, Bradford and Burnley.
東西方的結合或許仍有發展前景，只要我們愿意為之奮斗，不僅是在加爾各答和卡拉奇，還要在萊斯特、奧爾德姆、布拉德福德和伯恩利。
