 His decision to indulge these interests curtailed his initial rapid advancement through the ranks of the Service, although he was later appointed Census Commissioner and, shortly before his death in 1911, became Permanent Secretary at the India Office in London.In the intervening years he compiled various studies of Indian communities based on ideas that are now considered to constitute scientific racism.He emphasised the value of fieldwork and anthropometrical studies, in contrast to the reliance on old texts and folklore that had historically been the methodology of Indologists and which was still a significant approach in his lifetime.