I N D I A.
INDIA, from the rare and precious commodities with which it was known to abound, and from the general belief of its immense wealth, became, at an early period, the favourite resort of commercial adventurers from Europe. The Portuguese had enjoyed its commerce for nearly a century, when the English offered themselves as competitors for the riches of the east. After several unsuccessful adventures, Sir Francis Drake, in 1577, sailed for India, which he reached by Cape Horn, and returned by the Cape of Good Hope, having touched at several of the rich and populous islands which are scattered in the Indian Ocean, and brought back the most favourable accounts of their commerce, and of the friendly dispositions of the inhabitants. He was followed by several other adventurers, some of them of the highest rank, with whose commercial views were combined schemes of predatory enterprise against the Spanish settlements and trade. The first association for a regular trade was formed in 1599, and a capital of above L. 30,000 was subscribed in 101 shares, which varied from L. 100 to L. 3000. This Company fit-
ted out four ships to India, which set sail from Torbay in 1601, and returned in 1603, having made a handsome profit on the capital employed. From 1603 to 1613 eight other voyages were undertaken to India with similar views, and, with the exception of one in 1607, they were all successful, yielding a profit hardly ever below 100, and, in general, above 200 per cent. In 1611, those English fleets, notwithstanding the intrigues of the Portuguese, were favourably received by the Mogul government at Surat, which conceded to them the privilege of establishing factories at Surat, Ahmedabad, Cambaya, and Goga; a duty of 3½ per cent. being imposed on their merchandise in lieu of all demands. (Mill's History of British India, Vol. I. Chap. iii.)
It was now resolved to adopt the plan of a joint-Stock in place of a regulated Company; and, on these terms, a sum of L. 490,000 being subscribed, four different voyages were undertaken, the profit on which amounted to only 87½ per cent. The profit on the trade, while each individual acted for him-
India. self, amounted to 171 per cent.—a fact which sufficiently illustrates the superior efficacy of individual prudence over every other principle of management. In 1617-18, a second joint-stock was subscribed to the amount of L. 1,600,000; but from the hostility of the Portuguese and Dutch—from the active competition of the latter, in the lucrative trade of the Spice Islands—from the bad management of the Directors at home—and, lastly, from the competition of private adventurers, some of whom had the address to procure the King's licence for a voyage to India, the affairs of the Company fell into great disorder. They petitioned King Charles I. and his council against the new and most alarming grievance of a free trade; but it does not appear that they were reinstated in their exclusive privilege till the reign of the Protector in 1656. A new charter was afterwards received from Charles II., containing the important privilege of making peace or war with the native powers, and of seizing unlicensed persons within their limits, and sending them to England. In 1640, a settlement had been effected at Madras. About the year 1651, owing to the influence of the English surgeons, who had effected some remarkable cures at the court of Mogul, a licence was obtained on payment of 3000 rupees, for a free and unlimited trade, with the rich and extensive province of Bengal; and in 1668, the company received possession of Bombay from Charles II., to whom, on his marriage to the Infanta Catherine, it had been ceded by the court of Portugal. (Mill's British India, Chap. iv.)
From this period, the increasing wealth of the nation appears to have supplied the Company more liberally with funds for the Indian trade. In 1668, the value of the exports to India amounted to L.245,000; in 1674, to L.456,000; in 1675, to L.389,000; in 1678, to L.352,000; in 1680, to L.461,700; in 1681, to L.596,000; and, in 1682, to L.740,000. The Company's servants in India, however, involved themselves about this period in hostilities with the native powers, and, in the course of this contest, Arungzebe, the most powerful of all the Mogul sovereigns, was so exasperated by their conduct, that he issued orders for the expulsion of the English from India, and for the destruction of their establishments. The factory at Surat was seized; the island of Bombay was attacked; and the other establishments and factories of the Company were in like manner threatened; and it was only by the most abject submissions that the Company could obtain the restoration of the factories at Surat, and the removal of the enemy from Bombay. So detrimental was this contest to the affairs of the Company, that their equipments continued on a very reduced scale for several years.
In the mean time, the accumulation of capital in the country subsequent to the reign of Charles I., joined to the growing ardour of the nation for commercial adventure, had given rise to a general impatience of the Company's exclusive privileges, which was heightened and inflamed by the cruel and arbitrary measures pursued for the suppression of the private trade. Doubts began to be suggested as to the legality of restricting the rights of commerce
by royal charter without the sanction of Parliament. India. Applications were made to the Legislature on this subject, which were favourably received. In these circumstances, a proposition was made for the formation of a new company, which was eagerly adopted; and, in 1693, while both parties were keenly urging their pretensions, the old Company offered to Government a loan of L.700,000, at 4 per cent., for a renewal of their charter, and for the monopoly of the Indian trade secured to them by act of Parliament. They were outbid by their rivals, who offered L.2,000,000, at 8 per cent., for similar privileges. This latter offer was accepted; and a bill for this purpose was brought into Parliament. The old Company were, at the same time, allowed to trade along with the new, for the space of three years, until 1701, according to a proviso in their charter, that three years' notice should be given them previous to their dissolution. The rivalry of those two companies was the occasion of continual jarring and hostility, both at home and between their agents in India, which proceeded at length to undisguised violence. These disputes were displeasing to the nation at large, because they obstructed a highly beneficial trade, by which great riches, it was generally thought, were brought into the country; and the demand being general for a union of those rival interests, the separate funds of the Company were finally united into one great joint-stock. An indenture tripartite, including the Queen and the two Companies, was signed, to give legal efficacy to this transaction. Considerable differences still remained, which, however, it was agreed to refer to the arbitration of Earl Godolphin, Lord High Treasurer; and, in the mean time, an act of Parliament was passed, ratifying the agreement which had been concluded, and enacting that a loan of L.1,200,000 should, at the same time, be advanced to Government without interest; which, being added to the former L.2,000,000, constituted a loan of L.3,200,000, at an interest of 5 per cent. The Company were empowered, by the same act, to borrow to the extent of L.1,500,000 on their common seal. In 1708, at the time of the union of the two Companies, the official value of all the exports to India amounted only to L.60,915; in 1715, it fell to L.36,997. It afterwards increased, and the average value of the exports for twenty years, from 1708, was L.92,288.
The domestic trade in India, and more especially the provision of the Company's investment, owing to the general insecurity of the country, required expensive establishments for its support, and a body of experienced servants besides, to collect and to purchase commodities for exportation; an employment which, owing to the poverty and abject state of the natives, and their peculiar customs, involved duties of the most minute and laborious detail. During the decline of the Mogul Government, the tranquility of India was frequently shaken by the contentions of rival chiefs, and the slight security afforded even in the best times to commerce, became in this manner more imperfect. For the reception of the goods which it was necessary to collect and store up, that cargoes might always be in readiness for the Company's ships, warehouses were built, which,
with the counting-houses, and other apartments for the agents and business of the place, constituted the factories of the Company. These factories contained a valuable store of property, which, in the disordered state of India, it became necessary to secure from the rapacity both of governments and of individuals. The factories were therefore strongly built and fortified, their inmates were armed and disciplined, and, for better security, regular troops were occasionally maintained in these mercantile garrisons. In these defensive arrangements of the Company, we may discern the rudiments of their future empire.
The business of the Company in India was, at this time, managed by the three independent presidencies of Bombay, Madras, and Calcutta. The Presidency consisted of a governor and council of nine, twelve, or any greater number of members, as should seem expedient, in a majority of which all power was vested. The members of the council were not excluded from other more lucrative offices, which were, in general, shared among them. These offices were chiefly in the gift of the president, and, by means of his influence, the council were, in a great degree, placed under his control. The governor and council exercised the most ample powers over all the servants of the Company, and with regard to all others, they could seize and imprison them, and afterwards send them to England. The powers of martial law were bestowed on them at an early period, for maintaining the discipline of the troops under their orders; and, in 1661, a charter of Charles II. gave them the power of administering civil and criminal justice according to the laws of England.
From the conclusion of the peace of Utrecht, the country rapidly advanced in prosperity and wealth, and the Indian trade partook of this general improvement. In the year 1708, the imports amounted to L. 493,257, from which they increased to L. 1,059,759 in 1730. The rate of profit in 1708 was 5 per cent. on a capital of L. 3,163,200, from which it gradually rose till, in 1716, it amounted to 10 per cent., at which rate it continued till 1729, when it was reduced to 8 per cent. In India, the policy of acquiring dominion was pursued with perseverance and success. In 1698, the Company had been permitted to purchase the zemindarship of the three towns of Sootanatty, Calcutta, and Govindpore, with their districts; to which was afterwards added, a district, extending ten miles from Calcutta, on each side of the river Hoogly, containing thirty-seven towns. In the year 1732, the annual dividend was reduced from 8 to 7 per cent., at which rate it continued till the year 1744.
A new scene was now about to open in India. The European settlers had hitherto occupied the possessions allotted them by the permission of the native powers, to whom they were subject. But as the troops and military preparations at their different settlements increased, their views gradually became more lofty and independent. In 1744, France and England, from being auxiliaries, became principals in the great European war which was then raging, and the flame was soon communicated to their most distant colonies. In India the two rival powers were
quickly involved in hostilities, which scarcely ever ceased, until, by the ascendancy of the English, the French, after various changes of fortune, were, in 1761, driven out of the Carnatic. An account of these events having already been given in the Encyclopaedia, under the articles BRITAIN and INDOSTAN, the following observations will be chiefly confined to the policy adopted by the mercantile sovereigns of India in the internal administration of their newly acquired dominions; and with this view, it will suffice to observe, that, in Bengal, a plan was formed in 1757, in concert with a domestic faction, at the head of which was Meer Jaffier, a relative of the royal family, for the deposition of the reigning Prince Suraja Dowla, who had already waged war against the British, and was averse to their establishment in the country. This plan was accomplished, partly by arms, and partly by intrigue, and Meer Jaffier was raised to the throne of the deposed sovereign. In accomplishing this revolution, the Company's servants, who had imbibed the most extravagant notions of the wealth of India, took care to bargain for enormous sums of money to themselves. The new sovereign, who succeeded to an exhausted treasury, had recourse to the most severe extortions to satisfy the rapacity of his foreign allies. His subjects became discontented and rebellious; his troops mutinied for want of pay, and so dissatisfied were the British with his administration, that they dethroned him, and set up Meer Cossim in his stead. The new ruler of Bengal, aware of the tenure by which he held his precarious power, set in motion all the necessary machinery for extorting money from an impoverished people; and he had so far succeeded, partly by a strict and severe administration of his finances, and partly by the most vigilant economy, in restoring the vigour of the government; when every thing was again involved in confusion by the extravagant pretensions and unbounded rapacity of the Company's servants.
In India the transit of goods from one place to another was, under the native governments, subjected to a tax; and upon all the roads, and navigable rivers, toll-houses were erected, where this tax was paid. These toll-houses were multiplied to the great inconvenience and oppression of the internal trade, and as the duties varied in different places, the traders were frequently oppressed by the arbitrary extortions of the collectors. The East India Company had, at an early period, procured an exemption from these duties, for all articles which they were to export, or had imported; and the servants of the Company, who were allowed to engage in the internal trade of the country, frequently endeavoured to abuse this privilege, by claiming an indiscriminate immunity from taxation for all their own goods, which they had neither imported, nor were to export, but which, with a view to the domestic trade of the country, they were transporting from one place to another. This claim was, however, always vigorously resisted, as ruinous alike to the revenue and to the domestic trader; and the native rulers, while they retained their power, always restrained the Company's servants within their appointed limits. But when, by the dethronement of Suraja Dowla, and the elevation of Meer Jaffier, the English acquired un-
India. disputed ascendancy in the government, they broke through all the equitable restraints which had been imposed upon them, and not only engaged largely in the interior trade, but claimed, under the Company's passport, an immunity from all internal duties, not merely for articles of export and import, but for their whole commerce; and, from the general dread of the English name, the keepers of the different toll-houses no longer exacted the public dues on the transit of their goods through the country. In some cases where the demand was made and the goods stopped, the toll-keeper was arrested by a party of Sepoys, and carried prisoner to the nearest factories; and he was frequently exposed to even greater severities, being tied up and lashed. The confusion into which the country was thrown by the violence and injustice of these rapacious intruders may be easily imagined. The native merchant, still burdened with the heavy transit duties which were rigorously levied on him, was undersold in every market by the Company's servants, who, in a short time, engrossed the whole commerce of the country. The unhappy natives were subjected to various other oppressions. It was a common practice of the Company's servants to defraud them both in purchase and sale; to force goods from them at a lower, and to compel them to buy their own at a higher rate than the market price. Nor did the ordinary tribunals of the country afford any refuge from their injustice; for a band of foreign adventurers had usurped the sovereign power, which they rendered wholly subservient to their own schemes.*
Meer Cossim, the ruler who had been set up by the Company, was extremely displeased with the conduct of their servants, and he represented, in the strongest terms, to the President and Council, the enormities to which the private trade had given rise. But the majority of the Council were too deeply interested in these enormities to be much moved by this just appeal of the sovereign in favour of his oppressed people. They all participated largely in the profits of the private trade, and they had no disposition, therefore, to part with or to restrict this lucrative abuse. They even refused to pay 9 per cent. of transit duties on their goods, though this rate was far inferior to that paid by the native traders, and all that they would agree to was, out of their own liberality and free choice, to pay a duty of 2½ per cent. on salt alone. The Nabob, when he heard of the proceedings in Council, and of the injurious treatment of his officers for duly executing his orders, was naturally filled with indignation, and, in these circumstances, he came to the resolution of abolishing all internal duties. There could not possibly have been a more moderate or equitable measure. It gave freedom and equality to all parties; it threw down at once all the restraints to fair and open competition, and gave to the Company's servants the unlimited freedom of trade. This just and liberal policy, however, was far from corresponding with their views, and it ex-
cited among them the most violent clamours. They were discontented at losing so fair an opportunity for amassing enormous wealth. Their conduct (as Mr Mill justly observes) furnishes one of "the most remarkable instances on record, of the power of interest to extinguish all sense of justice and even of shame." (British India, Vol. II. Chap. v. p. 201.)
The conduct of Meer Cossim was so highly displeasing to the majority of the Council, that they resolved to dethrone him, and he, on the other hand, made preparations for war, which he saw was inevitable. The war ended in his discomfiture and flight, first to the Nabob of Oude, and afterwards to the Rohilla country. Meer Jaffier was chosen by the Company's servants to be the nominal ruler of Bengal, on the well understood condition of subservience to their views. A treaty was concluded, confirming the immunity which they claimed from all internal duties, with the exception of 2½ per cent. on the article of salt, while those duties were re-imposed on the goods of all other merchants. Large presents were bargained for, and other payments to a great amount, as compensation for losses alleged to have been sustained by the Company's servants, in the course of their illicit interference in the domestic trade. These sums (which were estimated at first at ten, soon afterwards mounted up to fifty-three lacks of rupees, equal to about L.596,250) were rigidly exacted, while large payments to the Company were still undischarged;—while the public finances were sinking under the burden of an expensive war, and great sums had been borrowed by the Company from its servants, at an interest of 8 per cent.; and while, with all these aids, supplies were wanting both for the war and for the investment; the Company's ships frequently returning, in consequence, half loaded to Europe.
Meer Jaffier dying in 1765, his son, Jaffier, was chosen by the Company's servants in India to succeed him. From each successive sovereign, it was the custom of the electors to exact not only a large donation, but also an extension of power and privileges, so that the native ruler was at length left in possession of little more than mere nominal authority. It was now resolved by the English that they should take upon themselves the whole charge of defending the country, and that they would only allow the Nabob a few troops for the sake of parade, or for other necessary purposes; while, in regard to the civil government, he was to choose a deputy with the advice of the Governor and Council, on whom the whole internal administration of the country should be devolved. So completely was the government under the control of the English, that the accountants of the revenue could not be appointed without their approbation.
During this important revolution, which gave to the British such entire ascendancy in Bengal, the Directors in Europe were distracted by the contradictory reports of their affairs, transmitted to them from India. Being alarmed by the eagerness of their
* See Ninth Report of the House of Commons on India Affairs; also a letter of Meer Cossim, dated Baccargunge, May 25, 1762, which states, that the inhabitants who refused to sell to the Company's servants were flogged or confined.
servants to embark in expensive wars—by their unwarrantable and rapacious proceedings in regard to the private trade—and by the general disorder and embarrassment of their affairs, they resolved to appoint Lord Clive to the supreme government of Bengal. They at the same time reprobated, in strong terms, the rapacity and tyranny of their servants. In a letter to the Governor and Council, they observe,—"Your deliberations on the inland trade have laid open to us a scene of the most cruel oppression."—"The poor of the country," they continue, "who used always to deal in salt, betel-nut, and tobacco, are now deprived of their daily bread by the trade of the Europeans, whereby no kind of advantage accrues to the Company, and the government's revenues are greatly injured." (See Mill's British India, Vol. II. p. 216.) The Directors, accordingly, issued the most peremptory instructions for the prohibition of the inland trade of salt, betel-nut, and tobacco, or rather of the monopoly held by the Company's servants, by which the country was so cruelly oppressed. The practice of receiving presents from the native rulers and princes, which had been carried to a great extent, was also prohibited. At a general meeting of Proprietors, however, it was urged, in opposition to those wise and salutary restrictions, that the "servants of the Company in India ought not to be deprived of such precious advantages, which enabled them to revisit their native country with independent fortunes." This reasoning convinced the majority of the Proprietors, and a recommendation was moved, in consequence, to the Directors, to re-consider their resolution in regard to the private trade. The Governor and Council were therefore instructed, after consulting with the Nabob, to form a "proper and equitable plan for carrying on the inland trade." (Mill's British India, Vol. II. p. 217.) In other words, they were to contrive how they could oppress the country, and yet adhere to the rules of equity. This transaction places in a very strong light the corrupt nature of the Company's government. It was admitted on all hands, that it was by extortion and rapine, i. e. by compelling the oppressed inhabitants both to purchase and sell at prices fixed by the Company's servants, that such profits were gained, and that they were enabled to return to Europe with enormous accumulations of ill-gotten wealth. It was, indeed, as we have just seen, acknowledged by the Directors, that the poor of the country were deprived of their daily bread by the trade of their European servants, who monopolized every profitable channel of business; yet, with these facts before them, we find the sovereigns of India delivering over their oppressed subjects to the rapacity of their servants, for the avowed purpose of enriching them with the spoils of the country.
Lord Clive assumed the supreme power in India in May 1765. At this period the servants of the Company, in defiance of the peremptory orders of the Directors, still persisted in all the ruinous practices connected with the inland trade; and, in place of abolishing these, and thus remedying some of those abuses of which he so violently complained, Lord Clive entered into a partnership for the monopoly of salt; of which large quantities were
accordingly purchased and sold, for a profit of 45 per cent., divided among three of his own dependants,—his secretary, surgeon, and another friend, for whom he wished, as he expresses it, to realize a fortune. The plan of a more extensive monopoly, including salt, betel-nut, and tobacco, the chief articles of consumption in the country, was afterwards devised, to be carried on exclusively for the benefit of the superior servants of the Company, among whom the profit, after setting apart L. 100,000 per annum to the Company, was to be divided according to their rank in the service. At the time this corrupt scheme of monopoly was established, the Select Committee were in possession of peremptory orders from the Directors for its abolition; but these orders, under various pretences, they delayed to carry into execution till September 1768.
While the servants of the Company in India were thus eagerly devising the means of enriching themselves, their masters were frequently reduced to great pecuniary wants. But, in the midst of all those pecuniary embarrassments, the most flattering accounts of the Company's affairs were circulated in Europe, and on the subject of Indian opulence there was a general disposition to credulity. The splendid acquisition which the Company had made of the territorial revenues of Bengal, the political events in which they had been involved, and the immense fortunes with which a few individuals had returned to Europe, confirmed the general delusion, and inflamed the impatience of the proprietors of East India stock to participate in the inexhaustible treasures of their new dominions. In pursuance of these views, the dividend on their stock was raised from 6 to 10 per cent.; India stock rose to 263 per cent. A higher dividend was called for, and it was in vain that the Directors represented the heavy debts of the Company, and the general embarrassment of their affairs. The Proprietors refused to listen to such disagreeable representations, and at a general court they voted a dividend of 12½ per cent. for the year 1767. The attention of government being now directed to the Company's affairs, this vote was rescinded by act of Parliament, and the dividend limited to 10 per cent.
In the mean time, every day's experience was refuting the fallacious expectations of annual treasures from India. It was represented, that the territorial revenue of the Company would prove an inexhaustible source of wealth; and the Directors and Proprietors, in giving ear to these golden promises, of which their servants had been very liberal, were the dupes of their own credulous avarice. Hitherto, however, promises were all that had ever been received from India. So far from possessing any surplus revenue, the servants were involved in debt for the current expences of their government; they drew largely on the directors, but they remitted little; and the whole of this complicated scheme of trade and sovereignty laboured in consequence under such pecuniary difficulties, that the directors, to avert a public bankruptcy, were compelled to apply to the bank for a loan of L. 400,000, and afterwards of L. 300,000. In consequence of this state of things, so different from the pleasing fancies of unbounded wealth, with which the proprietors of the Company, and the coun-
India. try at large, had been amused, great discontent, and a violent clamour, was raised against the Company's servants in India, who, by their profusion or corruption, had failed to realize those golden dreams. The affairs of the Company were at length brought under the consideration of Parliament by the minister, who introduced two acts for the regulation of their affairs, a full account of which, and of the discussions which took place in consequence, will be found in the Encyclopædia, under the articles BRITAIN and COMPANIES. It may suffice to observe here, that these acts vested the administration of the affairs abroad in a Governor-General, with four councillors, rendering the other presidencies subject to that of Bengal, and establishing a supreme court of judicature at Calcutta, consisting of a chief justice and three other judges.
Although the ascendancy of the English had for some years been thoroughly established in Bengal; and although they were formally invested in 1765 with the sovereignty of the country, its affairs were still administered in the name of the native prince, and according to the forms and policy of the ancient constitution. Justice was still dispensed by the native courts, and by the Nabob's officers; the revenues still flowed through the same channels into the public exchequer; and all transactions with foreign powers were carried on under the same authority as formerly. But such was the increasing power of the English, that the government, so far as regarded the protection of the people, was dissolved. Neither the Nabob nor his officers dared to offer any opposition to their sovereign will; and the tribunals of justice, far from being a refuge to the oppressed, became subservient to the rapacity of the Gomastahs, or Indian agents, employed by the Company's servants, and were converted by them into most efficacious instruments for oppressing and plundering the people.
The Directors had been long dissatisfied with the proceedings of their servants, and with the produce of the land revenues, which had fallen far short of their expectations, and they now resolved to put an end to the double administration of the Nabob and the Company; and dispensing with the empty name of the former, to take upon themselves, ostensibly as well as really, the entire care and management of the land revenues. But they had no right conception of the important consequences which were involved in this measure; they were not aware, that it was an innovation on long established habits and prejudices, and on the settled policy of the country; that it unsettled the basis of property as well as the administration of civil and criminal justice; and that it was calculated to produce a greater revolution in domestic manners, than if the country had been transferred by conquest from one sovereign to another. In order to explain this point, it will be necessary briefly to describe the state of property and manners which prevailed in India under its native rulers.
Under the Mogul government the public revenue was derived from a general land-tax, and the regular payment of this tribute was the tenure by which property was generally held throughout the empire. The lands were possessed by different descriptions of owners or occupiers, under the titles chiefly of Zemindars, Talookdars, and Ryots. The nature of the Zemindary tenure has been a standing subject
of controversy among the Company's servants; some insisting, that under the Mogul despotism, the Emperor was the sole proprietor of the lands, and the Zemindar, a species of steward or factor, appointed by the Government to collect and superintend the land revenues; and, after reserving a suitable portion for his own maintenance, to remit the surplus to the imperial treasury; while others maintain that he was proprietor of the lands, and that he was only bound to the state for a stipulated tax or quit rent. Without entering into this controversy, which is rather abstract and speculative than of any practical consequence, it may be observed, that the Zemindars had lived for centuries in great splendour on the produce of their lands, which had quietly descended under the existing tenure through successive generations; that they had the power to sell, to alienate, or to mortgage; and that so long as they paid the annual tribute to government, they enjoyed secure possession of their estates. Under a despotic government arbitrary ejectments might no doubt occur; but these were rare, and they were universally regarded, both in law and usage, as the illegal outrages of abused power. It is admitted, on all hands, that these rights belonged to the Zemindars, and the only point that still remains in dispute (and it does not appear very material) seems to be, whether, according to the theory of the Mogul constitution, the receipt of the land-tax by the sovereign, or of his allotted share of the produce by the Zemindar, entitled the one or the other to the title of proprietor of the land.
The Zemindars, being bound to the state for the revenue, were necessarily invested with the power of collecting the land-tax from the subordinate landholders and tenants. They united, in this manner, legal authority with the possession of property, while, as judges and magistrates, they administered both civil and criminal justice, and were held responsible for all crimes committed within their respective boundaries. In the criminal court held by the Zemindar, he had the power of inflicting all sorts of penalties, and even capital punishments, on reporting the case, before execution, at Moorshedabad. There were various other descriptions of occupiers or tenants, such as the Talookdars, &c. who had hereditary claims on the produce of the soil; and, while the government looked to the principal landholders for the discharge of its demands, the inferior occupants and tenants were bound, each to his immediate superior, for their several proportions of the stipulated tax. The Ryots were the cultivators of the soil, who claimed the hereditary right of occupancy, which they transmitted to their children, and from which, so long as they paid their demands to the state, they could not be lawfully ejected.
The country was divided into villages or districts, comprising some hundreds or thousands of acres of arable and waste land. The district was divided into a greater or smaller number of shares, according to circumstances, and was either cultivated by the joint labour of the whole inhabitants, or each individual was allotted a separate share for his own maintenance. In the one case, the whole population were bound, jointly and severally, for the common rent, while, in the other, each individual paid his separate
share. There were various distinctions of rights among the inhabitants, some of occupancy, some of ownership, of which exact accounts were kept in the public register of the village, as well as by the parties interested. * Every village had also its establishment of public officers and tradesmen. These consisted of the Potail, or head inhabitant, whose business it was to superintend the affairs of the village, to settle disputes among the inhabitants, to attend to the police, and to the collection of the public tax; the Curnum, to whom it belonged to keep an account of the cultivation and produce of the land—to register the proprietors of the village, and to attest all deeds of sale, transfer, or assignment; the Boundaryman, who preserves the limits of the village, or gives evidence of them, in case of dispute; the Priest, the Schoolmaster, the Astrologer; the Smith, the Carpenter, the Potter, the Washerwoman, the Barber, the Cowkeeper, the Doctor, the Dancing-Girl, the Musician, the Poet, who were each rewarded for their labours out of the produce of the village lands. The amount of their shares on the gross produce is estimated at 5½ per cent. The collectors were allowed 10 per cent., and the remaining proportion of the crop was divided between the sovereign and the cultivator.
It was not the policy of the Mahometan conquerors, when they invaded India, to innovate materially on the management of the land-revenues, or even to oppress the cultivators by heavy impositions. It was in 1573, during the reign of the Emperor Akbar, that they completed the conquest of the country; and a general rent-roll was at that time formed for all Hindostan, by Rajah Torrel Mull, minister of finance to the emperor, as well as a scheme of division fixing the separate proportions of districts and villages. According to this plan, a settlement was concluded by which the amount of the tax was fixed at 1 crore, 49 lacks, 61,482 rupees, or nearly L.1,683,166. † This assessment does not appear to have been increased by subsequent monarchs, since its amount, according to the authenticated rent-roll of the Mogul treasury, was, in 1728, L.1,425,000; which is only a variation of L.75,000 from its original standard, in the course of two centuries. Under the Mogul government, however, the inferior occupants and cultivators of the land possessed no adequate security for the possession of their rights; and though, during the vigour of the monarchy, the zemindars might be restrained by the dread of punishment, or by their regard to laws and immemorial usages, from gross oppression, yet many abuses afterwards took place, under which the share of the crop left to the Ryots was reduced to a bare subsistence.
In the reign of Aliverdi Cawn, who succeeded to the throne in 1741, the land-tax imposed by Akbar was augmented by various arbitrary assessments. To the original ground rent other taxes were added, some permanent, and others occasional. These consisted
of duties on the transit of goods through the country, of taxes on shops and manufactures, and of fines and exactions of various sorts; and the Zemindar, who was bound to the state for the revenue, was empowered in proportion to those augmented demands to increase the contribution of his tenants. In the reign of Meer Cossim, who was set up by the Company's servants in 1761, these oppressions were carried to a still greater height. He was raised to the sovereignty on the well understood condition of subservience to the rapacity of the English; he had engaged to pay them large sums on his elevation to the throne, and it was essential to the fulfilment of his iniquitous bargain that he should plunder his subjects. His government is accordingly described as being in the highest degree illegal and oppressive. In place of adhering to the assessment fixed by the ancient policy of the empire, he instructed his agents to ascertain, by exact survey, the produce of the land, and he claimed for the treasury the whole surplus which remained, after allowing a bare maintenance to the cultivators.
After the dethronement of this prince, the country was by no means improved under the growing ascendancy of the English. The state of society which prevailed in Hindostan arose from the mixed operation of a peculiar system of laws, customs, manners, religion, and policy; such an artificial structure required to be nicely and skilfully handled, in place of which it was lacerated in all its delicate parts by the rude hand of foreign interference. The English were ignorant even of the language of the people whom they had brought under their sway, and whom they now attempted to govern; and though they might know generally, that the public revenues were derived from an impost on land, they were entirely inexperienced in the usages of the country, and in the financial details of the Mogul government. They knew not through what an infinite variety of petty channels the land revenue was brought together, and at last poured into the imperial treasury. With what effect, therefore, could they interfere in such complicated details; how could they decide between the claims of justice and of fraud; how could they judge of cases connected with the peculiar usages of the country, and with all those minutiae of local manners with which no foreigners can ever become thoroughly acquainted? The Company's servants, involved in such a labyrinth of complex concerns, possessed no clue to guide them to any equitable issue. Supposing their views to have been honest, they wanted intelligence to give them effect, and although they could enforce submission to their decrees, the country, under their usurped and ill-directed authority, presented one vast scene of anarchy and oppression. Nor was there any tribunal to which the oppressed could fly for relief; the Nabob, the nominal ruler of the country, being totally without power, and consequently unable to maintain
* See Appendix to the Fifth Report (printed, by order of the House of Commons, 1812), from the Select Committee on the Affairs of the East India Company, p. 714, where, in the extracts from the Report of Mr Place, the reader will find a detailed view of the different rights and privileges, some of ownership, some of property, claimed by the inhabitants of the village.
† A lack of rupees is 100,000, a crore is 100 lacks, or ten millions. The rupee is worth about 2s. 3d.
India. the authority of his tribunals against the masters of the country. (Mill, Vol. II. p. 309.)
All those evils were readily ascribed by the Directors to the misconduct and rapacity of their servants, who, in their eagerness to make fortunes for themselves, totally neglected the interest of their masters; and this was no doubt true. But the objection of the Directors was, that they plundered the country for their own benefit, and not for that of the Company. Had the wealth acquired found its way into the public treasury, and been remitted to Europe in the form of a large investment, no such heavy complaints would have been made. The hope of receiving a surplus from their territorial revenues was, indeed, a delusion long and fondly cherished by the proprietors in this country. They expected to share among them the wealth of India. The land and labour of the country was to be laid under contribution for the benefit of its mercantile proprietors in Europe. The new sovereigns of India could never relinquish the notion of profit, the original object of their association. Their conceptions were never elevated to the true dignity of their situation. The glory of a sovereign consists in the felicity of grateful millions, and this is the only true and legitimate end of all government. But the East India Company were intent on profit,—on enriching themselves at the expence of their subjects; and the duty of the servants to their masters consisted in sending home a large investment. They were to possess themselves of as large a quantity as possible of the produce of the country, giving nothing in return, and to send it to Europe to be shared among the proprietors; and it was, accordingly, the boast of successive administrations how well they had succeeded in this matter,—not how happy they had made their subjects,—but how much of their property they had taken from them and sent to Europe.
To realize the hopes of a large surplus revenue from India, the territorial revenues were racked to the utmost. The revenue contracted for in 1765 amounted to L. 1,607,826; in 1766 and 1767, it amounted to L. 1,719,677, from which deductions were afterwards made, as it was found impossible to collect it. The revenue, however, actually realized, exceeded the surplus formerly paid into the Mogul treasury when the country was in a flourishing condition. But the methods by which it was collected were ruinous to the country. The landholders, failing almost universally in their engagements, were left to the mercy of the revenue-officers, by whom they were grievously oppressed. In many parts the villages were deserted by the cultivators, and the land was left desolate. All those evils were still further aggravated by a grievous famine which prevailed in Bengal, in the year 1770, by which it is computed that about one-third of the inhabitants perished. But, in the midst of all this misery, the revenue was still violently kept up to its former standard. The deficiencies occasioned by the famine were re-assessed on those who survived this calamity, and so strictly were they levied, that the land revenue for that year exhibited an increase above that of the year preceding. The ruinous effects of this heavy
India. exaction are stated at length in the different letters from the Governor-General to the Directors. In a letter, dated 3d November 1772, he observes, "It was naturally to be expected that the diminution of the revenue should have kept an equal pace with the other consequences of so great a calamity; that it did not, was owing to its being violently kept up to its former standard." He then describes the method by which this was accomplished, which was by "an assessment upon the actual inhabitants of every inferior division of the lands, to make up for the loss sustained in the rents of their neighbours, who are either dead or have fled the country." "The tax (he continues) not being levied by any fixed rate or standard, fell heaviest on the wretched survivors of those villages which had suffered the greatest depopulation, and were of course the most entitled to the lenity of government. It had also this additional evil attending it, in common with every other variation from the regular practice, that it afforded an opportunity to the farmers, or sheidars, to levy other contributions off the people under colour of it, and even to increase this to whatever magnitude they pleased, since they were in course the judges of the loss sustained, and of the proportion which the inhabitants were to pay to replace it." To the same effect, Mr Middleton, one of the superintendents of the public revenue, observes, "When a very considerable portion, supposed even a third of the whole inhabitants, had perished, the remaining two-thirds were obliged to pay for the lands now left without cultivators. The country has languished ever since, and the evil continues enhancing every day. The first remedy, without the adoption of which all other measures will be fruitless, is an universal remission of some considerable portion of the revenue throughout the provinces. Such remission should have been made immediately on the famine. Its not taking place, then, has made it more and more necessary every day; and the longer it is delayed the more ruinous the consequences must be to this country and its revenue."
To correct these evils, numerous feeble remedies were devised. For the purpose of superintending the native officers, both in the collection of the revenue and in the administration of justice, which were intimately connected with each other in the Mogul Empire, the Company's servants were stationed in different parts of the country with the title of supervisors, and, to add to their security, two councils with authority over the supervisors were established, one at Moorshedabad, and another at Patna. One of the most important duties of these supervisors was to procure information respecting the amount of the land revenues; the manner of collecting them; the amount of the cesses, or arbitrary taxes; the origin and progress of those modern exactions; and also to inquire concerning the regulations of commerce and the administration of justice. The reports made by these supervisors concurred with all the other evidence received as to the wretched and oppressed state of the natives. "The Nazims (they observed) exacted what they could from the Zemindars and great farmers of the revenue, whom they left at liberty to plunder all below; re-
serving to themselves the prerogative of plundering them in their turn, when they were supposed to have enriched themselves with the spoils of the country."
Such was the condition of the country when the Directors resolved to supersede the native government in the management of the land revenues. This resolution was adopted without any consideration, how far their servants were qualified for the task of legislators among a people with whose manners, habits, and laws, they were totally unacquainted; and the latter, on their part, seem as little to have distrusted their qualifications for the duties assigned them. They resolved to make a settlement of the land revenues for five years, commencing from the year 1772. For this purpose, a committee of the board, consisting of the President and five members, named the "Committee of Circuit," was appointed, who were to make a journey through the country, and were empowered to receive proposals for a new lease of the lands, first from their ancient possessors, and, if their offers were deemed unsatisfactory, they were to be let by public auction to the highest bidder. These persons proceeded in their circuit through the country, publicly advertising and letting in farm, for the highest rent that could be obtained, the estates of such as hesitated to contract for the assessment proposed. A great proportion of the landed property throughout Bengal was thus exposed to auction; and, in the general sale, the former owners and the great nobility of the country were outbid by adventurers, to whom property was acceptable on any terms, and were generally dispossessed of their lands, from the surplus produce of which a provision was assigned them by the indulgence of the revenue committee.
The supervisors who had been stationed in the different districts were invested with the necessary powers for the collection of the revenue, and were henceforth denominated collectors. A native officer was to be joined with them under the title of duan, to confirm and to check accounts, and to assist in all those multifarious details which were intelligible only to a native. Various regulations were adopted to check the exertions of the collectors; but the governor and council express their regret that it was not in their power wholly to remedy this evil. (Mill's British India, Vol. II. p. 312.) Under the Mogul government, the duty of collecting the revenues and of administering justice was united, as formerly mentioned, in the person of the zemindars. The new scheme for the management of the revenues subverted this ancient order of things. The zemindar was superseded both as collector and as judge, and his place was supplied by two courts, the one for civil, the other for criminal proceedings, established in each district. In the criminal court the new collector of taxes was to act as president, to be assisted by two Mahometan officers, the cauzee and the mustee, and by two Mohlavis, as interpreters of the law. The civil court consisted, in like manner, of the collector as president, assisted by the duan and other officers of the native court. Two supreme courts were, at the same time, established at Calcutta, for the review of the inferior courts both civil and criminal. To one of these all capital cases were reported, and were ultimately referred to the governor and
council; who, finding the labour too great, restored, in 1774, this branch of administration to the nominal Nabob, and carried back the court to Moorshedabad. It appeared that, for a long period before this, the administration of criminal justice was wholly at a stand. In the new arrangements all disputes about property, not exceeding ten rupees in value, were referred to the head man of the district to which the parties belonged.
In considering those regulations, the question naturally occurs, how these supervisors, who were now to act in the double capacity of collector and judge, became qualified for the discharge of such important functions? In all other countries, it is only by a previous course of laborious preparation, that any one is qualified for the office of a judge, and to appoint an unqualified person would be reckoned both dangerous and absurd. But how much more dangerous and absurd was it to appoint uninstructed persons to act as judges in a foreign land, with whose language they are but imperfectly acquainted, and of whose laws, manners, and customs, they are thoroughly ignorant? If, among a comparatively rude people, the mode of proceeding be loose and arbitrary,—if there be no books of written law, or of precedents to govern judicial decisions, which must consequently depend on the imperfect lights and analogies afforded by manners, religion, or customs, the incapacity of a foreigner for the discharge of such nice duties becomes even more glaring. By disposing of the administration of justice in this manner, it was clear, that the judicial duties would either be neglected, or that they would still be performed as before, and with no increased chance of amendment by native officers. This new arrangement was, therefore, like many others, a useless innovation on the established practice of the country. There is another weighty objection to the union in one person of the duties of collector and judge, namely, that it was in the collection of the duties that the grossest oppression had been committed; the powers of the collectors being frequently perverted to the most iniquitous ends. Under this new project those who sought redress from the courts of justice, met with their oppressor in the capacity of judge. He judged in his own case and of complaints brought against his own conduct. Justice was in this manner an empty name, unless it was supposed that the judge would pronounce himself an oppressor.
Under the five years' lease on which the land revenues had been farmed in 1772, the country was grievously overtaxed. The revenues fell into a heavy arrear the very first year, and the lands were let on a progressive rent. To collect the outstanding balances; and to force up the revenue to its standard, a host of extortioners was, under the name of Aumils, or collectors, let loose upon the afflicted country. But the rents contracted for by the farmers of the revenue were greater than they could pay, and, notwithstanding all their efforts, the arrears continued to increase. On the five years' lease, they amounted to a sum equal in value to L. 1,454,277, which was judged to be wholly irrecoverable; while, during the same period, the sums remitted, even under the rigorous management of public farmers, amounted to L. 1,336,451. Nor was this the only
evil arising from the mal-administration of the Company's servants. The zemindars, who are admitted on all hands, even by those who advocate the sovereign's right to the possession of the soil, to have lived in splendour on their hereditary possessions,—in all cases to have possessed the powers of magistracy within their district, and where the territory was large, to have exercised a species of sovereignty,—were either despoiled of their estates, or, where they were induced, by a hereditary attachment to their possessions, to engage for the rent proposed, they were overwhelmed with taxes which they could not pay, and were thus involved in poverty and ruin. Where the zemindar was himself the farmer of the revenue, he exercised the same extortion on his inferiors which was applied to himself; where a money jobber, who had no interest whatever in the property of the tenants, was the farmer, there was no limit to his extortion and cruelty.
The defects in this system for the administration of the land revenues soon began to disclose themselves; and the rulers of India, whose government was one continued innovation, immediately resolved to make another considerable change in the state machinery, which they had just set in motion. They abolished the superintendence of the collectors, and the country, with the exception of Chittagong and Tipperah, being formed into six grand divisions, viz. Calcutta, Burdwan, Moorshedabad, Dinazepore, Dacca, and Patna, a council was appointed for each of the last five, consisting of a chief and four senior servants, to whom were transferred the powers and duties of the collectors. They were to preside in the courts of justice, and to superintend the collections; and, in subordinate districts, they delegated their powers to naibs or aumils, who were natives, and who were appointed, like their superiors, to collect and to judge in all cases under the value of 1000 rupees. The empty privilege of appeal was, as formerly, reserved to the unsuccessful suitor in the provincial courts, and to superintend the whole collections of the country, a grand revenue-office was established at the presidency. The district of Calcutta was placed under the peculiar superintendence of a committee of revenue, consisting of two members of the Council and three inferior servants. These regulations, which were declared to be temporary, and only preparatory to something more permanent, failed as usual in all their important objects. The defective administration of justice among the natives was admitted and complained of by all parties, and the peace of the country was in consequence disturbed by the general prevalence of robbery and other enormous crimes. The truth is, that the new arrangements had subverted the ancient institutions and local manners of the country, and had thus left a void in its internal economy which the Government was in vain endeavouring to fill up.
The lease of the lands expired in 1777; and, after various suggestions and consultations, it was resolved that the rent should be regulated by the average collections of the three preceding years, and that the lands should be let, not by auction, but by an agreement with their ancient possessors in preference to other competitors. The liberal views of Mr Francis, who proposed that, in lieu
of the monopoly of salt and opium, a moderate duty should be imposed on those articles, and that a long series of oppression should thus be terminated, by giving freedom to trade, were rejected by the Governor-General. In pursuance of the plan proposed, the lands were let from year to year until the necessary arrangements could be completed for the system which was now to be adopted of a permanent land-tax.
The attention of the British Parliament had frequently been directed to the state of our Indian possessions, and to the transactions of the resident government; and, in 1784, a new system was established in Britain for the control of the local administration, under which, Lord Cornwallis, who was chosen Governor-General, was specially directed by the act of Parliament, as well as by instructions from the Directors and the Board of Control, "to inquire into the alleged grievances of the landholders, and, if founded in truth, to afford them redress; and to establish permanent rules for the settlement and collection of the land revenue, and for the administration of justice, founded on the ancient laws and local usages of the country."
Lord Cornwallis, on his arrival in India, did not deem matters fully ripe for the execution of the proposed plan, namely, the permanent settlement of the land revenue. On this important subject he found a great difference of opinion among the most intelligent of the Company's servants. Neither the nature of the land tenure, nor the rights of the different orders of people, who shared among them the produce of the soil, were sufficiently understood. All that was distinctly known was the amount of the revenue; but whether it was too high or too low was still a point in dispute among the English in India. In such wide diversity of opinion, the Governor-General was naturally anxious to proceed with caution, and to delay for some time the plan of a permanent settlement. The lands were, in the mean time, let from year to year through the agency of the district collectors, and information on which to found a more durable arrangement was diligently sought from every source.
In 1789, Lord Cornwallis had matured his plans for the permanent settlement of the land revenues. This he now conceived to be the only measure that could retrieve the country from its present condition, which he described to be wretched in the extreme. "I am sorry (he observes) to be obliged to say, that agriculture and internal commerce have for many years been gradually declining; and that at present, excepting the class of Shroffs and Banyans (bankers and merchants), who reside almost entirely in towns, the inhabitants of these provinces are advancing hastily to a general state of poverty and wretchedness. In this description I must even include every zemindar in the Company's territories; which, though it may have been partly occasioned by their own indolence and extravagance, I am afraid must also be in a great measure attributed to the effects of our former system of management."—"I may safely (says he) assert, that one third of the Company's territory in Hindostan is now a jungle, inhabited only by wild beasts." So thoroughly persuaded was Lord Cornwallis of the necessity of a permanent settlement of the land re-
venues, with a view to the improvement of the country, that the agreement with the landholders, at first made for ten years, was afterwards declared unalterable; and the zemindars of Bengal, Bahar, and Orissa, were formally constituted legal and perpetual proprietors of their respective estates on the payment of a fixed rent to the state. The ten years, or, as it is called, the Decennial settlement, was completed in every district in 1793, and was afterwards extended to the conquered countries.
Along with the decennial settlement Lord Cornwallis also introduced other important reforms in the administration of civil and criminal justice. The union of the duties of tax-gatherer and judge had produced, as might have been expected, the most glaring abuses. The tax-gatherer not only officiated in many cases as his own judge, but where the duties of the two offices happened to interfere, which was often the case, it invariably happened that the one was discharged by the neglect of the other. It was now proposed to separate those incompatible functions, and to establish in each district of the country, and in all the considerable towns, a civil court, in which one of the Company's servants, higher in rank than the collector, should act as judge, to be assisted by a register, and one or more of the junior servants of the Company, and also by a native expounder of Hindu or Mahomedan law. The judge was authorized to refer all cases of inconsiderable importance to his register, from whom they lay an appeal to himself; and for determining suits regarding personal property, not above the value of 50 rupees, courts of native commissioners were established in every district, to decide in a summary manner. From this inferior court of law there lay an appeal to the court of the district, whose decision was final, except in cases of real property, or in the event of the decision of the inferior court being reversed. A new scheme of appellate jurisdiction was also introduced. All causes involving property above the value of 1000 rupees might formerly be appealed to the Governor-General in council. This court, however, was found to be useless to the natives, whose disputes never involved property to such an amount, and who, as the court was established in Calcutta, could not afford the expence of such distant litigation. To remedy this grievance, Lord Cornwallis established four tribunals of appeal; one in the vicinity of Calcutta, and one at Patna, Dacca, and Moorshedabad. In these three the Company's servants were to sit as judges, to be assisted by a register, and one or more of the junior servants of the Company, and by three expounders of native law. To these, which were styled provincial courts, the privilege of appeal was eventually given from all the decisions of the inferior tribunals. To complete these arrangements, a court of supreme jurisdiction was established at Calcutta, composed of the Governor-General, and the members of the superior council, with suitable assistants both English and natives. The former exaction of 25 per cent. by the judge on all litigated property was abolished, as well as the impost on the commencement of the writ, and all fees of court.
Such were the arrangements adopted by Lord Cornwallis for the reformation of the civil judicature
in India. The criminal department he describes as being replete with still more disgraceful corruption. In a letter to the Directors, dated 17th November 1790, he observes, "Your possessions in this country cannot be said to be well governed, nor the lives and property of your subjects to be secure, until the shocking abuses, and the wretched administration, in the criminal department, can be corrected. Anxious as I have been to apply a speedy remedy to evils so disgraceful to government, so ruinous to commerce, and, indeed, destructive to all civil society, it has still appeared to me to be so important as to make it necessary for me to act with great circumspection." For the purposes of criminal judicature, four tribunals were established, in which the judges of appeal in the provincial courts were appointed to act, and were provided with the same assistants, as in the civil courts. They were to make regular circuits through the country, holding a session for jail delivery at the four principal cities of Calcutta, Patna, Dacca, and Moorshedabad, every month; in the district of Calcutta four times; and in the remaining districts of the country twice in the year. The judges in the four courts of appeal were to form two courts of circuit. The inconvenience of devolving both the civil and criminal business on the same judges was soon heavily felt; and, in 1797, after some previous arrangements, which had been found inadequate, two of the judges were specially appointed to the business of the civil appeal court, while only one was left for the business of the circuit. In addition to these arrangements, a criminal tribunal, of supreme jurisdiction, was established at the seat of government, composed in the same manner as the supreme civil court of the Governor-General and members of the Supreme Council.
In regard to the plan for the permanent settlement of the land revenues, which demands our first consideration, it may be remarked, that, in the imposition of a land-tax, the great danger is, not that it be too small, but that it be too large; and this evil ought more especially to have been guarded against in framing an assessment that was to be fixed and invariable. Lord Cornwallis, in calculating that permanent possession, on payment of an invariable tax, would afford a sure encouragement to cultivation, did not sufficiently consider that this altogether depended on the amount of the tax. The invariable rate of a tax is a benefit to a country exactly as it is moderate or otherwise. In the one case, it is satisfactory to know that it cannot be increased; while, on the other hand, the invariable rate of an oppressive tax is a great additional calamity, as it shuts out from the country all hope of relief. Here, then, was one obvious and capital error in the scheme, namely, that a permanent land-tax was imposed without any equitable standard to fix its amount. The legislators of India had not yet acquired the necessary knowledge of the country for such a measure. They had no data on which they could, with any certainty, adjust the tax to the capacity of the soil; and, after long discussions, it was at length fixed at the average amount of the collections for the last three years. But it had been a general complaint, that the country was overtaxed; and to this cause was ascribed its misery and decline.
Indis. From this high standard of taxation, no systematical reduction had ever been made. Arrears, which had been long accumulating, and which could not be recovered, had, indeed, been remitted; but every method of extortion had been practised in order to realize as large a revenue as possible; and the country was now charged with a permanent assessment, founded on the actual revenue of those years. The invariable rate of the tax was, in this case, no benefit to the country; and, in order to receive the advantages supposed by Lord Cornwallis to arise from permanent possession, he should have assured himself of the moderation of the tax imposed. In place of this, it was exorbitant, and greater than the land could bear; and this radical defect, even if there had been no other, would have ensured the failure of the plan. The zemindar, who was bound, in the first instance, for the public tax, depended, for the means of discharging it, on the produce of his rents; and the state, by imposing an immoderate tax on him, laid him under the necessity of practising similar extortion on all below him. The example of the government was a general warrant for extortion, which, once begun, would necessarily descend from the proprietor to the lowest tenant.
There was another important defect in the plan of the decennial settlement, namely, that it seemed to rely entirely on the exertions of the zemindars for the improvement of the country. No attention was given to secure the under-tenants and ryots in the hereditary privileges which they claimed in the soil. As they varied in different places, and depended on different rules, the subject appeared to involve details too troublesome and intricate for European management; and the important task of settling with the ryots was, therefore, devolved on the zemindars, with a mere general recommendation to be guided by the custom of the place, and to give the ryot a written copy of his lease. According to this plan, it was the great proprietors only who had any permanent interest in the lands, while the inferior proprietors and tenantry were at the mercy of the principal landholders, who might exact from them whatever they pleased. The under-tenants and cultivators, in this ill-defined state of their rights, had no interest whatever in the improvement of the soil; being well assured that, however abundant the produce of the soil might prove, they would be left nothing more than a bare maintenance. But it is not agreeable to experience, that the cultivation of any country was ever materially forwarded by the exertions of its great lords. On the contrary, it is their character generally to be inactive, wasteful, and improvident, while the improvement of the land is invariably the work of the cultivators and tenantry, to whom, however, the plan held out no sort of encouragement. Though humanely intended, therefore, it was calculated to entail ruin upon the higher classes of landholders by the tax which it imposed on them; while by necessitating them, and, at the same time, giving them the power, to oppress all below them, in order to satisfy the exorbitant demands of the state, it necessarily had the effect of extending this ruin downwards to the lowest tenant. Its effects have entirely corresponded to this view of its principle.
India. It soon appeared that, in order to realize the revenue, it would be necessary to sell the lands; and this evil once begun continued to increase. The revenue was not punctually paid, and for the recovery of outstanding balances lands to a great amount were at stated times exposed to auction. In the year 1796-7, the lands advertised for sale bore a rent of 2,870,061 sicca rupees (L.332,927), and those actually sold yielded an annual rent of 1,418,756 rupees (L.164,576). In 1797-8, the quantity of land sold bore a rent of 2,274,076 rupees (L.255,833), and it is observed in the Fifth Report, p. 56, that "among the defaulters were some of the oldest and most respectable families of the country;" "the dismemberment of whose estates," the report continues, "at the end of each succeeding year, threatened them with poverty and ruin, and, in some instances, presented difficulties to the revenue officers in their endeavours to preserve undiminished the amount of the public assessment." In order to check those evils, several alterations were made from time to time by Lord Cornwallis. But they appear to have been unavailing, and, in the year 1802, in a report from one of the collectors, we have the following melancholy picture of the state of the country:—"All the zemindars," it is observed, "with whom I ever had any communication, in this and in other districts, have but one sentiment, respecting the rules at present in force for the collection of the public revenue. They all say, that such a harsh and oppressive system was never before resorted to in this country; that the custom of imprisoning landholders for arrears of revenue was, in comparison, mild and indulgent to them; that though it was no doubt the intention of government to confer an important benefit on them, by abolishing this custom, it has been found by melancholy experience, that the system of sales and attachments, which has been substituted for it, has, in the course of a very few years, reduced most of the great zemindars in Bengal to distress and beggary; and produced a greater change in the landed property than has perhaps ever happened, in the same space of time, in any age or country, by the mere effect of internal regulations." (Fifth Report, printed in 1812, p. 60.) In another part of the same document, the collector, after commenting on a regulation then recently introduced, observes, "Before this period (1799), complaints of the inefficacy of the regulations were very general among the zemindars, or the proprietors of large estates; and it required little discernment to see, that they had not the same powers over their tenants which government exercised over them. It was notorious, that many of them had large arrears of rent due to them, which they were utterly unable to recover; while government were selling their lands for arrears of assessment." The collector adds, "Farmers and intermediate tenants were, till lately, able to withhold their rents with impunity, and to set the authority of their landlords at defiance. Landholders had no direct control over them; they could not proceed against them, except through the courts of justice; and the ends of substantial justice were defeated, by delays and cost of suit." To the same purpose, Sir Henry Strachey observes, "That the men
of opulence are now all men of yesterday; that the greatest men formerly were the Musselman rulers, whose places we have now taken, and the Hindoo zemindars. These two classes are now ruined and destroyed." (See Answers to the Interrogatories of Government, dated 30th Jan. 1802.)
One cause which undoubtedly contributed to the ruin of the zemindars, was the want of any effectual method of enforcing their claims against the small tenants. For the purpose of duly collecting the revenue, the public officer was empowered to proceed against defaulters by a summary process,—and to attach and sell, by public auction, the zemindar's land for the discharge of arrears; while against the under-tenants, the zemindar had to seek redress by an ordinary suit at law, which was both tedious and expensive. To heighten this evil, the courts of justice were overloaded with a long arrear of undecided causes, so that no decision could be expected, before the lapse of years. In the district of Burdwan, the undecided suits were said to amount to 30,000, and the probability of a decision in any suit was estimated to exceed the ordinary duration of human life. The zemindar, in this manner, while he was compelled to pay, by the prompt and efficient process of government, was left to seek redress from his tenants through a labyrinth of endless litigation, and the knowledge of this impediment to justice gave great encouragement to the tenants to refuse payment of their rents. The ruin of the zemindar, therefore, was the inevitable consequence of those measures, which levied on him a heavy assessment by the most summary process, while he was restrained from levying on his tenants the means of its discharge. The zemindar was the channel through which the land revenue flowed into the treasury. He paid what he received, reserving a small surplus for himself; but to pay what he did not receive was impossible. The injustice, then, and the folly of the present measures, consisted in the means adopted to make the zemindar pay, while no means were given him of making others pay to him; in establishing a regular drain on the zemindar's treasury, and at the same time in withholding from him the means of insuring an equally constant supply. These regulations were universally complained of, and on the justest grounds. In an address from one of the collectors to the board of revenue, in behalf of the Zemindar of Burdwan, who had in vain applied for redress to the civil courts, it is observed, that he (the zemindar) begs leave to "submit to your consideration, whether or not it can be possible for him to discharge his engagements to government with that punctuality which the regulations require, unless he be armed with powers as prompt to enforce payment from his renters, as government had been pleased to authorize the use of, in regard to its claims, on him; and he seems to think it must have proceeded from an oversight, rather than from any just and avowed principle, that there should have been established two modes of judicial process, under the same government; the one summary, and efficient for the
satisfaction of its own claims; the other tardy and uncertain in regard to the satisfaction of claims due to its subjects; more especially in a case like the present, where ability to discharge the one demand necessarily depends on the other demand being previously realized."
The system which impoverished the zemindars was equally ruinous to the ryots. It was the practice of the zemindar to contract for a certain rent with a land farmer, who subdivided the land into smaller portions, and let it to a variety of inferior tenants. To this head farmer, it appears that a written agreement was given, according to the regulations; but the under-tenants were left, without any security, to the mercy of their superiors. It is well known, and admitted by the servants of the Company, that the ryot, even when he receives written agreements from the zemindar, is liable to indirect oppressions which no law can remedy; and though, owing to the expence and delay in the administration of justice, he could retaliate on the zemindar, by refusing payment of his rents, this privilege could be of little advantage to him, while it tended still farther to widen the breach between the landlord and the tenant, and to add to the hatred, strife, and violent distraction of interests by which the community was now, as it were, torn in pieces. To remedy the grievances which the zemindars suffered from the evasion of payment by their tenants, it was enacted, in 1799, that they might have recourse to the same summary process against defaulters, as was tried by the government against themselves. They were empowered to seize the property of their tenants for arrears, previous to any legal judgment, or any proof of the justice of their claim. This regulation gave to the zemindars the power of unbounded oppression, against which the ryot had no redress, as he was effectually shut out of the courts of justice, by the enormous expences of law proceedings.* It was undoubtedly just that the zemindar should have the same efficient process for enforcing payment as was used against himself; but such was the unhappy condition of India, under the unskilful management of strangers, that every plan of reform seemed only to increase the general disorder. Her rulers wanted intelligence for the delicate task of domestic legislation; their schemes were crude and inapplicable, nor could they ever mould the various and jarring interests of the Indian community into any consistent scheme of civil order; so that, though they were continually patching their imperfect work, it still bore the same incongruous character, and the cure of one evil was constantly followed by an eruption of other and worse evils from some other quarter.
The institutions of Lord Cornwallis, for the administration of civil and criminal justice, appear to have been equally unsuccessful with his finance measures; and it soon appeared, as has been already stated, that the new courts of judicature had more business than they could manage, and such an arrear of undecided cases accumulated, that the course of
* All the collectors invariably bear testimony to the oppressions of the zemindars, after the passing of the regulation of 1799.
India. justice was nearly stopt. In this dilemma, the costs of suit were raised for the purpose of discouraging litigation; and this expedient being found ineffectual, they were raised a second time. To place justice out of the reach of the poorer and more numerous class, by laying a heavy tax on it, was indeed an easy and effectual method of discouraging litigation. It was, in fact, a denial of justice,—a direct refusal to hear the complaints of the poor, who might, therefore, be harassed for ever after with impunity. Notwithstanding this discouragement, however, the evil went on increasing, and at last amounted to an almost total dissolution of civil order. As no decision was to be procured before the regularly constituted tribunal, every man began to arm himself in his own quarrel, and the country thus became the scene of bloody affrays between armed individuals unhappily left without any other resource for the decision of their differences. In some of those conflicts 4000 or 5000 persons were arrayed on each side, and many lives were lost. In a letter of the Court of Directors, dated October 1814, it is observed, "As to affrays respecting the possession and boundaries of lands and rents, this has been long a serious evil, and must, we conceive, have existed in a greater or less degree in every part of the country."—"These affrays," continue the Directors, "which often lead to homicides and woundings, have been very naturally ascribed by several of the judges to the difficulty of obtaining judicial redress."* In the district of Tirhoot, where the public peace had been frequently disturbed by those private feuds, the judge, for the division of Patna, observes, that they chiefly "arose from the accumulated arrears of suits," and "that the parties finding a delay in obtaining redress, had resorted to force."† Mr Melville, also a judge in the division of Dacca, expresses himself to the same purpose. "With respect to affrays (he observes) attended with homicides and wounding, it is known that those disorders arose from attempts to retain by force possession of lands, or rents of lands, to which the different parties alleged separate claims." The same person afterwards states, that "in Chittagong, they (meaning these quarrels) had not only been frequent, but violent; that the police authority had been often resisted, and in one instance overpowered; that it would be wrong to disguise the length of time a claimant must wait, with the sacrifices he must make, before the decision of a civil court can be obtained."
We shall now briefly advert to the system of penal judicature and police established by Lord Cornwallis; the object, in this case, being to give security to the people by the suppression of crimes. With reference to this object, however, the scheme has notoriously failed. Since the year 1793, India has become a prey to disorders of every sort, and to the worst of crimes. Violence and depravity seem to have overspread the land, and to have produced an almost universal dissolution of morals among the people. The crime of robbery, accompanied
with murder, had risen to a most alarming height in India, and was prosecuted with a degree of union, perseverance, and cruelty, inconceivable to those who live in the civilized communities of Europe. Robbery is a regular profession, which is handed down from father to son; and the decoits, or gang-robbers, are formed, as the title implies, into powerful confederacies, and make their irruptions on the peaceful country with a force which it is vain to resist. They are described by Mr Hastings as "a race of outlaws, who live from father to son in a state of warfare against society, plundering and burning villages, and murdering the inhabitants." In the year 1772, the robbers are mentioned by the Committee of Circuit, and stated to be "not like robbers in England, individuals driven to such courses by sudden want; they are robbers by profession, and even by birth; they are formed into regular communities, and their families subsist by the spoils which they bring home to them."
India All the reports of the judges employed in the administration of criminal justice concur in representing the deplorable prevalence of the atrocious crimes of gang-robbery and murder. Sir Henry Strachey, writing on this subject in 1802, observes, that the crime of decoity (that is, robbery by gangs) has increased greatly since the British administration of justice. Another judge, writing on the same subject in 1808, observes, "That decoity (gang-robbery) is very prevalent in Rajeshahye has been often stated. But if its vast extent were known: if the scenes of horror, the murders, the burnings, the excessive cruelties, which are continually perpetrated here, were properly represented to government, I am confident that some measures would be adopted to remedy the evil. Certainly, there is not an individual belonging to the government, who does not anxiously wish to save the people from robbery and massacre." (Mill, Vol. III. p. 311.) He afterwards adds, that such is the state of things which prevails all over Bengal, and as to his own particular district, he expresses his persuasion that no civilized country ever had so bad a police. To the same purpose, Mr Dowdeswell, the secretary to the government in 1809, observes, in a Report which he drew up on the general state of Bengal, "Were I to enumerate only a thousandth part of the atrocities of the decoits, and of the consequent sufferings of the people; and were I to soften that recital in every mode which language would permit, I should still despair of obtaining credit, solely on my own authority, for the accuracy of the narrative." "Robbery, rape, and even murder itself (he continues), are not the worst figures, in this horrid and disgusting picture. An expedient of common occurrence with the decoits, merely to induce a confession of property, supposed to be concealed, is, to burn the proprietor with straw or torches, until he discloses the property, or perishes in the flames. And when they are actuated by a spirit of revenge against individuals, worse cruelties, if worse can be, are perpetrated by these remorseless criminals. If the informa-
* See Papers relating to the Police and Administration of Justice in Bengal, from 1810 to the present time. Printed, by order of the House of Commons, 1819, p. 21.
† Ibid. p. 22.
tion obtained is not extremely erroneous, the offender, hereafter noticed, himself committed fifteen murders in nineteen days: And volumes might be filled with the atrocities of the decoits, every line of which would make the blood run cold with horror." (Fifth Report, p. 603.)
It would far exceed our limits to trace in detail the cause of these evils, which necessarily arose out of the very nature of the government now established. The truth is, the British were never qualified to act as legislators in India. They were too ignorant of the habits, manners, and character, of the people to meddle with their institutions, on which, however, they were continually innovating. By altering the old mode of settling the land revenues, they compromised the rights of the different classes of landholders and occupiers. Strife and contention immediately ensued,—litigation burst upon society like a flood,—the civil courts were overwhelmed with suits which they could not decide, and the people, desperate from a denial of justice, were involved in furious affrays with each other in prosecution of their rights, or, being driven from their lands, they had recourse to robbery for a subsistence. Business was thus, from various sources, accumulated in the criminal courts, which being encumbered with the delay, the expence, and all the tedious formalities of the English practice, proceeded with their decisions at much too slow a pace for the wants of the country; and the evil in this manner daily increased. The mischief of this delay was twofold: 1st, It allowed criminals, during the long interval between their apprehension and trial, to prepare the certain means of their escape, by the suborning of false witnesses, who, in the gross dissolution of morals which now prevailed, were always to be readily procured, and in any number; and, 2dly, It entailed a grievous hardship on the innocent, great numbers of whom were crowded into jails with the worst of felons, there to wait until the tardy hand of justice should bring them relief.
The inefficient state into which the police had fallen was also one cause of the general prevalence of crimes. By the ancient institutions of the Mogul government, ample means were provided for the preservation of the public peace. In every village a permanent body of guards and watchmen was maintained, whose business it was to assist in all the subordinate details both of the revenue and police—to convey the rents of the ryot to the district collector—to watch those ryots who were in arrear—to guard their crops from depredation—to act as guides and protectors to travellers—to collect information of any offences committed—and to report the arrival in the village of suspicious persons. For these various services they had grants of land rent-free, or on very easy terms. Besides this standing force of guards and village watchmen, the zemindar, who was at the head of the police, and was held responsible for all crimes committed within his boundaries, had under his orders a large body of pykes or armed constables, whom he could call out in aid of the police service, either for the apprehension of offenders, or to prevent breaches of the peace. These establishments, though they had fallen into a state of disrepair at the time of the permanent settlement in 1793, and though they were frequently perverted from their
original purposes, yet existed in all parts of the country, and the police force was found to be in great efficiency and strength. The zemindary of Burdwan, a tract of country 73 miles long by 45 broad, which was in the highest state of cultivation, and well stocked with inhabitants, maintained a body of 2400 village watchmen, who were distributed under their respective chiefs among the different villages, for the double purpose of protecting the inhabitants, and of procuring information; besides 19,000 pykes or armed constables, who were liable to be called out, under the orders of the zemindar, in aid of the police. In place of improving upon those ancient establishments which had taken root in the country, which were interwoven with the frame and texture of Indian society, and which were, generally speaking, efficient, though frequently perverted from their original purposes, Lord Cornwallis demolished the whole structure. According to his new scheme of police, the zemindary constables were disbanded, and their lands, which were allowed them in lieu of pay, were resumed, i. e. were seized by government. The country was divided into districts of 20 miles square, over which a native police officer, or darogah, was placed, with 15 or 20 armed men under his orders; he was assisted also by the village watchmen, and such of the zemindary constables as were still retained in the public service. It was soon found, however, that the new police officers could not effectually call out this array in aid of the civil power. They wanted the personal consideration of the zemindars, who had been long looked up to with respect and reverence as the hereditary aristocracy of the country. The system proved, therefore, eminently inefficient, nor were the officers employed under the new plan found to be less corrupt than the disbanded constables of the zemindars. The merits of the plan appear to be pretty fairly estimated in the Fifth Report, p. 71, in which it is observed, that the head police officers, and "the inferior officers acting under them, with as much inclination to do evil, have less ability to do good, than the zemindary servants employed before them." How vain was it to imagine, that any better materials could be found for the regulation and government of the country than those which the country itself afforded! To complain of them was to complain of the general state of society out of which they were produced; and to throw them away, because they are corrupt or otherwise imperfect, evinces an ignorance of the Legislator's province, which is not to create materials, but to make the best use of those which are provided to his hand. Herein, then, consisted the error of the British Legislators. They cast from them the only efficient instruments which were to be found for the government of the Indian community, while they had nothing to substitute in their place; and their plans, when tried in practice, were accordingly found to be idle theories, at variance with the whole frame and order of the society for whose use they were intended.
The pernicious consequences of thus rashly subverting the ancient establishments of the country were soon displayed in the alarming increase of crimes. The disbanded zemindary constables, whose lands were seized, were deprived of the means of
India. living, and they necessarily betook themselves to theft and rapine for a subsistence. The country became infested with gangs of robbers and murderers, whose horrid cruelties struck terror into the peaceable inhabitants, while lesser crimes also became more frequent. The police was inadequate to the detection of offenders; the courts of justice to their conviction; and, among other evils, a host of false witnesses now arose, amid the general corruption of morals, who swore in the teeth of each other, perplexing all judicial proceedings, and confounding the innocent with the guilty. For remedy of these complicated evils, various expedients were resorted to. Among others, a feeble attempt was made to revive the ancient powers which the zemindars had over the police; but this was attended with so little success that it was abandoned in 1810. In 1808 a superintendent of police was appointed, with a view of concentrating, as was stated, in his office, all the information which might be obtained from different quarters, and of giving unity and vigour to the measures adopted for the apprehension of offenders; and as a last resource, a regular establishment of police spies, called goyendas, was organized, and placed under a species of superintendents, called girdwars, the office of the first being to point out the robbers, that of the latter to apprehend them. Notwithstanding all these measures, crimes of every description appear to have gone on increasing, and, in a minute of Lord Minto, dated November 1810, it is observed, "That a monstrous and disorganized state of society existed under the eye of the supreme British authorities, and almost at the very seat of that government to which the country might justly look for safety and protection; that the mischief could not wait for a slow remedy; that the people were perishing almost in our sight; that every week's delay was a doom of slaughter and torture against the defenceless inhabitants of very populous countries." The Directors, in whose letter of the 28th October 1814 this passage appears, confirm the truth of the statement by the following brief observation:—"That this representation of the late Governor-General is not too highly coloured, would appear from the minute of Mr Lumsden, and the reports of Mr Secretary Dowdeswell, forming also part of the proceedings in regard to Mr Ernst."
The new scheme of organizing a body of professed spies in the service of the public, while, in some cases, it was of public benefit, was, in other respects, highly detrimental to the peace of the community. Those spies, and more especially their superintendents (girdwars), became, in many cases, the pests of society. They took advantage of the power which they possessed of apprehending suspected persons, to extort money from them; and frequently, under threats of immediate apprehension, they laid under contribution all classes indiscriminately. It is stated, in a letter of the Directors, dated October 1814, on the authority of Mr Dick, a circuit judge, that "whole
villages are put under contribution, or subjected to the rapacity and spiteful machinations of the vilest members of society."† In some cases, the innocent were brought to trial, and convicted, on suborned evidence, procured by these wretches.
India. Among the other causes of these evils may be enumerated the incapacity of Europeans to officiate as judges in a society so peculiarly constituted as that of India, with the usages and manners of which, as well as with the general character of the people, they remain to this day in a great measure unacquainted. This is a fact which is deeply regretted by all the most experienced servants of the Company, from Sir John Shore downwards. Europeans are sent out to India with the sole view of amassing a fortune. They have no interest in the country from which they draw such important benefits. They know nothing of its habits and manners—never mixing with the natives in their ordinary business or amusements—and never attaining to more than a theoretical knowledge of their characters. With such qualifications, they begin to officiate as judges, how miserably ill-appointed for such an office their own experience quickly teaches them. They soon find the difficulty of appreciating or understanding even the most ordinary transactions of a society, with the rules and principles of which they are entirely unacquainted. What is intelligible by intuition to a native is a mystery to them; and it is easy to conceive how these difficulties must be accumulated on them in any long process of criminal judicature, involving a train of circumstantial, and frequently of contradictory evidence. It is not, as every one knows, on the mere naked testimony of a witness that a judge entirely relies; it is the tone, the manner, the living evidence of expression and character, which impresses upon testimony the stamp of truth; which carries conviction to the mind; and saves a judge from the miserable dilemma of being blown about by every wind of opposite evidence. These discriminations are, however, far too nice for a European judge in an Indian court, and he frequently knows not what to believe. He cannot, by any judicious cross-examination, extort the truth from contradictory witnesses. In any train of questions involving the peculiar usages of the country, his stock of knowledge is soon exhausted. A story which hangs together in all its main circumstances, may yet be inconsistent in some of its minute and delicate points. But a European can never detect inconsistencies which are wrapt up in the veil of local manners. He lies, in this manner, at the mercy of every perjured witness who chooses to practise upon his ignorance. The truth of this statement is illustrated and confirmed by the concurring reports of many of those who have acted in this trying situation. Sir Henry Strachey, whose reports to the supreme government abound in most just, enlightened, and comprehensive views of Indian society and manners, observes, that "nothing is more common,
* See Papers relating to the Police and to the Administration of Civil and Criminal Justice in Bengal, Fort George, &c. from 1810 to the present time, printed in 1819, p. 24.
† Papers printed by order of the House of Commons, 1819.
even after a minute and laborious examination of evidence on both sides, than for the judge to be left in utter doubt, respecting the points at issue. This proceeds chiefly from our very imperfect connection with the natives, and our scanty knowledge, after all our study, of their manners, customs, and languages. Within these few years, too, the natives have attained a sort of legal knowledge, as it is called, that is to say, a skill in the arts of collusion, intrigue, perjury, and subornation, which enables them to perplex and baffle us, with infinite facility."—"We perhaps judge too much by rule—we imagine things to be incredible, because they have not before fallen within our experience. We make not sufficient allowance for the loose, vague, and inaccurate mode in which the natives tell a story,—for their not comprehending us, and our not comprehending them. We hurry, terrify, and confound them, with our eagerness and impatience."—"We cannot (says the same discriminating observer) study the genius of the people in its own sphere of action. We know little of their domestic life, their knowledge, conversation, amusements, their trades and casts, or any of those national and individual characteristics, which are essential to a complete knowledge of them. Every day affords us examples of something new and surprising; and we have no principle to guide us, in the investigation of facts, except an extreme diffidence of our opinion, a consciousness of inability to judge of what is probable or improbable."—"The evil I complain of is extensive, and, I fear, irreparable. The difficulty we experience in discerning truth and falsehood among the natives, may be ascribed, I think, chiefly to our want of connection and intercourse with them; to the peculiarity of their manners and habits, their excessive ignorance of our characters, and our almost equal ignorance of theirs." The following passage, from the same document, gives a striking view of the inefficiency of European judges. "The evidence on every trial convinces us, that innumerable robberies and murders, that atrocities of the worst conceivable kind, are committed; and that very often the perpetrators are before us; yet do we find ourselves, from causes of the nature above described, constrained to let them loose again, to prey on society; or, at the utmost, to direct that they be discharged, on giving security for their good behaviour."—"The judge of circuit is from day to day engaged in trying large gangs for robbery and murder, and letting them go; and the country continues to be overrun with them, to a degree truly deplorable." (Answers to Interrogatories of Government, 30th January 1802. Fifth Report)
It is well known that, according to the rules of the Company's government, no European is allowed to acquire landed property in India, and that all colonization of the country is studiously discouraged. The European rulers of India could not possibly pursue a more weak and pernicious policy, by which all the other errors of their administration are aggravated; which marks their own jealousy of their subjects, and evinces a disposition to hold possession of the country by any means, however exceptionable. The effect of the Company's government
in India, as appears from the preceding review of its measures, has been to destroy the hereditary aristocracy of the country. All the great families have disappeared, under the rigid exactions of revenue to which they were exposed; their estates have been sold, and they are confounded among the mass of the people. The extinction of this important order of men, and the want of that natural influence which they possessed, is severely felt in every branch of the public management. The business of the revenue, the magistracy, and police, have, as has been shown, fallen into a state of almost irreparable disorder; and these evils are, by all the most experienced servants of the Company, and by the Directors at home, ascribed to the degradation and ruin of the ancient gentry and landholders, who had great authority and respect among the people, and who were universally looked up to as the guardians of civil order. On this subject, Mr Stuart, judge in the Benares division, in a Report to Government, reasons with great force and clearness, and observes, that the extinction of the aristocracy "may be traced throughout the country as one principal source of the disorders which prevail." (Fifth Report, p. 374.) The great problem, therefore, in the government of India, is to devise the means of re-establishing, in the country, a body of resident gentry, qualified to undertake the management of its internal affairs; and for this purpose no policy seems so effectual as the encouragement of European settlers. If this policy were adopted,—if Englishmen were allowed to acquire land, and taught to consider India as their home, they or their descendants would gradually become naturalised to the climate,—they would be compelled to mix with the natives in their ordinary transactions, and the succeeding generation familiar with the language, manners, and character of the natives, might be qualified for the important duties which are now so inadequately discharged. At present the government of India is composed of a small body of foreigners, who have no interest in the welfare of the country, and who only visit it for the purpose of engrossing, from their rightful owners, every post of honour or profit. It is a strange, anomalous, and insolent domination of the few over the many; it has no tie of sympathy to connect it with the people; it draws no support from the natural feelings and affections of mankind, but derives its strength mainly from the knowledge of its power. It is a singular spectacle to see a whole people, through the agency of foreigners, excluded from all honourable competition for public rewards. A proscription so universal must produce the most unfavourable effects on the national character. By narrowing the sphere of ambition, we diminish the incentives to active exertion—we take away from mankind the motives which prompt them to cultivate their faculties—we weaken the animating principle of all improvement—we relax the moral tone of society, and thus pave the way for the progress of vice and disorder. All accounts accordingly agree that the state of morals in Hindostan has not been improved under the rule of the English. "The decline of morality," says Lord Moira, in his judicial minute, dated 2d October 1815, "is stated to be a subject of reproach against us by all the natives whom birth or education have inspired
India. with concern for the good order or well-being of society." This is imputed to the decay of religious endowments and public seminaries; and to the decline, also, of those moral sanctions connected with custom, religion, and prejudice, which have been gradually relaxed under the ascendancy of the British law. But the monopoly of power, emolument, and honour, in the hands of a few, by constituting the majority a degraded class, must have also had its share in producing those unfavourable effects on the character of the people. Mr Stuart, (already alluded to, whose Reports on the state of India abound in the most masterly views of the state of property and manners,) expresses this opinion in the strongest terms: "As we proceed (he observes), these provinces will soon present the singular spectacle of a great empire, the government of which rigidly excludes its subjects from every object of fair ambition, which, in the pursuit, could stimulate men to cultivate their faculties, or, in the possession, enlarge their understandings and elevate their minds. The natives may accumulate wealth as merchants; they may be proprietors of land; but these occupations, as they are managed in this country, have no great tendency to raise the character. Beyond them, with the rarest exceptions, there is nothing to which the people can aspire, higher than the command of a platoon of seapoyes, or the possession of some petty civil office, insignificant in its functions, and paid with a salary hardly adequate to a bare subsistence. My speculations may have perhaps misled me, but I am persuaded that very unfavourable effects from these causes, may already be traced, in the habits of our native subjects; and their long continuance must, I think, infallibly end in reducing the whole population to one ignorant, groveling, litigious, and profligate herd."
The Directors of the Company in Europe, as soon as they were informed of these vices and disorders in their Indian government, displayed the most praiseworthy zeal in their endeavours to remove them. Far from blaming the freedom with which they were exposed, or seeking, by palliations, to evade the truth, they listened to the representations of their servants; and, in many cases, followed their judicious and enlightened suggestions. One of their first cares was to re-establish the vigour and efficiency of the police. It was soon found that the system established in 1793, not being connected in any degree with the institutions or local manners of the country, was ill adapted to its end; and that the subversion of the ancient establishments, on the ruin of which it was founded, had been attended with the worst effects, and had paved the way for all the disorders and evils with which the country had been afflicted. To restore the ancient institutions of the country is now, therefore, the policy of the government; and, for this purpose, they are endeavouring to revive, for the public service, the ancient array of village watchmen and zemindary constables, formerly disbanded. In many cases, their efforts have been attended with success. A new energy has been infused into the police; and this, joined to the activity of the local magistrates, has had the effect of diminishing the crime of gang-robbery; though, in some districts, this crime still prevails, and conti-
India. nues to spread dismay through the peaceful country. It does not appear that there has been any decrease of other offences, or that the morals of the people have been in any degree improved. This desirable effect, indeed, if it takes place, must be the work of time; and a long period must elapse before, even under the best institutions, the effect of former errors can be done away. For the improvement of the people, the village schoolmasters have been everywhere encouraged; and, for the same laudable purpose, other seminaries are about to be instituted. The civil courts, according to recent accounts, still continue to be overloaded with an arrear of undecided causes. To remedy this defect, assistant judges have been appointed; and it has been proposed to have recourse to the effectual assistance of the natives in the judicial business of the country. Those judicious arrangements, aided by the zeal of the Directors at home, and by the great ability employed in the local government, may certainly check those alarming disorders by which the country has been distracted. But the evils which afflict the Indian community have continued too long, and are now too deeply rooted, to be easily removed.
From the year 1805, when a general peace was established by Lord Cornwallis, to the year 1813, when Marquis Hastings assumed the government, the political relations of the Company with the native powers had undergone little alteration. The tranquillity which prevailed was, however, more apparent than real; and it was scarcely to be supposed, indeed, that the widely extending domination of a foreign power could long continue to be viewed without jealousy by the native princes of India. Such of them, accordingly, as retained any sense of national honour, were naturally hostile to the British, and were well disposed to unite against them as the common enemies of Indian independence. In 1814 the war with the Nepalese commenced, and in the outset the reverses sustained by the British in their attempts to penetrate into the hill country, strongly excited the hopes of the native princes. In the following year, the valour and military talents of Sir D. Ochterlony brought that war to a brilliant close; and the bravery and discipline displayed by the troops in the course of the campaign, renewed among the Indian princes the former impression of their invincible superiority. Whatever might be their ulterior views, therefore, they were compelled for the present to temporize, and to soothe their conquerors by an outward show of humility and peace.
A more favourable opportunity, as they conceived, soon occurred for successful resistance to the British power. From the constant wars and commotions in which India had from time immemorial been involved, it happened that a great proportion of the native population were trained to habits of disorder and military licence. At the general settlement concluded in 1805, it was naturally supposed that these bands of adventurers, having no longer any scope for their predatory enterprises, would betake themselves to pacific pursuits, and would thus be gradually dissolved among the mass of the people. It happened otherwise. Those hordes of freebooters, known under the general denomination of Pindarees in-
proved both in strength and union, and Scindia and Holkar, in whose neighbourhood they were settled, if they did not openly abet them, made no active efforts for their suppression. The nature of their force may be shortly described. It consists of a species of light cavalry, which was formerly attached to the native armies, in the same manner, and for the same purpose, as the Cossacks are to the armies of Russia. Their horses were trained to long marches and hard fare, it being their object to plunder the country, and to elude pursuit by the celerity of their movements. They were generally armed with a bamboo spear, from 12 or 18 feet long; every fifteenth man carried a matchlock; about 400 out of every 1000 were well mounted; of the remaining 600, 400 were indifferently mounted, and the rest were slaves, attendants, and camp-followers, mounted on wild ponies, and keeping up with the corps as they best could. About the year 1814, these predatory bands comprised about 40,000 horse, who followed plunder as their mode of subsistence, and were indeed a more formidable species of gang-robbers; but, like other robbers and murderers on a great scale, they assumed all the form and pomp of military array. The strength and numbers of this disorderly mass were daily increasing by deserters from Holkar's irregular bands, and from the loose cavalry establishments of Scindia and others, where they were retained by no tie but that of present advantage, and where their pay was always in arrear. The central situation of the Pindarees, at an equal distance from the three presidencies, rendered their hostility still more formidable, and enforced on the British the necessity of maintaining an extensive line of defence, which was always, however, penetrated by those flying hordes, and the territories of our allies exposed, in consequence, to annual devastations. In 1808-9, and in 1812, they carried their incursions into the British territories, and returned loaded with spoil. The fame of these successful exploits recruited their bands, and enabled them to extend their ravages. In October 1815, a force of 8000 Pindarees crossed the Nerbuddah, in a northwest direction, and, dividing into two parties, they penetrated to the Kishna, though they were watched, and one party was surprised by a body of infantry and cavalry, which did them, however, little damage. They were only deterred from crossing into the Madras presidency by the swollen state of the river, along the fertile and populous banks of which they took their course, plundering as they went along, and committing every kind of enormity. In their return along the line of the Godavery and the Wurda, they passed the British positions, making good their retreat with an immense booty, and with utter impunity. A second expedition was soon planned, which, crossing the Nerbuddah, appeared on the western frontier of the district of Masulipatam, under the Madras presidency, on the 10th of March 1816. Next day they made a march of thirty-eight miles southward, plundering ninety-two vil-
ages, with every circumstance of unheard of cruelty, and, on the 12th, they marched thirty-eight miles, plundering fifty-four villages. By the 17th May they had nearly all recrossed the Nerbuddah, loaded with spoil, and with scarcely any loss. During the twelve days that they had remained within the Company's territories, it was ascertained that 182 persons had been put to a cruel death, 505 were found severely wounded, and 3603 had been put to different kinds of torture.*
It now became necessary to adopt efficient means for protecting the country against these destructive visitations. For this purpose, a defensive line of posts was extended along the Nerbuddah, and across the country for about 150 miles. This was, as usual, soon penetrated by the activity of the enemy, and various expeditions advanced southward for the purpose of plunder. By the singular activity of the different corps, and by a train also of fortunate accidents, almost all of these expeditions were intercepted, broken, and discomfited, so that very few of the plunderers made good their retreat. It was resolved, however, in the year 1817, to commence offensive operations—to attack the enemy in their native haunts, and either to exterminate them, or to drive them from the advantageous position which they occupied, in the very centre of India. The season of inaction was accordingly spent in making preparations for a great military effort; and, by the end of the rainy season of 1817, a numerous and well-appointed army was ready for the field. The plan of the campaign was, that the armies of the different presidencies should advance southward, and gradually converging to a common centre, hem in, on every side, the devoted territory of the freebooters.
But, while this plan was in progress, it was interrupted, and part of the troops engaged in executing it were suddenly recalled, by the unexpected hostility of the native powers. Bajee Rao, the Peshwa or Prince of Poona, who had long been impatient of the British yoke, availed himself of this opportunity to make a fresh attempt at independence. With a view of more vigorously prosecuting the war against the Pindarees, all the troops had moved southward, with the exception of a brigade which had been left at Poona; and it was to overpower this small body of troops that the Peshwa's first efforts were directed. They were completely unsuccessful, however; he was repulsed at all points, by the steadiness of the Company's troops. This action took place on the 5th November. On the 13th, the British were joined by General Smith's division, which had advanced on the Godavery, on an understanding that, if he did not hear daily from the resident at Poona, he should countermarch to that place. It was resolved to attack the enemy's camp next day, but it was found deserted. General Smith immediately commenced an unremitting pursuit of the Peshwa, who was hunted from place to place by the different corps of the British army, until he at length deemed prudent to surrender. He was deposed from
* Narrative of the Political and Military Transactions of British India under the Administration of the Marquis of Hastings. By Henry T. Prinsep, Chap. i. and v.
his throne—a residence in a particular city was fixed upon for him; and a pension of about L. 100,000 per annum assigned him for his support. His dominions were, of course, taken under the administration of the British.
The Rajah of Nagpoor, Appa Saheb, who was held in the same thralldom by the British, pursued a similar course, and with the same results. On the 26th November, at sunset, he attacked, with a great superiority of force, the brigade left at the residency, which was, in consequence, in great peril. A doubtful contest was maintained through the night, and next day the attack on the British was renewed with fresh vigour. Under every disadvantage, however, these attacks were finally repulsed, and the weak prince, Appa Saheb, taking fright, sent to ask forgiveness from his enemies. The conditions offered him were, that his territories should be placed at the mercy of the British government—that he should give up all his artillery; disband his troops, and come in person as a hostage into the British camp; on an understanding, however, that if he acceded to these terms, the former relations between him and the British would be restored; it being at the same time understood, that he should cede part of his territory, and that due provision should be made for a greater degree of internal control over his future movements. Being threatened with an immediate attack, he came to the British camp with a few attendants. His troops, however, as if to shame their pusillanimous prince, fought an unsuccessful battle for his rights and independence; after which, the city of Nagpoor, with its fort, was surrendered to the conquerors, and this second war brought to a triumphant close. Appa Saheb, afterwards repenting of his spiritless conduct, began to plot new schemes; when he was arrested by the British resident, and detained in close confinement. He found means to escape in the summer of the following year, and making good his retreat to the hills, where, being joined by a band of irregular followers, he continued to give disturbance up to the latest accounts.
It had been the professed intention of the Anglo-Indian government, according to its usual arbitrary mode of treating the native powers, to force the two independent chiefs, Scindia and Holkar, into an acquiescence with its views in regard to the Pindarees, and also the Patans, a species of infantry, better appointed, and more regularly disciplined, than the Pindarees, but associated together on the same unlawful principle of indiscriminate plunder. Scindia had been compelled to temporize, and finally to accede to the British propositions; Holkar, feeling strongly the disgrace of yielding to foreign threats, resolved to try the fortune of war. A battle took place on the 21st December, in which he was totally defeated, with the loss of his camp and all his artillery. He sought peace, which was granted him; but he was compelled to accept of British protection and alliance, which has always been accounted the last dishonour of an Indian prince.
The main object of the war, which was the destruction of the Pindarees, was not, in any material degree, impeded by those incidental contests. According to the plan proposed, the different divisions of the grand army proceeded southward, converging
as they advanced for the purpose of surrounding their haunts, and preventing their escape. They were driven out of the province of Malwa, retiring as the British advanced, but were at length so effectually hemmed in, that, in attempting to retreat, they were intercepted at all points, and the greater part of them destroyed. The remainder were so humbled by fatigue and misery, that they were glad to submit on any terms, and at length the three chief leaders surrendered on condition that their lives should be spared.
It will now be proper briefly to revert to the General Review of the commercial character of the East India Company, and to inquire what has been the general result of its transactions, considered merely with a view to profit and loss. So long as the attention of the Company was confined merely to trade, the annual dividend which, from the year 1708 to 1766, varied from 5 to 10 per cent. may be taken as a tolerably fair criterion of the profit gained. The acquisition, in 1765, of the sovereignty and revenues of Bengal gave rise among the proprietors to the most extravagant anticipations of wealth, and, on the faith of these, the dividend, as already mentioned, was raised to 10 and afterwards to 12 per cent. These expectations proving fallacious, it was, in 1773, lowered to 6 per cent. It was afterwards raised to 8, and, in 1793, to 10½ per cent. Ever since the acquisition of the sovereignty of Bengal, it was not so much from trade as from revenue that the Company's profits were expected to arise. It was by the remittance of a large surplus revenue from India, that the proprietors hoped to be enriched. These hopes, however, have never been fulfilled. A large and increasing revenue has been indeed collected; but it has been invariably followed by an increase of charge; and the debt in India, which began in 1769, has been gradually increased to the enormous sum of L. 34,775,792, its amount in April 1818.
The constant increase of the charge is a standing subject of complaint in the correspondence of the Directors with their servants in India, whom they frequently accuse of the grossest profusion and corruption; reproaching them with the enormous expense of their establishment, and urging them, in the most earnest manner, to retrenchments and economy; while the servants, on the other hand, always hold out the fairest promises of their future management, and flattering statements of revenue to be regularly overtaken by the increasing charges of the succeeding year.
When Lord Clive was sent out to India in 1765, it was for the purpose of securing the Company's revenue from the profusion and mismanagement of corrupt servants, against whom the clamour in this country was loud and general. No amendment, however, took place, and the Directors continued their complaints. During the ten years administration of Mr Hastings, which commenced in 1772 and ended in 1783, the Company were deeply involved in the wars and politics of India, the effect of which, on the finances, appears to have been to increase both the revenue and the charge, and in the same proportion to accumulate debt. In 1772 the revenues of Bengal, Bahar, and Orissa, amounted to L. 2,973,650, the charges to L. 1,705,279; produ-
India. cing a surplus of L. 668,371. The India debt amounted to L. 1,850,166. In 1785 the revenues of Bengal, Bahar, and Orissa, including the new revenue of Benares, amounted to L. 5,315,197; the charges to L. 4,312,519; thus producing a surplus of L. 1,002,678; to counterbalance which, however, the debt in India was increased to L. 10,464,955. With the management of their affairs in India, the Directors never seem to have been satisfied; for we find them about this period complaining that certain late revenue regulations were made, "rather with a view of creating lucrative posts for a certain description of men, than with any design either of increasing the revenue, or of promoting commerce." In the same strain we find them complaining in a letter to Lord Cornwallis of a disposition in their servants to "innovation and experiment, without urgent necessity, or apparent cause, new institutions, and almost instant deviations from them, multiplication of offices, and increase of salaries." These, they continue, "are always introduced with flattering schemes of increase to the revenue and diminution of expence, which has hardly, in any instance, been realized by the event." In consequence of this constant increase of expence, though the Company's revenues were increased, the surplus revenue was diminished. In the same letter, the Directors state, that it was one million less than in 1766, when the Bengal revenues were acquired.
In 1793 the revenues amounted to L. 8,225,628; the expence to L. 7,007,050, thus yielding a surplus of L. 1,218,578; and the debt was reduced to L. 7,971,665. This state of the Company's affairs became the subject of the most extravagant declamations both in Parliament and elsewhere. The old delusion of Indian wealth, nearly as absurd as the South Sea bubble, was successfully revived; annual remittances of treasure were confidently expected and confidently promised; and the expected surplus was most gravely appropriated by acts of Parliament to its appointed ends. Mr Dundas was the principal actor in this solemn farce, in which, being probably credulous himself, he imposed on the credulity of others, boasting that India would be a vast source of wealth to the Company, and to the nation. These predictions were soon falsified by the event. The surplus of Indian revenue, for the appropriation of which so many wise provisions were passed, soon vanished, and in 1797, a deficiency appeared which continued till 1810. The revenues had, in the meantime, increased from L. 8,225,628, their amount, in 1797, to about 15½ millions Sterling; but, in place of any surplus being remitted from India to Europe, there appears a balance against India, from 1797 to 1807, to the amount of L. 1,629,701; and it appears, that, during this period, there was sent from England to India, more than was received, a sum of L. 5,691,689. This was the sum, therefore, which England lost during those ten years, by its connection with India. From another account also, it appears that, from 1793 to 1816, England remitted of cash to India
L. 8,824,067 more than was received. (See East India Annual Accounts laid before Parliament, p. 19.) India. In 1811, the revenues began again to exceed the charges; and, in the three following years, there was a large surplus of nearly three millions Sterling in each year. In 1816, 1817, 1818, this surplus continued to be above two millions annually; and it is stated by Mr Prinsep, in his narrative of the last Indian war,* that there was actually accumulated in the different treasuries of the Company bullion to the amount of eight millions Sterling. Here, then, was an opportunity for making a large remittance to the Directors in Europe. But of this great accumulation of treasure they received not one shilling. The Indian government was involved in a series of new wars, in the carrying on of which not only was all this wealth expended, but an additional sum of about 4½ millions Sterling was borrowed; so that the Indian debt, which, in 1814, amounted to about 29 millions Sterling, was raised to nearly L. 34,775,792, its amount in April 1818. Mr Prinsep, however, in his interesting account of the administration of Marquis Hastings, still confidently holds out the hope of a surplus revenue; and he finds his expectations, 1st, On a reduction of expence, in consequence of the peace recently concluded; and, 2dly, On a great increase of revenue from the late extension of the Company's territories. It remains to be seen how far these expectations will be fulfilled.
A general view of the Company's affairs discloses similar results. In 1772, after the possession of the Bengal revenues should have produced its full effect, the Company was involved in such difficulties that, on an estimate for three months of the payments falling due, and of the funds for their discharge, there appeared a deficiency of above L. 1,200,000. At this time the Company was assisted with a loan of L. 400,000, and afterwards of L. 200,000 from the bank, and with L. 1,400,000 from government. In 1773, from a general account of the Company's affairs, it appeared that their effects and credits in England, set against their debts, produced an unfavourable balance of L. 1,434,424, 19s. 8d. The same account of their effects and credits in India, set against their debts, produced a favourable balance of L. 4,364,993, 10s. 10d. Deducting the one from the other, the remainder, consisting of their whole available property, amounts to L. 2,930,568, 10s. 10d. which is all, therefore, that remained of their original capital, amounting to L. 4,200,000. According to a general account of the concern in 1793, this favourable balance was reduced to L. 1,956,866, less than in 1772 by L. 973,702; and to this we have to add an additional million of capital subscribed in 1789, at 17½ per cent., amounting to L. 1,740,000; thus showing a deterioration of the Company's affairs, from 1772 to 1793, to the amount of L. 2,713,702. In 1810, the same general account showed a balance against the Company of L. 6,025,505; to which the Committee of the House of Commons, appointed at that time to inquire into their affairs, having added the capital stock received
* Mr Prinsep has not told us on what authority this statement rests.
India. in 1793 and 1794, and made several other adjustments, there appeared a balance against the Company of L. 11,062,591, which they had no effects to discharge. In 1813, this unfavourable balance had increased to L. 7,773,493; but in 1815, the Company's affairs were so far improved that it was reduced to L. 2,611,311. Adding the capital received, amounting to L. 7,780,000, the balance against the Company appears, at this period, to be L. 10,391,311.
Renewal of the Company's Charter, and partial opening of the Trade. Although, at each successive renewal of the Company's charter, the mercantile part of the community have remonstrated against the continued monopoly of the Indian trade, it was not till the year 1814 that this trade was in any degree laid open to the merchants of this country. This was effected by the act passed in 1813, which, with the exception of the trade in tea, and the China trade, opened the general commerce of India to the merchants of this country, under certain limitations and restrictions. The Company was as tenacious as ever of their valued monopoly; they gave it up only when they found they could no longer retain it; and they still contrived to narrow, as much as possible, the freedom granted, by unfavourable restrictions. The trade with China, and the important trade in tea, was still continued under a strict monopoly: and, as a security against apprehended dangers to their dominion, from an unrestricted trade, it was provided, that no vessel engaged in the private trade to India should be under 350 tons burden; that no vessel should proceed to any place on the continent of Asia, between the Indus and Malacca, without a special licence from the Directors, regulated by the Board of Control; nor to any place not on the continent of India, within the same limits without a special licence. The effect of these restrictions is greatly unfavourable to the extension of the Indian trade; as they exclude the British merchant from the eastern coast of Africa, from the Red Sea, the Persian Gulf, all the numerous islands scattered in the Indian Ocean, and all other countries eastward of Malacca; with which the Americans and others, who are freed from these restrictions, carry on an extensive and lucrative trade. The rigid monopoly still held by the Company of the Chinese trade and the trade in tea, is severely felt by the British merchant; the effect of it being to exclude him from a most beneficial branch of commerce, engrossed, not by the Company, but by foreigners. The trade between China and Europe, in which tea, the great staple of the one, is exchanged for the manufactured products of the other, is chiefly carried on by the Americans, for whose benefit, therefore, and not for the benefit of the Company, the British adventurer is excluded from this trade. Such further relaxation of the Company's monopoly is, therefore, still anxiously sought for by the merchants of this country, as would allow them to enter into such branches of commerce as are at present entirely engrossed by foreign merchants; and these demands are so just and reasonable, that, on every principle, they ought to be conceded. It is doubtful, however, whether the Company will agree to
soften, in the smallest degree, the harsh provisions of their pernicious monopoly. India.
Under all the restrictions imposed on it, however, and under all the difficulties incident to new undertakings, the private trade to India has increased to such a degree, that the shipping employed in it during the last six years has nearly tripled the amount of the tonnage in the service of the East India Company. The extent of the trade carried on in private vessels has also been gradually increasing, until it now regularly exceeds that of the Company, although the private merchant is still excluded from the trade to China, and from the tea trade. The value of the tea, exclusively imported into Great Britain by the Company, generally exceeds three millions Sterling. During the two years, 1818 and 1819, it amounted in each year to L. 3,062,734, and to L. 3,645,078. Still, however, with little more than L. 200,000 for this article in the list of private imports, the value of the latter exceeded that of the Company's imports in 1818 by L. 4,905,846, and in 1819 by L. 505,115. The following account will show the progressive improvement of the private trade:—*
| Years. | Value of Exports by the Company, year ending January 5, | Free Trade, including Privilege Trade. | Value of Imports by the Company, year ending January 5, | Free Trade, including Privilege Trade. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| L. | L. | L. | L. | |
| 1815, | 1,732,719 | 870,177 | 7,227,663 | 4,061,892 |
| 1816, | 1,753,302 | 1,454,728 | 7,154,130 | 5,769,459 |
| 1817, | 1,539,130 | 1,868,396 | 7,855,312 | 5,703,912 |
| 1818, | 1,313,493 | 2,708,021 | 7,361,802 | 5,097,748 |
| 1819, | 1,250,064 | 3,052,741 | 5,192,804 | 7,098,650 |
| 1820, | 1,358,326 | 1,650,338 | 5,792,405 | 6,297,519 |
This account proves sufficiently what an important advantage would be conferred on Great Britain by setting free the commerce of India from the restraints imposed on it. The use of British manufactures is daily becoming more common, and there is no doubt that if more scope and facilities were afforded to the free trade, it would soon become beneficial and lucrative. And when we consider the commercial embarrassments under which the country has been long labouring, it seems but reasonable that every possible expedient should be adopted for the revival of its depressed commerce, and that, if the grievance of the Company's unjust monopoly cannot be entirely done away, the mischief should still be confined within the narrowest limits possible.
The article BENGAL, in the Encyclopædia, contains an account of that province. The article HINDOOS contains an account of the manners, religion, arts, and learning, of the people of India. The article HINDOSTAN, contains a geographical view of India, and narrates its earlier history; while the history of its more recent wars, and revolutions, down to the conclusion of the Mahratta war, under Marquis Wellesley, is given under the article INDIA. (o.)