respecting property, concerning India landholders, as far as he then knew their securities and condition, and respecting European affairs.

MY DEAR SON,

Beaconsfield, Wednesday, Nov. 1777.

I give you a thousand thanks for the papers you have been so good as to put into my hands. I wished to keep them a little longer, but I husbanded my time as well as I could, and, when my company went to bed, spent the greatest part of the night in reading them. This morning I went through the whole. I don't know that I ever read any state paper drawn with more ability, and, indeed, I have seldom read a paper of any kind with more pleasure.

In general, I perfectly agree with Mr. Francis, that a nice scrutiny into the property and tenures of an whole nation is almost always more alarming to the people than advantageous to Government. It is never undertaken without some suspicion at least of an attempt to impose some new

Mr. Francis is a

burthen upon them. better judge than I can possibly be of the politics which have given rise to such a measure. Upon that subject, therefore, I can form no opinion but what I take from his authority. The idea of forcing every thing to an artificial equality, has something at first view very captivating in it. It has all the appearance imaginable of justice and good order; and very many persons, without any sort of partial purposes, have been led to adopt such schemes, and pursue them with great earnestness and warmth. Though I have no doubt that the minuté, laborious, and very expensive cadastre which was made by the late King of Sardinia has done no sort of good; and that, after all his pains, a few years will restore all things to their first inequality; yet it has been the admiration of all the reforming financiers of Europe; I mean the official financiers as well as the speculative. You know that it is this very rage for equality which has blown up the flames of this present cursed war in America. I am, for one, entirely satisfied

that the inequality which grows out of the nature of things by time, custom, succession, accumulation, permutation, and improvement of property, is much nearer that true equality, which is the foundation of equity and just policy, than any thing that can be contrived by the tricks and devices. of human skill. What does it amount to but that, after some little jumbling, some men have better estates than others. I amn certain, that when the financial system is but tolerably planned, it will catch property in spite of all its doublings, and sooner or later those who have most will pay most; and this is the effective equality, which circumstances will bring about of themselves, if they are left to their own operation.

This paper of Mr. Francis has given me one idea, which, I confess, I had not before (indeed it has given me several), and it is an idea which affords me satisfaction. I find that Mr. Francis thinks that the occupier of the soil, and not the Government, is the true proprietor of the land in Bengal. I

did not understand before, that a sort of custom had given them a preference; but that on the whole Zemindars did not stand on so good a footing as our copyholders in England, or even as the holders of churchleasės. Their custom of annual letting seemed much to favour this notion. I am glad to find I was mistaken; for, whatever the practice may be, I am sure that every thing which favours the stability of property is right, and does much for the

and civilization of any country.

peace, order,

I write with little consideration, and less knowledge of the subject. We make an hundred blunders in a matter so very remote from our situation, and our local circumstances and customs. But if I But if I guess rashly in such things, I do not persevere obstinately in my errors. I am afraid that Mr. Francis begins, by his distance, to make very nearly as mistaken judgments on our affairs here, as we do on his in India. He thinks, alas! that Parliament troubles itself with these matters. We were, indeed, busy enough

.

about them until the East India Company was put into the hands of the Court. Since that time, a most religious silence is kept about those affairs. Government is sure to

throw them immediately out, if any one's forward zeal prompts him to bring them before us. Nothing but the approaching expiration of the agreement with the public can submit it again to our instrumental consideration. Something will then be done. If more can be done for confirming the power of the Crown over the Company, as to its exterior form, like other forms, it will, I fancy, be suffered to continue,

When you write to Mr. Francis, pray put him in mind of me, and thank him for his permission to you to communicate his very valuable paper, of which I neither have made, nor shall make any improper or indiscreet use. I have written to him a letter, which I hope will not be wholly useless, about the first object of my heart, our friend William Burke. You are happy that you have our friend S

under the immediate