Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

rectors be deprived of their patronage or of their political power, in either case the influence which would devolve on the ministers of the crown would be very great. Were the patronage of appointment transferred to the universities, &c., as is proposed, the Directors would require remunerative salaries for the duties they now perform. On the other hand, if the Court of Directors were abolished, a ministerial department would have to be created to supply their place, and a variety of important offices of the state, eagerly coveted by the aristocracy of the land, together with the great establishment of the India House which could not be dispensed with,* would be at the disposal of the crown. If to all this we add the turning over of the Indian army to the king, and the conversion of the Peninsula of Hindostan into a Colonial possession, both of which events are now being discussed before the Select Committee of the House of Commons, we shall have a government at home strong enough at any time to follow the example of Spain

The total expenses of the India House are about £360,000 a year, of which £72,000 is commercial, and the remainder political. While on this subject, I must notice the unfair statement of the Westminster Reviewer as to the India House charges having increased £100,000; to endeavour to eke out which, he has tacked on the pensions to the salaries, and entirely omitted the consideration of the great extent of business which has taken place since 1814 in Indian affairs, and which in every government seems to go hand in hand with civilization and freedom. I recommend the Reviewer's attention to the following parliamentary return :—

TOTAL NUMBER of PERSONS employed by the EAST-INDIA
COMPANY in ENGLAND.

[blocks in formation]

The Secretary's-office at the India House includes fifty-six persons; in 1827, it cost £20,333. The expense of the Examiner's-office is about £21,000; that of the Military Secretary's, £6,000. The expense of the India Board is about £30,000 a year.

and Portugal, when their respective monarchs were sovereigns in Asia and America !*

I will not dwell longer on the foregoing circumstances, notwithstanding their incalculable importance to India as well as to England, because every intelligent person who marks the progress of passing events, will I think perceive, in the preceding sketch of the Home governments of India, the existence of present benefit as well as the germ of future advantages, and the positive danger to both countries by rash or crude plans of fancied perfection being urged for adoption at this eventful crisis of the world; more especially if the growing instability of peace between Great Britain and Russia, be reflected on† and the power which the latter possesses (which need not be denied) of embarrassing this empire in a very vulnerable portion of it, and which might prove as inimical to the permanent connection of the British dominions, as the incursion of northern and western barbarians, in former ages, proved fatal to the proud and widely conquering mistress of the earth. Prudence, therefore, independent of warmer feelings, would dictate the advantage of continuing the present system of Home Indian government (without permitting a further addition of patronage or power to the crown), according to the motto of the East-India Company," Auspicio Regis et Senatus Angliæ ;"-while the increasing vigilant control of Parliament, the fast growing

One witness before Parliament in the present year, Mr. Holt Mackenzie I think it is, told the Committee he thought Ministers would be in want of some more patronage since the passing of the Reform Bill, and therefore they should have that of India! Would Mr. Mackenzie force on Earl Grey that which he brought in the Reform Bill to obviate the necessity of declaring that no honest man could be Minister under the present system?

+ Since the foregoing was written, Lord Durham's special mission to Petersburgh has been announced, one of the alleged causes of which is an intrigue with some of the northern powers on our Indian frontier.

influence of public opinion, and the omnipotence of the press, will from time to time, suggest and carry into effect such improvements as may be safely, and with a prospect of permanent benefit, enacted; recollecting always that governments are not like a forge nail, struck out at a single heat of the iron, but like an oak tree which grows from year to year, and the greater its age the deeper and firmer become its roots, until at last transplanting (or change) would be fatal to the existence of the forest monarch.

CHAPTER IV.

REFUTED-IN

FREE TRADE WITH INDIA-WHAT HAVE BEEN ITS RESULTS
OF LATE?-A DECREASE OF IMPORTS AND EXPORTS!-
THE ASSERTIONS OF MR. CRAWFURD
CREASE OF COTTON GOODS OWING TO THE DISPLACEMENT
OF SEVERAL MILLION OF HINDOO MANUFACTURERS-
DEPLORABLE EFFECTS THEREOF DESCRIBED BY BISHOP
HEBER AND OTHERS, WITH REGARD TO SURAT, DACCA,
&c.-RESTRICTIONS ON THE INDIA TRADE BY PARLIA-
MENT AND THE GOVERNMENT; NOT BY THE COMPANY,
WHO HAVE GIVEN EVERY FACILITY FOR COMMERCE.

THE flux and efflux of prosperity and distress, by which England has been alternately excited or depressed, has given birth to a variety of projects for the mitigation of evils necessarily attendant on such constitutional convulsions; and which, in their paroxysms or subsequent syncope, are equally fatal to the permanent health and happiness of the nation. One of the most specious delusions of the present day is the cry of "a free trade with India," which coupled as it is supposed to be with the downfall of the "EastIndia Company's monopoly" forms the standing toast, and the electioneering test of large bodies of respectable individuals, who have heretofore been looking at only one side of the question, apparently quite forgetful that every case, however bad, has two aspects. I do not commence this chapter with an intention to espouse the cause of monopoly in trade, for I think that internal commerce in the hands of a few is as injurious, in a mercantile view, as the exclusion of the many from political power is detrimental to

liberty. But I might, did space and time permit, shew the extensive trade which the East-India Company created, fostered, and still protect for the benefit of the people of this country; that, when "assailed by the malignant rivalry of foreign Europeans, with the weapons both of art and arms, sacrificed by their own rulers to favoritism and foreign influence, and weighed down in common with the rest of their own countrymen, by the effect of warst and revolutions, the Company yet preserved the national station in the India trade, by dint of extraordinary exertion and at an immense expense, ‡ a trade most valuable in itself, and still more valuable as including the reversion of an empire ;"§-I might with truth assert that the blood and treasure spent in procuring a pre-occupancy or preeminence for Englishmen in the eastern hemisphere, is

* I beg to refer to the introduction of my work on the Tea Trade, for the definition of political and commercial liberty, foreign and domestic, of which America affords an example.

Mr. Rickards says, that during the eight years' war which ended with the treaty of Ryswick, the Company (as well as the public) sustained vast losses, their trade being reduced to so precarious a state that for several years they were unable to divide any profits. During the war 4,200 British merchant ships were captured by French ships of war and privateers; among the captured were several valuable homeward-bound Indiamen. Rickards India, vol. iii. p. 445.

Macpherson, in his History of the European Commerce with India, gives a detailed account of the sums of money paid to the public by the East-India Company for permission to erect that splendid empire which they have added to Great Britain. The sums thus paid amounted, from 1708 to 1793, to upwards of ten million sterling! The expenses to the Company caused by the home wars carried on by government against France, America, &c., were upwards of fifteen million sterling, previous to those of the present century! In 1799 the East-India Company raised 6,000 seamen for the navy, and built, armed, and completely equipped three ships of seventy-four guns each for the crown. In 1803 the Company presented 10,000 tons of shipping to the public for six months, or longer if required; large sums were paid in bounty for seamen. The expenses which fell on the Company by the American war were upwards of £4,000,000! Many other sums of immense value might be added to these items; but perhaps the public of the present day would not heed them.

§ Expressions of the Right Honourable Robert Grant.

« AnteriorContinuar »