The Press.
London, England, 1855-07-14 00:00:00

NAGPORE AND TEHREE.

Sonic seventeen years ago the present Premier,
and then Secretary for Foreign Affairs, Lord
PALMERSTON, told the electors of Tiverton that
they had probably never heard of such a place as
Affganistan, but that the Whigs were reaping
a great harvest of glory there, Sir Join; KEANE
having triumphantly entered Cabul. Regard-
ing the exit of our troops from Cabul his
Lordship was afterwards silent; and, as there
was no Roebuck Committee on the Affgan
war, this most disgraceful chapter in
Whig history was consigned as far as could be
to oblivion. As the electors of Tiverton had
never heard of Affganistan, so many of our
readers will perhaps be equally unfamiliar
with the names of Nagpore and Tehree ; but
some important events have taken place there
latterly, and these we now propose to not ice.
Nagpore is the capital of the kingdom of
Berar, one of the most healthy and fertile
thrc ughout the whole of India. It is ad-
mirably adapted to the European constitution,
and it is almost the finest cotton land in the
world. Its agriculture is most flourishing—
its population has, under native rule, been
largely increasing —it is filled with rich
bankers—it contains an area of nearly eighty
thousand square miles, a population of be-
tween four and five millions, and a revenue
of half a million sterling. At the time of the
late Rajah's death, moreover, which happened
about a year ago, there were accumulations,
not in the State Treasury, but in the Queen's
private coffers, of more than nine millions of
rupees. It is the custom of sensible Eastern
Sovereigns thus to save money, as it has
always been the custom of sensible English

JULY 14, 1855.

Sovereigns, and also of other Potentates on
the Continent of Europe. The kingdom of
Tehree or Oorcha, on the other hand, lies in
Bundelkund, one of the most unhealthy
and unprofitable of the districts of India. Its
people are warlike and untractable, and the
attempt to screw a revenue out of them would
be somewhat like shearing swine. The State
of 'relit ee is small, consisting of only a few
hundred thousand acres; the population is
scanty; cultivation is carried on with difficulty ;
and at the capital there is not, according to
SLEEMAN, a decent house, except the Rajah's
palace, nor i s there a single banker, or even
respectable shopkeeper, in the place. What
the private treasury of the Rajah may
contain we cannot tell, but many readily
surmise a beggarly account of empty cash-
boxes is all that one could reasonably look for
in such a place.
The Rajah of Nagpore died, as we have
stated, about a year ago without issue, and
the Indian Government immediately seized
upon the territory, refusing to allow the un
doubted right of the Royal Family to adopt.
Nay, more, it not only seized upon the terri-
tories of Nagpore, and its public property
and public treasure, but it actually sent
troops to surround the palace where the Royal
Ladies were, and, under threat of personal
violence, plundered them of the whole of their
private money, jewels, and even personal
ornaments, that they possessed. Thus went
at once their accumulated savings of many
successive years. This last was an act of
peculiar atrocity, and for which there was not
a shadow of pretence. However unjustifiable
(and all who are acquainted with the Hindoo
law must know it to have been most unjusti-
fiable) the seizing upon the territory as a
lapsed inheritance, yet nothing could warrant
this robbery of the private fortune of the
Royal Ladies and children residing in the
palace, and who had done no wrong. They
had not, by levying troops to oppose us or
otherwise, given the slightest colour for the
confiscation, as might have been the case had
they gone even in self-defence to war. It was
a more wanton and gratuitous violation of all
decency and justice than the celebrated
spoliation of the Begums, so denounced by
SHERIDAN, in WARREN HASTINGS time. The
Indian Government seems to have been desirous
of silencing in some degree the clamour that
this nefarious act created; and the death of the
Rajah of Tehree has afforded them the op-
portunity they sought. He likewise died
without sons, and the Rondula chiefs have
been allowed to select a successor for the
Royal Family to adopt. This done, the fact is
now cited as a proof of the unfairness of
charging with rapacity a Government capable
of so disinterested an act. The contrast which
we have drawn between the condition and
value of the two States of Nagpore and Tehree
will, however, be sufficient to account for the
latter being selected for this generous display.
There are no people more ostentatious with
their small donations at church or meeting
than those who are engaged in the wholesale
plunder of the confiding constitutents who
place their thousands in their hands.
An attempt has been made by the Govern-
ment organ in India to explain the difference
of conduct towards these two States in the
enunciation of a principle which is as un-
tenable as it is new. It is said that we have a
right to do as we please with the Nagpore
State because a predecessor of its Sovereign
was placed by us on the throne ; while, as re-
gards Tehree, the late Sovereign, not having
been similarly indebted to us, the Royal
Family there have a right to supply a failure in
heirs male of the body as they please. It is
not, however, the fact that the late Rajah of
Nagpore was in any way indebted to us for his
throne. He succeeded his ancestors before
him according to Hindoo law and custom,
which recognises the adoption of a collateral
relation in the male or female heir where there
is no direct successor to the throne. It is
true that in 1818 the then Rajah of Nagpore
was defeated by us in war and deposed, and
the next of kin was elevated to the Crown.