The Sun.
London, England, 1853-06-07 00:00:00

told them that nothing had been done, and that when be
sent remonstrances and recommendations t 3 the directors,
the only effect was that ho received a sneering answer, and
was told to take Westminster-hall as a model. Thero was
no part of the right hon. gentleman's (Sir C. Wood's)
speech to which he listened with so 'much surprise and
mortification as that in which ho spoke of the operation of
the law in India. Speaking of the whole subject in a
slighting manner, the right honourable gentleman said
no doubt there were abuses of the law in India—there
wore abuses of that kind in all countries, and that if
our own courts were ransacked, similar abuses would be
found to those which existed in Inclia, as he had been in-
formed by a judge. Whoever made this last statement
had grossly calumniated the administration of law in
this country. (Hear, hear.) Mr. Holt Mackenzie said
that just in proportion as the law hail been enforced in
India had the people suffered ; and he (Mr. Philliznore)
behoved that if any abuso of the same kind were dis-
covered in England, the whole country would be in a
flame, and Parliament would address the Crown for the

removal of the judge who had been guilty of it. Mr. Le-
win said there were now on the bench at Madras persons
who were ndt only unfit for the office which they held, but
who had been guilty of acts which rendered them unfit to
be trusted with the life of a flea. (Laughter.) In one
ease there was a document, consisting of a side and a-half
of foolscap, in which it was declared that one man was to
be hanged, another to be transported, and a third to be set
free " because there was not a westige of evidence against
him." (Laughter.) Such was found to be the spelling of
the word. The judge had evidently not examined the do-
cument to which he attached his name. In another case—
a case in which a man was prosecuted by a nabob in an
affair of accounts—the accounts kept by. the nabob's_wife

were admitted as evidence. Many of "the cases in India
were of such a nature that if they wanted anything like a
parallel they must look for it in the orations of Cicero
against Verres. The question was not one of refinement or
comfort, it was one of existence. One groat reason, he be-
lieved, why natives of Britain did not settle in India, was
that they were unwilling to entrust their property and cha-
racter to the jurisdiction of the Indian courts. The remedy
for this state of things was the employment of natives, in
favour of which he might quote the authority of almost
every man of great official experience in India. To say,
indeed, that among one hundred million of people none
were to be found who were qualified to administer justice,
was to libel Providence. Sir Thomas Munro said the in-
tegrity and diligence of the natives fitted them to adminis-
ter the law. Sir George Clerk, who was by no means un-
favourable to the East India Company, said that the mo-
rality among the higher classes of Hindoos was of a high
standard, and that among the middle and lower classes it

was remarkably high. That was the evidence of an old
servant of the company, and similar evidence had been
given by individuals equally intelligent and influential,
This was the oppression that made the heart sick, this the
iron that was sure to enter the soul. They talked of Hin-
doo corruption, but could not the Hindoos retort about
European corruption? (Hear, hear.) Had they not in
recent clays seen all the influence of a Government used to
screen corruption, and had they not seen rank and station,
and, what was worse intelligence, bowing down before
successful speculation ? How had committees of the House
of Commons been employed during the last three months ?
(Hear, hear.) The right hon. gentleman, whenicomparing
India under native rule with the present government, had
gone to the period immediately preceding our invasion,
when the country was torn and convulsed, and had not al-
luded to the time of Akbar when it was contented and
happy. He might as welt have gone to the days of Attila
for an account of the Augustan era. Suppose the Hindoo
were to refer us to Europe in the 17th century, to the times
of the Regent Orleans, of Louis XV., of Catherine of Rus-
sia, or to the incestuous court of Berlin, or more recently
to the sack of Warsaw, the partition of Poland, or the still
freshly remembered horrors of the French revolution ?
(Hear, hear.) Did not the house think that in such events
a Hindoo might find counterparts for the worst scenes
in the history of his own country. (Cheers.) The
next question to which he should allude was the tenure of
land, a question respecting which it was scarcely possible
to exaggerate the difficulty. With respect to the land, the
East India Company had assumed all the rights of the na-
tive proprietors, while, at the same time, evading all the
duties. The settlement of Bengal in '93 was perhaps
adopted from good motives,' but it had been adopted in
ignorance, and had ended in complete failure. It was
called a permanent settlement, but such were its effects
that at the present moment only one family remained that
had signed the compact, all the rest having been ruined or
totally destroyed. Mr. Mill condemned the settlement of
'93 as having ruined both the Zemindars and the ryots,
the latter being in a state of utter poverty and degrada-
tion. 'With respect to the state of this same Bengal pre-
vious to our rule, he would quote the testimony of Mr.
Holwell, a very old traveller, who described it as the best
ordered and happiest portion of India, and the only one
that retained the best features of the ld Hindoo system.
At the present moment there was the one level of uniform
misery in the richest country in the world, under the go-
vernment whose power the house was now called upon to
renew. At Madras they had adopted the Ryotwarrie sys-
tem, the great defect of which was that one collector was
obliged to settle terms with 300,000 ryots, and there could
be no lower deep of human degradation than the condition
of Madras ryots under the sway of Madras collectors. The
t_iyste9i had also been introduced at Bombay in spite of Mr.
Elphinstone but the authorities had been obliged to with-
lra'v%steln2 the north-western province an entirely dif-
ferenthad been established.
volumes as aa:sn One fact would speak
Inatogete prosperity of the country under the com-
pany's Sixty raiment. It was that during the last fourteen
the inhabitants of of arrears of rent had been remitted to
public works, a uoioAndia. (Hear.) Of the question of
the public funds were wasted eminent civil servant had said that
a million Properly laid out
and misapplied, and that half
y couldwould have produced better re-
sults than any the zbabit. /I opinions of Mr. Burke, Mr. having quoted the
as hostile to the patronage of
companyrelA d GreenlandGle,
butnow the patronage
learned member proceeded to say, he h
the evil was to
of the company was to be taken awaya
g about to take
remain. The right hon. gentleman
away everything that was essential to a government
lowed the company to remain as a sham with that
tarsus irrve-
When the right hon. member had been told that thaelm" •
tern of Indian government was anomalous, he answereds
anomalous. Why, if that
that our Indian empire was itself
MOM necessary to get proper men t
were s
bpi
the
t (Hear.) But the right hon,
• It„r,. • ,
admi
4
• .„,., aro was anomalous, and there-
gi.eP ~,g,t R:riinar. •• e anomalous also. The right
-I "--- - --,,,,g....i 'Vie' riainal in that, as they all
114
110 iNimielna- —"I ,7-3 Vt: IB,°„wt'ell's "Johnson " "Who
: embers be havkite?l` -fat!, (Hear, and laugh.)
- 'yes fit ores OPP I' 1 tl man to pause before he
iki
liqgged -Of the right
in. gen e
_____... .„A if he
ant; R 4"
ett!wea the grout oyiQ of Woram
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