The Sun.
London, England, 1824-06-19 00:00:00

VICTUA !LW G-oFli ICE, June 18, 1324.

THE COMMISSIONERS for VICTUAL-
LING His AreIJESTY'S Arid VY, ere. do hereby give
Notice, that on Friday next, the. 45th instant, they will
be ready to receive 7'enders in writing (sealed nv), and treat

One Thousand Sacks of BISCUIT .M EA L ;
Six Hundred Sacks of KILN DRIED FLOUR;
Fort!/ Tons of NEW OATMEAL;

And One Thousand Quarters of PEASE ;
To be delivered We His Majesty's Victualling Stores at
Deptford, one-half by the 10th July, and the other hair by
the Sd of August next.
And also, for Five Tons of EAST INDIA RICE ; to be
delivered into the said Stores by the 2d of drquist next.
- The Conditions of the Contracts ,nay be seen at this Office.

Each Tender must specify the price in word► at length, and
be delivered _before One o'clock on the day appointed ; and
the Person who makes the Tender, or some Person on his
behalf, must attend to answer when called for.

AI. rrw,LER CLIFTON'.

EAST INDIA HOUSE, June 9, 1444.

THE COURT of DIRECTORS of the
UNITED COMPANY of MERCHANTS of ENG-
LAND TRADING to the EAST INDIES, do hereby give
Notice,

That they have received a Letter, Copy of which is as fol.
lows, viz.:—
" To the Honourable the Court of Directors of the East

India Company.
" London, June 5, 1324.

" We, the undersigned Proprietors of East India Stock, duly
qualified. request the General Court of Proprietors, summonvd
for the iad instant, may he made Special, fur the purpose of
taking into consideration the State of the Public Press in
India, the Regulations that are now in force respecting it at
the several Presidencies in India, and also the Proceedings
which have attended the Suppression of the Calcutta Jour-
nal, and the Banishment of Mr. Buckingham and Mr. Arnot,
two of its Editors.

"JOSEPH HUMS.
" DOUGLAS KINNADID."
The GENERAL COURT, appointed to he held at this
House oil -the 23d Instant, is therefore made further SPE-
CIAL accordingly.

JOSEPII DART, Secretary.

SPICE PLANTEttI.

It appears by a paper lately printed by order
of the House of Commons that, on an average of
16 years, the annual consumption of nutmegs is
42,6301b5. and of mace 24,8601b5. ; and a Memo-
rial, of which the following is a copy, has re-
cently, we understand, been presented to his Ma-
jesty's M iuisters, as well as to the East India
Company.
MEMORIAL of SPICE PLANTERS to the COURT of
DIRECTORS.—June 11, 1024.
London, June 10, 18244
That your Memorialists are possessed of considerable pro.
perty at Bencoolen, and particularly of extensive plantations
for the cultivation of nutmeg and clove trees, on which large
sums have been expended, without as yet having yielded any
adequate returns.
That those pittntations were originally commenced with the
immediate sanction and strong encouragement of yonr Ho-
nourable Court, communicated through the Governments in
Bengal and Bencoolen, and have since been greatly increased,
under repeated assurances of their continued support and pro-
tection.

That in addition to these powerful incentives to their enter-
prise and industry, your Memorialists were from the beginning
taught to believe, that, in establishing in Sumatra a counter-
poise to the Dutch spice monopoly of the Moluccas, they were
rendering an acceptable service to Great Britain, and were in
fact promoting a great national object ; and although your
Memorialists disclaim the affectation of having allowed Treater
weight to this consideration than, as men of business and mer-
chants, they may be supposed to have done, yet they do assert
that it has operated throughout strongly on their minds as an
additional encouragement to persevere ; nor could they antici-
pate that an object which had long been deemed so important
in Europe would be lightly or abruptly abandoned, or that the
interests of individuals, embarking their fortunes in such an
undertaking, would fail to receive due consideration at the
hands of the British Government.
Under this confidence, and with these prospects, the Bencoolen
Planters have gone on, for the last 20 years, extending their
cultivation and increasing their outlay, until, through their
individual exertions and at their individual cost, a sufficient
quantity of the finest spices Is now produced at Bencoolen for
the consumption of Great Britain and every prospect exists
that, with due encouragement and protection for a. few years
longer, that settlement might divide with the Moluccas the
supply of the world.
In this state of things, and when your Memorialists were
looking forward with confidence to some remuneration for the
great sacrifices of preceding years, they learn, with the utmost
surprise and alarm, that Bencoolen has been ceded to the Dutch,
and under circumstances which must involve your Memorialists
in utter ruin. _ _

For, on referring to the Treaty between the two Countries, your
Memorialists do not find any specific stipulations for the seta.
rity of their interests, nor for indemnity against the losses which
must overwhelm them, when the Dutch shall again be put in
undisturbed possession of a monopoly which they have ever ex.
ercised most rigorously, and to which they have always attached
the highest importance.
As to the general assurances of protection which the Treaty
contains, your Memorialists know too well how to appreciate
them; far without wishing to attribute to the Netherlands Co.
vernment any vindictive feeling towards your Memorialists
(however natural it is that such anticipations should exist in
the minds of your Memorialists), still less meaning to question
the good faith and sincerity of the Dutch negotiators who signed
the Treaty, your Memorialists cannot forget that all expe-
rience shews the utter improbability of a jealous commercial
state abandoning a profitable and favourite object to which
she has invariably attached so much value, and to which she
still evidently clings with equal pertinacity, merely because the
interests of a few unprotected foreigners happen to be at vari.
ance with her own, and require for their security a different
and we liberal line of policy.
Yet if the Dutch spice monopoly Is to be upheld in all its
strictness (as the treaty declares that it shall be) and if the same
principle is extended to Sumatra, (without which, indeed the
declaration would be nugatory), the Bencoolen planter itt as
effectually ruined as if every tree in his possession were torn up
by the roots. _

The spice plantations of Bencoolen are still for the most part
in their infancy—the clove and nutmeg trees requiring Bor 10
years of, incessant care before they bear any thing, anti then
becoming only gradually productive until the 20th year, when
they attain maturity. They are not therefore by any means as
yet in a state to compete with the longer established and more
favoured culture of the Moluccas; and so sensible were your
Honourable Court and the British Government of this import.
ant fact, that when the Spice Islands were restored to the
Dutch at the late peace, a protecting duty equal to 30 per cent.
was granted to the spices of Bencoolen when consumed in
Great Britain; while throughout the British possessions in India
they were relieved from all duties whatever when imported in
a British ship.
Your Memorialists conclude, that these Indulgences and pro.
tections, both in India and in England, must cease with the
transfer of Sumatra to an alien Power; and if to this be added,
as must naturally be anticipated, the exaction by the Dutch of
the same export duties at Bencoolen as are levitd at all their
other possessions in the East, instead of a free export which is
now permitted, the impossibility of your Memorialists carrying
on their trade for even a single year must be apparent to any
one at all conversant with the present situation of the Sumatran
planters.

Under so many depressing circumstances, as unexpected to
your Memorialists in the midst of profound peace, as they are ca-

lamitous to their interests, your Memorialists see but one course
to pursue; they throw themselves on the justice•and liberality
of your Honourable Court and of the British nation, and claim
indemnity for their losses. The transfer of Bencoolen will un-
doubtedly relieve the East India Company from a heavyan-
nual expence, and the arrangement may also possibly be pro-
ductive of
i political and commercial advantages to Great Bri-
tain ; but t is inconsistent with good faith and common justice
that these results should be purchased at the expence of indi-
viduals who have been led on, by the warmest encouragement
of the Government under which they resided, (even up to the
date of the last advices from Sumatra), to invest their fortunes
in an object once deemed of high national importance, although
now no longer thought worthy of support.
Your Memorialists therefore most humbly but earnestly
pray, that the necessary measures may be taken for ascertain-
ing the loss which will be sustained by your Memorialists, by
the depreciation of the value of their respective plantations anti
other property, and that a fair and reasonable indemnity may
be granted to them, according to the universally admitted prin-
ciple, that when the interests of individuals are sacrificed to
national objects the sufferers are entitled to equitable cornpen-
.sation.

The quantum of depreciation which their property will sus-
tain, your Memorialists submit, may easily be ascertained, under
the superintendance of fit and impartial Commissioners, by
putting up the estates of such proprietors as are desirous of re-
linquishing them to public sale after the transfer of the Colony
shall have taken place, and comparing the price then bona fide
obtainable for them with that at which they were respectively
rated, in an official survey and valuation of British property in
Sumatra, made very recently under the orders of the Superin-
tendant of that settlement, Sir Stamford Raffles ; a valuation
which your Memorialists conchae to have been a fair one at
the time, although cerfainly not including in its amount one
half of the sums actually expended on the different properties.