The Sun.
London, England, 1851-12-18 00:00:00

FROM THE MORNING FAPIAIS OF TIII3 DAT.

TIMES.—The Chairman 01 the East India Company,
in adaressing last Monday the select candidates for the
civil service of India, admonished them, in remarkable
words, of the responsibilities to which their profession
was now subjected by the improvements of postal inter-
course. "Remember," sai.l he, " that the days are
gone by when it required months, or even years, to re-
view in England the proceedings of our administration
in India. Even now the facilities of communication
bring you almost nadir the immediate control of public
opinion in your native country. There is now no longer
concealment in distance, and in a brief period we shall
have the mistakes of incompetence and the offences of
indolence so speeded to us by electricity and steam that
the errors of the Courts of Delhi shall be as patent and
03 promptly before us as those of Westminster-hall."
This prophetic monition fell, we trust, wiih due weight
on the ears of the audience; but it did not, perhaps,
t•Callr to the speaker that the capacity and cu:lt:et of
the whole Indian Government would be-brought, by the
operation of the same circumstances,
n to the vtrY
test of which he was warning its
yongest officers.
Iu these days no Administration can shift
the respensi-
bility of failure from itself to its subordiaates The
same telegraph which apprises the directors of the mis-
conduct of a collector or a judge will inform the Bri-
tish public of the general ability of the directors
evinced in the condition of India. If productive
I."
p
vincss remain without roach, fields without water,
and
ports without cotton, the " control of publie opinion"
will be exercised upon that body from which these sup-
plies are expected, and the chairman and court of the
company will infallibly be put to that trial which in the
case of their own officials they already discern. We live
in times when a tree is judged by its fruits. No person
conversant with the subject will deny that the acquisi-
tion and maintenance of our empire in the east reflects
extraordinary credit on those who achieved such a mo-
nument of enterprise and power; but India is not what it
might be, and its resources have hitherto failed us exactly
at the point where they are most indispensable. We get
little or no cotton from a country which is confessedly as
well qualified to produce it as Georgia itself, and when
we invastigato the causes of the detalcation we discover
that the whole territory is without roads for the car-
riage of agricultural produce, and the whole population
without energy sufficient to speculate in the improve-
ment of its field crops. If no push our inquiries
further, we are assured that a vicious system of taxa-
tion so cripples the means of the farmer as to leave
him helpless in the hands of the collector, and that
native enterprise has altogether vanished under a Go-
vernment which closes every opening to native
ambition. Whether this reasoning be correct or not,
the original proposition at any rate remains, India can-
not rear its own natural produce fur exportation, and
the published accounts of its governors distinctly inform
us that a considerable revenue is so entirely absorbed in
an imperfect administration as to leave no appreciable
fraction fur works of public use or popular advantage.
If the evil does not lie in the general impossibility of
the problem, it must be sought for either in the in-
judicious assessment of the revenue or in the faulty
system of the expenditure. We believe the latter
cause is in reality operative to a very ma-
terial extent. "No man," as an accomplished
essayist once remarked, " will work for the same remu-
neration under the sun of Calcutta as be would accept
under the trees in King's Bench-walk." This is per-
fectly true, and perhaps 10,0001. a year is not more than
sufficient to tempt across the Bay of Bengal such men
as the Government of India may require. But when
this principle is carried out through every department
of an Imperial service two results are inevitably pro-
duced: first, the consumption of all working power
upon the machine itself; and next, the extinction of all
available talent in a people superseded in its political
duties by an imported administration. The restriction
of all State and judicial offices of importance to Euro-
pean competitors, and the e emareat ion thus established
between a handful of highly paid functionaries and an
immense native society, must of necessity be extremely
detrimental to the latter, while the charges entailed by
such an arrangement operate with equal prejudice on the
revenue. The strength of India, in fact, is self-consumed,
and contributions which aro represented as distressing to
taxpayers scarcely suffice to maintain in action a cum-
brous aad overtasked Government. It is considered that
both the military and civil services of the Company
aro at present under-officered; the Sepoy regiments are
notoriously weak in this respect, and the administration
of justice is said to be suffering likewise from the want
of hands. Yet when complaints of this nature are made,
it is unanswerably replied that the finances of the Go-
vernment will bear no further charge, and that the taxa-
tion is equally incapable of extension. While this is
the case with the ruling nation the inhabitants of India
suffer in a still greater degree. There is no avenue of
distinction open to a native gentleman, whatever may be
his capacity, integrity, or ambition. He is absolutely
excluded from any concern in the administration of his
country. Such regulations, of which there are many
examples, have invariably produced one of two effects
—either radical discontent resulting in revolution, or
listless apathy resulting in the extinction of all national
spirit. The latter has been the case with the popula-
tion of India. We have kept them from all public
office till they are described as no longer competent for
the duty. We have withheld trust from them till they
are reputed as really untrustwcrthy, and we have de-
graded them till they are pronounced incapable of ele-
vation. Wo are consequently compelled to export from
England every responsible officer required for the go-
vernment of a hundred millions of subjects, ana we find
that all the revenue which these subjects can contribute
is insufficient to leave any portion for their own benefi',
after liquidatirg the expenses of eu artificial administra-
tion. but what is this system, in plain words, but the
support of a mercantile company at the cost of a noble
empire? The reasons which originally dictated this
policy aro both manifest and sound; but they cannot be
alleged with equal force in defence of its continuance.
If India, with its teeming population, its variety of cli-
mate, its precious products and its proverbial resources,
cannot be made to do more than provide its rulers with
a balance-sheet, from which all charges of public utility
are practically excluded, it would be hard to make out a
case for oar dominion.. This wonderful empire, as the
Haileybury cadets were truly told, is now under the eye
of the English public, and the English public is not ac-
customed to acquiesce in results so sterile. We acquit
the Company of wilful misgovernment and of any
systematic disregard to the interests of their subjects.
They have maintained a dominion cf unexampled
splendour through the perils and trials of a century.
They have reared a body of officers inferior to no ser-
vice in the world in ability and conduct, and they have
exhibited, on many occasions; an unflinching rectitude
of policy not often discoverable under European Go-
vernments. But the present and visible result of their
administration cannot be considered satisfactory. It is
possible that other systems may vield no bettor fruit,
but the " control of public opinion is is not likely to stop
short of suggesting a trial. India must be something
more for the Indians, and more for Englishmen, too.
There is no reason why it should have ceased to rear
either cotton or men, and perhaps the changes which
tend to regenerate the latter may beat be trusted for
the reproduction of the former.

DAILY NEWS.—The first want of France—the
grand thing to be desired by those who look to a defini-
tive settlement and: pacification of that country—is, or
rather was, a reconciliation between the upper and lower
classes of society. It was the total breach, the wide
schism, between those classes created by, or at least
terminating in, the communistic tendencies of the one
class and the ultra-Conservative tendencies of the other,
that has ruined France, and laid its liberties and its
existence at the feet of an usurper. We have often said,
and we again repeat, that no ono will succeed in be-
coming permanent head of the French nation unless ho
succeeds in Effecting this great compromise, this vital
reconciliation. There was, perhaps, no person better
placed to if: et this compromise than Louis Napoleon,
previous to his late coup detat, or when ho first as-
sumed the duce of President. He was sufficiently strcng
in Conservative support, and in the necessary adhesion
of the wealthier classes, to have addressed the people
in some other language than that of bayonet and re-
pression. By allowing full sc)pe and play to discussion
and association, and to the ventilation of ideas, he
might, whilst putting do conspiracy, have soon con-
vinced the Communists of fho folly of their schemes, or
at least exposed them to the ridicule of all. The de-
mands of the more rational of the popular party could
easily have been reduced to some standard compatible
with society and with government. And the National
Assembly, instead of being an arena fur the conflicting
passions and mutual challenges of the two classes, might
have been made the scene and the means of their com-
mon understanding. After all, had Louis Napoleon the
true sense of his own interests and position, it is with
the people he would have identified himself. His birth,
his name, and the respect borne to both by the working
classes, and by no other, suggested such a policy. But
the dandy of the west end of London c,uld not stoop to
be anything less than the heir of au Emperor; and so he
trusted his fortunes and his political guidance to the re-
presentatives of the wealthier classes, all of whom placed
their hopes and reposed their fealty in a very different dy-
nasty from his. One might have thought that when Louis
Napoleon had made full discovery of this; when he had
seen that the other monarchic parties would never more
tolerate him, and would never let pass an opportunity
for conspiring against him, or against the Republic;
one would think such a conviction would have prompted
the President to address himself sincerely to the people.
It was, perhaps, not too late on the second of Decenabt.r.
If there ever lurked a really generous and liberal ten-
dency in Louis Napoleon,. it must have displayecl itself
then. It could not be then said that he stood
the Assembly, or that he was compelled to
fblone topro-
fess wt o awe
its
majority. He was master of his actions, and re
any doctrine. And yet he choosethis v
s mo-
ment to profess in the face of the world the mostery retro-
grade principles of government of the two most retro-
grade schools. All that is bigoted in legitimacy, with
all that is violent and arbitrary in a purely
military government, unite to form the cha-
racter and political creed of Louis Nepolecn.
We can conceive such a
policy, if representative or
parliamentary government was to bo continued, and
if it were necessary to win over some hundred members
end,
and a hostile majority. But Parliaments e arueesattioann is,of
and the word majority a delusion
what use legitimist adhesion will bo to Louisq Napoleon
throughout the country. We may answer at once that
it will do as much harm as good, and produce as much
weakness as strength. For every partisan who may be
won
from the high noblesse and the ultra-montane clergy
to Louis Napoleon, an hundred liberal men bedis-
gusted. Besides, all the charlataneric of the. President
will never win over the more respectable and moderato
cf either the Legitimists or of the Churchmen. That
Phillpotts of Frauce,—the Bishop of Chartres,—may
write circular pastorals in Napoleon's favour; and Count
Montalembert may intercede for him, by alleging that
people may support him without becoming appsoyers of