The Sun.
London, England, 1858-02-16 00:00:00

fore, as most unfortunate. India abounded in noble
families, some descended from the sun, others from
the moon. (Laughter.) Those persons possessed
great pride of birth and ancestry, and by way of
conciliating them and reconciling them with our govern-
ment, we deprived them of the honour and gratification
of feeling that they were the subjects of a sovereign
whose ancestors had worn the crown of these isles 500
years before the reign of the Great Mogul, making them
instead the vassals of a commercial joint-stock company.
He was toll by a gentleman who bad much exp nonce
in India that the notion they had of the Government
under which they lived, was that India was a kind of
farm leased by the Crown to the Company, and that the
object of the latter was to squeeze as much rte it could
out of it, and that gentleman's opinion coincided with
that of Mr. Halliday, that nothing would be more cal-
culated to promote the interests of India than to place
its government in the hands of the Crown. The matter,
however, did not stop there ; they knew something of
the past history of India, and need he point to the long
catalogue of differences and bickerinee more or less vio-
lent between the servants of the company and the ser-
vants of the Crown. The mutiny which they were at
present engaged in putting down was not the only
mutiny which had occurred there. Every one recollected
Sir 11. Fletcher'e conduct in the time of Clive, and that
he and his associates did not consider themselves guilty
of treason against the English Crown, but only against
a commercial company to whom they did not own alle•
glance ; and in the case of Gen. M'Doevell and Sir G.
Barlow, which nearly led to the loss of the Deccan,
tho troops were open the point cf declaring them-
selves independent of the government of Madras. ,
One case more which illustrated the inconvenience of
the present system was this ; the East India Com-
pany might b' at war with a power with which the
Queen might be at peace, incurring a heavy expense
without involving the na te of the British Crown.
(Hoar, hear.) As to the question of time, whether legis
lation at the moment was convenient or proper, the
hon. and learned gentleman bad quoted him (Mr. Lowe)
against himself. On that account he must, however
reluctantly, refer to the speech which he made in
1853 on tho resolution similar to the resolution now
moved by the hon. memberte b n foroltheHuntingdon,e lord
which
was
brought
a
r
Kbrionugg'hetLyftn'rn (Lordwa
rdbyStan h
ley). The only observation in
member
that speech on which the hon. gentleman could have
anchored his remark was one in which he said that if
the Government of India were to be continued in the
Company, whose operations in arms and policy there
had hitherto been successful, the governing body must
be maintained respected and respectable, and he re-
peated the observation now as entirely applicable to the
present circumstances. Of those who asked what would
happen if the bill passes, he must ask what would occur
it it did not pass ? The Company had been for a series
of years in a state of gradual deterioration. In 1818
they lost their India trade; in 1833 they lost the China
trade ; and when their commercial assets were gone they
are but the shadow of their former self ; merely the
first mortgagees on the revenue of India • or, rather
were, compelled to look to a sinking fund of 2,000,000/.
which was now become 4,000,0001. or 5,000,0001. That
course was not a wise one for the purposes of Govern-
ment. So long as it was their intention to govern India
through the East India Company, so long ought they
to have done everything to make that company powerful
and respectable, being the trustees of ihe Queen for the
exercise of the imperial prerogatives. But after these
present debates had occurred, and the exposure of the
system which would yet take place, and which would be
read, as the hon. gentleman said, by the natives of India,
what respect for the Company could still be entertained
among the native princes or the native people. Let
Parliament spars the Company's existence now if they
would, India must feel that the sword of Damocles
was suspended over the head of that body, and that
the existence of that Company would be prolonged
for a few months, or at the most for a few years.
But when it was said that we should wait for a quiet
time, he must ask them to consider that although the
rebels who showed themselves in the field might be dis-
sipated and destroyed, they could not expect for years
to have returned to that condition of peace which was
referred to as the epoch of the proposed change. But the
interference of Parliament was pio`nred as an evil, and
the nccation of evils. He for one had no dread of the
bugbear. He had himself been a British celoniet. He
admitted to those who made a charge against the Imps.
rial Government that there had been mismanagement of
the colonies by the Celonial-office. But he made a dis-
tinction. The Colonial-office erred from ignorance.
Some of these colonies were new and unknown; theyhad
sprung into existence of a sudden, and so rapid was their
continued growth, that a person who absented himself
for five years, returned to see a new world entirely un-
known to him. Under these circumstances the Colonial
Office were without the requisite information, and those
who cams to London from any of them usually were
brought by personal objscts, and gave one—hied infor-
mation. But with regard to India, the Minister could
not desire to take proceedings in any of its corner'', but
he would find in this country a man who, without a
motive to bias hie communications, could give the reost
accnrate an.l detailed information respecting it. Besides
he must assure the house that nothing was so much
desired in the colonies as the discussion of their case in
Parliament at the time of that mismanagement. They
need to say, half in bitter earnest, half in joke, that if
they could only get up an insurrection, however small,
they were certain of the attention of Parliament and
deliverance from the evils which they suffered. The
Indian Government was essentially a bureaucracy in
principle, in which there was something good and some-
tbiog bad, and something which had outlived its day.
But the characteristic of a bureatioracy was that itcould
not reform itself. The insinuation contained in this
petition against the house that it would be rash, violent
ax l presimp'uons in its interference with the
gneetrnment of India was repelled by the course which
it had pursued in the case of the British colonies—
(hear, hear)—for instead of retaining the power
which the house might have exercised through
the Colonial-office, they had, through the influence of
such men as his lamented friend Sir William Moles-
worth, relinquished that power for ever by giving these
colonies constitutions and the advantages of self-govern-
ment. He, in conclusion, expressed his trust that the
conanaotions which new convulsed India would cease
with the change which this bill proposed, and that the
bill would be introduced into that country with An act
of grace and Amnesty which might have had the happy
effect of calming down the sanguinary excitement that
still existed in that country.
Mr. LIDDELL was not prepared to hand over to the
Government of India to the nominees of the Crown. Ile
strongly opposed the bill, both in principle and details.
Mr. SLANEY supported the bill, admitting that the
er a
number
ut emr
bs
ee
rd
government of the Company had dons much for the
civilisation of India. But it had yet left India by its
exations in a desolate and
twetp:lns:dincwonhdicithionth,ewEhiacsht
called f. )r reform and change.
Mr. CRAITFURD thought, that the merchants of
0 found fault with the composition of the
ofaesigahtcmomempabneyrs of
which it was to he esmposed. They would not be suffi-
pmlLrnoeodrnpindaobosanecnd
tows:
.neo rpueanLinc aggrieved
yiwa nads
of
fc bht yha
tient for the duties they would bnve to perform. The
chief reason for opposing the bill was that it ought to
have been preceded by inquiry before a committee. An
yet the Noose was not in pesseesiou of sufficient infor-
mation.

Sir H. RAyirLINSON would offer a few practical
observations, the results of thirty years' experience. He
should not discuss all the particulars allulel to by the
last speaker, but should confine himself to the
points actually before the boase ; first, whether
'
any change was required; and, secondly, whether,
if it was required, this was the proper time
to introduce) it. The change, if any, must be
twofold : the abolition of thedoublegoveromentat home,
and the proclamation of the Q'ieeo'e name in India. If
they would bear in mind or refer to the evidence before
the committee which sat in 1852 and 1853, they would
find in it a mass of evidence condemnatory of the double
government, which made it marvellous that such a
system had existed so long, Its continuance could only
be explained by an allusion made in another place by a
member of Lord Aberdeen's Government, to the effect
that the defects were admitted but it wad thought an
abrupt change would be dangerous, and so a partial im-
provement was first introJueed to break the fall of the
company. (A laugh.) It would be perhaps more
agreeable and more graphic to state a few facts than to
go into the general question ; he would cite two such
facts—the constitution of the secret committee, and the
relations of the Court of Directors to the Board of Con-
trol. It was generally thought that the company was
responsible to the Government, and the petitions as-
sumed that ; but in fact for a large portion of the actual
government it was not the company but the Board of
Control who wore responsible. In the case of the Per-
I sian war, the Courtof Directors were not indeed opposed
to war, for they knew nothing about it till they read the
printed despatches in the Parliamentary blue-books.
Ho did not say whether this was right, but it was an
anomaly to say that under such circumstances the com-
pany could be responsible. (Hear. hear.) Another
point was, the relationd3ip which existed between the
Court of Direetors and the Board of Centre). He should
describe the gestatioo of a despatch from conception to
parturition. The idea of a despatch was first conceived
by one of those gentlemen whose fine Roman band was
recognised in the petition. (A laugh.) The hon. gen-
tleman then described in detail the processes through
which a despatch had te pass up to the period when it
was sent out of this country. It was true that in
a case of emergency all this could be simplified,
but what was to bs thought of a system which, when the
time of trial came, had to he superseded / It was a poor
defence to say tha.; it could be simplified, because if the
flame results were obtained by the simple process what
was the good of tie complications t He thought that
when the system was abolished the only feeling enter
tained on the subject would be one of astonishment that
it had ever existed, Having considered the merits, or
rather demerit?, of the Government at home, he came to
the question of the effects of the change in India. With
regard to the European community, with the excep-ion
of .a few ex tlusivee the old civil servants of the company,
no one would be otherwise than pleased with the change.
Mr. Halliday, the vice-president of the Bengal province,
bad given his opinion that much detriment resulted from
the government being carried on in the name of the com-
pany. Officers in the army, and jedgee, were proud of
being in the service of the Queen, and those under the
company desired to be considered as in the service of the
Crown. The natives had a strong feeling in favour of
government by the Crown. Several other gentlemen
also givers Crhe: •i .
r.voc of
Crown were brcu;n, thE: re•
verence of the natives fur the Government. The result
of his own experience in the military service of the com-
pany was that both the military and the civilians had