The Sun.
London, England, 1859-02-17 00:00:00

THE DUCHESS OF LEINSTER.

The papers announce the death of the Duchess
of Leinster yesterday morning, at Carton House,
Maynooth. Her Grace had been for several years
suffering from au attack of paralysis, which com-
pletely deprived her of the use of her limbs. The
late Duchess was Charlotte Augusta, youngest
daughter of Charles, third Earl of Harrington;
the first earl of that title was Lord-Lieutenant of
Ireland from 1746 to 1751. She was married in
1818 to Ireland's only Duke, by whom she had a
family of three sons and one daughter, all of whom
survive her. Her Grace was greatly and de-
servedly esteemed in Maynooth and the districts
surrounding.

RESOURCES OF INDIA.

Eighteen months ago India had become a word
of shame and of weakness to the Englishman. The
unanswerable argument of results had turned
against him, and with the thought that a whole
people, as it seemed, had risen against their oppres-
sors, he blushed in the presence of the stranger, and
falteied even in his own high consciousness and
steadfast resolution. For once we had little to reply
to the foreigners, who can always spare so much
sympathy- for the victim of the British aristocracy,
whether it be the factory child, or the Irishman, or
the tawny Hindoo, whom the former starves by com-
petition and the latter runs through with his
bayonet. It did occur in darkmoments of self-dis-
trust that we certainly were intruders in India ;
that we had blighted one civilization without sub-
stituting another ; that we had been false apostles
of our own religion ; that there must be deep wrong
to implant so savage a resentment; and that the
long-predicted day, had come when of the great
Anglo-Indian Empire there would remain no mate-
rial token but our broken champagne bottles. The
facts most familiar to the Englishman were not such
as to reassure him in the presence of the accuser.
We saw those who had returned rich, and we knew
that Indian life was not exactly that which poets
assign to the regenerators and civilizers of the
human species. There were few who venture to
join issue with one of the company's many foes as
to the railways authorized or in progress, the works
of irri°ation, the state of agriculture and trade, the
condition of the peasantry, the courts of justice,and
the collection of revenue—all said to be as low, as
misirable, and as ill managed as was possible under
the light of day. But how stands the case now?
The war, it is true, is not yet quite over. It has
severed even a wider space and shown a greater in-
tensity than many of us then reckoned upon. Yet
there is hardly one Englishman who is not now
perfectly satisfied with the righteousness of our
cause, and therefore confident of its suc-
cess and resolute to maintain it. The
reason is plain. People know more about
Inda. It has become what many deprecated,—a
Parliamentary and a public question. In Lord
Stanley's speech on Monday night we see the first
fruits of that direct responsibility to the House of
Commons which Lord Derby's friends told as last
year was only another name for faction and corrup-
tion. The affairs of a great empire have been de-
scribed with simplicity, and with no other wish
than the prosperity of the many millions blessed
with our rule; and Lord Derby's own son is the
man to do what was supposed impossible in a Bri-
tish politician.
No doubt, nearly all this information was to be
collected by proper inquiry and research ; but it
is the habit of this country to believe nothing till it
is publicly asserted by a responsible informant, and
has stood the risk of contradiction and the test of
debate. That is what is really meant by respon-
sible government, and it is as much a domestic as a
political practice. Englishmen pin their faith, not
on what they read in their libraries, or are told by
a solitary bookworm, but on the man who pledges
his word at a dinner table, and challenges imme-
diate contradiction. There are piles of Indian
blue-books about us, but six columns of our paper
by a Minister solemnly committed to the full and
exact truth of all he says outweigh them all. His
statements and his promises will alike pass current
with his countrymen ; for they will confidently
assume the one and expect the other. The British
public will now believe—for it has it on the word
of a responsible man—that the trade of India has
doubled in twenty years, that in three years three
thousand miles of railway will be completed, and
that in little more time all the great lines of com-
munication will be traversed by railways, all the
chief cities and ports joined, the interiors opened,
and railways made wherever there is a good object.
The same may be said of the other undertakings
mentioned by Lord Stanley. Extensive works of
navigation and irrigation have been undertaken
or proposed, and some lately finished have proved
immensely productive. The fact is now before
the world, and it will not be the fault of
British capitalists if the good work stops here.
Lord Stanley shows the rapid increase in the export
of cotton under the stimulus of high prices and
better knowledge. Ten thousand eyes have read in
that statement the deliverance of England from the
thraldom and scandal of slave-grown cotton. Lord
Stanley offers regular employment and local train-
ing to civil engineers; he gives encouragement to
European settlers and points out favourable locali-
ties ; he promises sales of land, more secure titles,
and the opportunity of paying in full and redeeming
public dues. No dcubt, many will accept without
hesitation these important offers thus made on the
credit and honour of their country. Lord Stanley
does not generalise or disclaim. There can be no
doubt as to his meaning. If he misleads us, the
forgery is a very culpable one, for he speaks like a
bank note. Sueh is the speech of a responsible
British Minister, exposed to that ordeal which last
year we were told was so dangerous to honesty and
good sense. We feel we may now repose on the
unqualified assurance that no cruelty or injustice
shall be committed by the operation of the Enam
Commission, and that the object is rather to secure
titles and to settle disputes than to confisca` o under
vexatious pretences. On all these points we seem
to have gained a step on " the President of the
Board of Control."
Lord Stanley anticipates that at some future day
England may take the entire responsibility of the
whole Indian debt for the difference of value between
the English and the Indian security. Our grand-
, childrea will decide for themselves whether twenty
or fifty millions is a sufficient price for so great a
responsibility. Perhaps it was not necessary to
observe that a repudiation of the Indian debt would
cause a great shock to British credit. That "repu-
diation" could only take place on the total loss of
the security, viz., the Indian revenue—after a
fearful struggle. uch an event would undoubtedly
shake confidence, not in the honesty, but in the
strength and resources, of this country. Our honesty
cannot be concerned in the payment of a debt
expressly contracted on a given security, at a rate of
interest apportioned to its precarious nature. As
Lord Stanley leaves the question to posterity, we
need not anticipate it, but we should certainly ex-
pect to find great recklessness of borrowing, if Bri-
tish credit could be pledged at once for Indian
purposes. When the question next arises, it may
be under better auspices. The Indian Government
has to earn and merit the confidence of the British
public. It will acquire that confidence if it invests
the rich revenues of India in the public works de-
scribed and promised by Lord Stanley, and not in
ruinous wars of aggression or mere official plunder.
When the electric wire has brought Calcutta within
five minutes of London ; when railways shall have
made the present journeys by dawk or by boats a
matter of fable ; when Europeans can settle and
move in the interior of the Peninsula as securely
and comfortably as in this country, and estates can
be bought and sold as here, no doubt Englishmen
will feel very differently on the subject of the
Indian debt from what they now do. The late
change of the Indian Government is a step in this
direction. We see in the speech before us ample
proof that it is a change for the better, and that
India promised to be more responsibly governed