Star.
London, England, 1813-07-17 00:00:00

on account of the territorial revenue in India, was
comprehended under the fourth class of appropria-
tion. The Company's dividends were to be paid in
preference to all other demands ; first, out of the
proceeds of the Company's sales, except in the dis-
charge of the debt in India.
The Earl of LAUDERDALE, whatever sense
lie entertained of the enormous magnitude of the
question then before their Lordships in all its bear-
ings, relations, and consequences, and howsoever
strongly it called for full and ample discussion, yet
when he looked round and saw the state of the
House, he felt himself admonished to confine himself
to,scanty limits of observation, and should chiefly
employ the present occasion in registering his solemn
protest on the Journals of their Lordships' House,
against a measure which he considered so undigested,
so alarming, and so injurious to the political and
commercial interests of the country' and to the pro.
sperity and security of our possessions in India. He
was persuaded, that .not only was the commercial
Reveaue inadequate to the discharge of the territorial
arrears, but that the territorial debt was caused" and
created by the commercial deficiency. In that opi-
nion he was fortified and sanctioned by the recorded
testimony of the Marquis Wellesley. He had often
solicited information and explanation on the subject
of the Bill, and of the Resolutions, but frdm'first to'
last was disappointed. The practice of railing loans
in India, and paying the dividends in England, was
of a most injurious and ruinous tendency, and in the
end must affect the complete spoliation of that coun-
try.—Here the Noble Lord referred to the.anthority
of Mr. Hastings, who had condemned and reprobat-
ed the practice,. which he said must lead to ultimate
ruin. The capital of the Company, he contended,
was ideal, and that they were trading merely on cre-
dit. As to the free trade to India, that had been
tried.
.under the provisions of 1793, and •the conse-
quence was, that no reasonable man who had made
the experiment would proceed in his speculations. It
was indeed a mere farce to suppose that the free
trader could enjoy the advantages professed to be
held forth in the Bill ; and lie would freely; venture
to predict, that if any one should proceed upon it, he
would be tired of his experiment in one year. On
the whole, his objections were not confined to the Bill
itself, but to the general policy which had long pre-
vailed in the whole administration of affairs in India.

In the continuance of that system, Government
must advance more money to the Company p--that
money must be supplied by means of further taxa-
tion, and it was not only adverse to all wise and pro.
videnr political regulation, but directly hostile to the
commercial interests of the country. He should
trouble their Lordships no further than to state and
record his solemn protest against the Bill.
The Earl of BUCKINGHAMSHIRE was per-
suaded that the EastlndiaCompany possessed ample
means, provided no extraordinary occurrence took
place, for discharging every claim upon them, and
he must distinctly enter his protest against the al-
'edged impoverished state of their funds. The state
of the Company was nourishing, their revenue ample,
their credit great, and their trade increasing every
, day. There was no reason to suppose that by the
new regulations the advantages of that trade which
foreigners had hitherto enjoyed, would be amply
communicated to the British merchant, and America
yield up a large proportion of her profits. As to the
C impany's trade being conducted to disadvantage,
in immense sum had been cleared last year, and he
could produce the evidence of. Mr. Cartwright to
shew that R 4,580,000 had been cleared in a period
of no very wide extent. In short, the state of the
Company's affairs was such, that in the ordinary
course of things, the most prosperous resufts"might
be expected, and eminent advantages laid open to
the private merchant, provided ire proceeded with
discretion.
.The Earl of LAUDERDALE could by no
means admit die jus,tre4 of the description which
the Noble Earl had given of the state of the East
IrOja Company's Aran s ;—but if even all that had
been said of their prosperity and commercial re-
sources were true, all the territory, all the planta-
tirrrs, all the wealth and commerce of which they
could boast, would not, in his mind, compensate for
that system of spoliation with which those advan-
toges must be accompanied, and which, in the end,
must beggar and ruin India.
Ihe Bill was then read the second time, and or-
dered to be committed on Monday.
PALMER'S REMENERATION.

Upon the Order for going into a Committee on
Mr. Palmer's Remuneration Bill,
Earl MORTON thought it proper to make a few
observations. He had heard of nothing on the part
of Mr. Palmer, or those who urged the present Bill,
to inauce him to alter the opinion which, in Common
with the majority of their Lordships, he had often
expressed before. Much had been said about the
merit of Mr. Palmer in the discovery which he had
made of facilitating the progress of the mails by the
means of coaches. Really there seemed nothing very
admirable in that ; it was little different horn the
ordinary uses of stage coaches, which had existed be-
• fore Mr. Palmer was born. That House had reject- I
ed three successive Bills brought up from the other I
House of Parliament, setting forth claims advanced
by Mr. Palmer for an enormous sum of money, but
which their Lordships, in his opinion, very properly
threw out, thereby shewing themselves better guar-
dians of the public purse than that branch of the Le-
gislature which was supposed to have the special care
of it. He could not discover any motive for depart-
ing from the principle on which he, with the House,
had previously resisted the application of Mr. Pal-
. mer ; and he thought it was incumbent on those who
supported the present 13ill to shew what new claims,
or what new merits, Mr. Palmer had set forth to in-
duce their Lordships to sanction a measure which
seemed too much connected with the object and in-
tention of passing Bills by solicitation. His Lord.:
Ship was decidedly against the Bill.
Tbe. Earl of 41VERP001., should offer but a
few observations. He did not perceive the incon-
sistency to which his Noble Friend would advert, in
their I...oldships passing the present Bill, though they
had *lifted the former thee. He was among that
majority which liad.opposed the former Bills, and he
pposed them on two principles; first, he objected to
• the charm of right set up by Mr. Palmer; idly, he
• objected to the enormousness of 00 or 490,000, to.
vt4t4 wish "000 emu, compepaii94 pore