The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1844-02-13 00:00:00

HOUSE OF COMMONS-THURSDAY.

Lord ASHLEY called the attention of the house to the
situation and treatment of the Ameers of Scinde. After
citing, as a ground for his own interference, an opinion of
Sir H. Pottinger in their favour, he took a short retro-
spect of their early history, and referred to treaties of
amity between them and this country, down to the year
1838. The object of our negotiations had throughout been
the navigation of the Indus, which, under certain restric-
tions, we had thus obtained. No doubt the conduct of the
Ameers towards the army of Sir John Keane was a disho-
nest one ; but at Khelat they had made amends by a truly
cordial 00-operation. The increase of our difficulties did
not diminish their friendship, even when their hostility
might have done much towards crushing us. They had
now been charged with treachery • but he could find no
proof of it; though he admitted that they were desirous
of getting rid of the English from their country. They
had been accused of writing treasonable letters, but they
denied the charge, and asked why those letters were not
produced to them ? Not merely the forms of law, but'
the substance of justice, required such production. He
complained also of the publication of Sir C. Napier's run-
ning commentary upon Major Outram's letters. He
urged the improbability that the Ameers should have in-
tended treachery when they had taken none of the pre-
cautions which might have been expected to accompany
such a design. He desired the house to remember the
assistance given by them at the time of the disasters in
Cabul. Ile contrasted the conduct of the present
Governor-General towards these Ameers with that of
Lord Cornwallis in the treatment of Tippoo's children.
He enlarged upon the policy of public virtue, exhorted
Great Britain to pursue it, and concluded by moving an
address to her Majesty, praying that she would take the
subject into consideration.
Mr. ROEBUCK considered Lord Ashley to have taken
a narrow view of a great subject. The real question was,
at what time that policy commenced which had made
these evil steps inevitable. Until 1834 the proceedings of
the British government had been directed to the fair ob-
ject of enlarging our commerce. Even until 1838 we had
kept the tiger's paw within the velvet. Then we tried to
establish a commercial agent in Scinde, and, the Ameers
naturally dreading us, we had put the screw upon them,
by threatening them with Runjeet Singh. They gave way,
and our agent was established at Hyderabad. Upon Lord
Auckland he charged the injustice and the want of wisdom
which were now developed. The year had hardly ended

'i

when we enteredinto the tritoittits trcaty which provided
that Schah Soojah should renounce his claim upon the
Punjaub, pay tribute to Iluhjt et Singh, and forbear from
any attempt upon the Anirer,, on condition that thee
should pay him a sum to besetit9d by the mediation of the
English ; he being all that tio e a mere puppet of the
En4lish, who supplied him with the only means of hos-
tility which he possessed. Anti then Lord Auckland had
the hardihood to pretend to the A treers that he would
endeavour to prevail on &thrill Soojah to accept a rea-
sonable amount. The mans proposed for so prevailing
on him, were horse, foot, and artillery, which Colonel
Pottinger proposed to have ready, for the sake of the
moral effect they would produce. A letter had been
written by the Ameers of Byderabad to the Schah of
Persia, which Lord Auekland chose to consider as an
offence against the British power; and this was to be made
a reason for transferring their dominion to another family
of Ameers more friendly to Britain. Mr. Roebuck read
a letter from Colonel Pottinger to Lord Auckland, re-
commending that troops should be stationed in certain
parts of Scinde, which measure would establish the su-
premacy of Britain as effectually as if she possessed the
whole country of Scinde. A new treaty was now imposed
upon the Aineers ; and the party who first broke it was
the British government. The Ameers now tried evasion ;
and well they might, when they felt the serpent coiling
closer round them, and preparing finally to crush them.
After a condemnation of the route chosen through Scinde
to Afghanistan, he adverted to the difficulty of the po-
sition in which Lord Ellenborough found himself on suc-
ceeding to Lord Auckland amid the unexampled disasters
of that time. On learning what the Affghans had done
against the British force, the Beloochees of Scinde were
inspirited, under the injuries they had sustained, to hope
much from the adoption of a similar course. Thus there
was now an extensive conspiracy throughout India to
break down the power of England ; and Lord Ellen.
borough had the anxious question to decide, whether,
after retreating in Affghanistan, we were also to withdraw
from Scinde. The resolution he formed was justifiable,
although it was so only by the vast and dangerous ne-
cessity under which he was placed. Mr. Roebuck likewise
vindicated Sir C. Napier against some criticisms which
Lord Ashley had made upon his notes on Major Outram's
letters; called upan Sir C. Napier's country to give him
in generous measure the praise which was due to him
under his heavy responsibility ; and read a letter addressed
to Major Outram by Sir C. Napier himself, in justification
of the course adopted. Mr. Roebuck concluded with
three resolutions, which, however, found no seconder.
Mr. EMERSON TENNENT considered that the policy
of Lord Auckland was completed by the treaty of 1829 ;
and that, therefore, Lord Ellenborough's own views, and
not Lord Auckland's previous policy, must be deemed to
have produced the measures since taken against the
Ameers. Mr. E. Tennent went on to take a review of
our earlier negotiations with the Ameers, stating against
them a strong case of bad faith. lie questioned the ge-
nuineness of the letter purporting to have been written by
Sir H. Pottinger, which Lord Ashley had cited as a fa-
vourable opinion of the Ameers; such an opinion being
contrary to all the sentiments of Sir H. Pottinger as ap-
pearing throughout the papers printed for the house.
The treaty of 1839 had been a very beneficial one to the
people of Scinde ; the British governor bad never infringed
it; but it was hardly signed before the Ameers of Hyder-
abad endeavoured to break it. A charge had been made
against Lord Ellenborough that he had involved those
Ameers who were innocent in the same ruin with those
who were guilty ' • but, in fact, all were guilty, though there
were shades in their guilt; and this appeared on the evi-
dence of Major Outram himself. The instructions of the
government had been, that they should be treated with
every respect and accommodation consistent with their
safe custody, without regard to any strict economy, and
it would be found that those instructions had been care-
fully fulfilled.
Sir JOHN HOBHOUSE animadverted with a good deal of
pleasantry upon Mr. Roebuck's speech and upon his pro-
posed resolutions, to which he himself had never, in his
five-and-twenty years' experience of parliament, seen
anything similar ; and so thought the house, for no one
member of it was found to second them. Not a man
would back the learned gentleman in the race of glory
which he had been so eager to run with Lord Ashley.
There was hardly one material fact among all those men-
tioned by Mr. Roebuck, which he had not much misstated.
Sir John Hobhouse went into many particulars, for the
purpose of proving this exception to Mr. Roebuck's ac-
curacy ; and protested, with some indignation, against this
attack upon Lord Auckland, a man bearing the highest
character, and acquainted with Indian policy—almost as
well as Mr. Roebuck himself. He justified the arrange-
ment under which the Ameers had paid a sum of money
to Schah Soojah, and defended the entry into Affghanis-
ton. The hon. and learned gentleman had dealt rather
roughly with Colonel Pottinger, observing upon the over-
charged notion which Indian servants entertained of their
own importance ; but that was a notion not confined to
Indian servants. He had cited as censurable certain re-
commendations made by Colonel Pottinger to the Go-
vernor, but he seemed to be unaware that the Governor
did not act upon them. Why he had thought it necessary
to say so much in defence of Sir C. Napier, was not very
intelligible ; for not only had Sir C. Napier not been
attacked, but his name would eternally be held, by every
lover of his country, in esteem and admiration. It be-
hoved the house to be circumspect in judging the conduct
of distant officers intrusted with great interests, and
sometimes bolding in suspense the very balance of Eng-
land's destiny. In general, the less that that house inter-
fered with the distant Government of India, the better.
Certainly he could not vote for the present motion of Lord
Ashley, which would be a sort of side-wind censure upon
the Governor-General.
Commodore NAPIER praised the course taken by his
relation in India, and inveighed against the Ameers for
their treachery, cruelty, and injustice. He also made a
rough attack, amid much laughter, upon the class of po-
litical agents, whom he thought mischievous enough in
peace, and wholly intolerable in war.
Sir R. PEEL, enforced the recommendation of Sir J.
Hobhouse, that the house should give all possible credit
to the motives and to the conduct of men administering
great public functions in distant quarters of the world.
To the motives of Lord Auckland the fullest credit was
due, even from those who might differ from him in his
policy. He feared that when civilization came into con-
tact with barbarism, it was hardly possible to enforce
precisely the same maxims which applied among the states
of modern Europe. It was difficult when Russia was
intriguing against England in India, to say calmly, I look
at my Vattel and my Puffendorf, and I refrain from march-
ing my troops across a neutral territory. He would deal
the same general measure to Lord Auckland as to Lord
Ellenborough ; but Lord Ellenborough was entitled also
to the benefit of the argument derived from the circum-
stances in which he was placed by preceding acts. When
he arrived in India, a material change had already been
made in the general constitution of Scinde ; British as-
cendancy had been established there, and the feudal sys-
tem of its chiefs abolished. The independence of Scinde
was in truth at an end. There had been great reverses in
Scinde, which it was important to counteract. Among
other states, commanding armies of 30,000 or 40,000 men,
Lord Ellenborough perceived a growing disposition to
shake off the power of Britain, which the events in Cabul
had led the natives to regard with diminished considera-
tion ; nor is it clear that if he had desired to abandon
Scinde, the troops could have been safely withdrawn ;
nor that their withdrawal would have been followed by
the return of the Ameers to the obligations of the treaties.
It might be that there was not, as against some of the
Ameers, such evidence as would have been deemed suffi-
cient in an English court of justice ; but it was impracti-
cable to deal with India upon the rules of British evidence.
If you established the principle that an Ameer shall not
be responsible for the treachery of a minister of his, of
whose tendency to bad faith he has had full notice, you
might bid farewell to your Indian empire. Of Sir Chas.
Napier's high merits he would attempt to speak on Mon-
day next; and he would bear testimony meanwhile to the
personal valour, the military skill, and the civil sagacity
of that distinguished man. To Lord Ashley's motion
the government could not consent. He trusted the house
would not take the responsibility of advising what mea-
sures should be taken at the distance of 5,000 miles. If
this motion were adopted, every one of these Ameers
would be set at liberty, to revisit Scinde, to resume his
revenues, and to enter into intrigues of all kinds. How
to deal with them was a difficult question, and one which
had been anxiously considered ; and with that considera-
tion he would advise that the house should not interfere.
But he would assure them that it was the wish of the go-
vernment to avoid all needless personal restraint, and to
treat the Ameers with the utmost consideration and com-
fort. At present a sum of about 424,000 per annum was
allotted to their maintenance; and if this were found in-
sufficient, no narrow economy would be allowed to stand
in the way of any further reasonable indulgence to which
they might have been accustomed.
Lord JOHN RUSSELL agreed that it would be difficult
to affirm this motion. He could not undertake the re-
sponsibility of giving a vote which might involve conse-
quences so dangerous to the peace of Scinde. Still the
suddenness of these Indian events, and the height from
which the Ameers had fallen, entitled them to every pos-
sible indulgence. As to the policy of Lord Ellenborough,
the paper had been too recently printed to have given him
the opportunity of forming a mature opinion • and on this
head, therefore, he desired to reserve himself. His con-
fidence in Lord Ellenborough had certainly been some-
what shaken by that nobleman's own changes of opiniop
on the subject of the territorial limits of India. Two
things, however, he would say—that Sir C. Napier could
not have acted otherwise than he did; and that he must
question the opinions thrown out by Sir R. Peel on the
subject of the law of nations. Ile could understand an
extreme case, which might justify such a course as Lord
Ellenborough had taken with respect to Scinde ; but he
could not accede to the notion of invading a country for
the sake either of improving its government, or of advanc-
ing the march of civilization.
Sir R. PEEL explained his meaning to be simply that
there were Indian cases in which the European rules of
international law would not apply. That could have been
the only ground of Lord Auckland's measures.
Lord ASHLEY replied, and the house divided,—
AFograiints.t his motion ........... . 2,002

Majority against it
Mr. DIVETT then moved an address to the crown to
dismiss F. B. Bonham, Esq., from his office of storekeeper
of the Ordnance. He represented Mr. Bonham to be
connected with the elections of the conservative party, and
to be the confidential friend of the prime minister. Gen-
tlemen coming from the country to look for candidates
were introduced to Mr. Bonham ; candidates seeking the
image.
There of contest looked to him as the golden
There was no confidential service or mission in which he
was not employed. He had been concerned in settling
the election for Bridport, and had been particularly active
at the late London election. So had the Attorney-
General, who bad told hen it was not decent to put this
notice on the older-list. Mr. Divett and Sir Gregory
Lewin had paired for the London election. Sir Gregory