the Company without reserve; or, as if their possession of that exclusive benefit was, in itself, the most advantageous arrangement for the public interest. The grant has always proceeded upon a principle, of bargain and covenant; and on the consideration of a pecuniary advance, to be made by the Company to the Public, as the condition for the renewal of the lease of the public rights in the India trade. Upon this principle alone, has the exclusive trade ever been conceded to the East India Company; either under its present form, or under any of its former denominations.

To shorten the discussion, however, let the Proprietors and the Company take the following compressed view, of the probable consequences which would severally result, from a compliance with, or rejection of, the proposition made by Government, as the basis of a new Charter; and let them consider, in which of the two they foresee the greatest security for their own future interests.

If, upon maturely weighing the case before them, the Company should accede to the proposition of Government; and if an arrangement, founded upon that proposition, should receive the sanction of Parliament;

1. The Company will preserve the entire China trade; and this principal sphere of their commercial profit, will remain undisturbed.

2. They will possess advantages for continuing to carry on the India trade, so far superior to those of all private competitors, from their territorial and commercial revenues, that, with a moderate exertion of their activity, they may preserve almost the whole of that trade.

S. They will possess the regulation and control of the India Trade, so far as depends upon the Indian Governments; and as those Governments will continue in the exercise of the executive power, all the private merchants, who may repair to the ports and harbours within the extensive limits of their jurisdiction, will of course be subject to the authority of their Government.

4. They will retain the whole patronage and expenditure of a revenue of upwards of Fifteen Millions sterling per annum in India, together with very extensive establishments at home, depending upon that revenue.

5. The accounts between the public and the Company, being brought to no sudden and violent crisis of settlement, may be amicably and leisurely adjusted, with a view to mutual convenience.

On the other hand, should the Company incautiously drop the substance to pursue the shadow, and refuse the proposition of Government: and should Parliament, upon a full and deliberate consideration of the actual circumstances of the Company, deem it more advisable to bring their accounts with the public to a thorough investigation and final settlement, than to admit the Company's new pretensions to a perpetual monopoly:

1. The Company will lose as much of the China trade as may fall into the hands of the private merchants, who think they shall be able to sell tea 85 per cent. cheaper than the Company.

2. They will lose the control of the India Commerce, and will carry on their traffic in India as subjects, in common with the private British merchants.

3. By that loss, voluntarily incurred, they may throw the greatest part of the trade into the hands of the private traders.

4. They will lose the patronage of India, and the establishments depending upon it; which they will thus compel Parliament, contrary to the disposition of Government, to place under different arrangements.

5. The accounts between the public and the Company must be referred for investigation to Commissioners of Inquiry, to be finally settled and adjusted.

It is now for the Proprietors, after well considering these two alternatives, to determine, under which of the two their dividend will be most secure,

With regard to constitutional objections against taking the Government of India out of the hands of the Company (upon which objection their confidence in their present pretensions chiefly reposes), it is difficult to conceive that the wisdom of Parliament, after the experience of so many years, is unequal to the task of devising a system as good as that of the Company, without incurring the evil which those Constitutional objections suppose. The Company's Government, it must be recollected, has been a production of chance, and has grown by the progress of accidental events. It has, indeed, answered far better in practice than could have been

expected, if we consider its origin; and therefore, it is not desirable that it should be materially altered; neither is it likely that any such alteration of the system should be contemplated, unless the indiscretion of the Company should impose upon Parliament the necessity of resorting to that measure. But it certainly does not seem to be a measure insuperably difficult to preserve whatever is really good in the present system, and even, to remedy some of its defects, without departing from the path of experience, and resorting to improvements of theory and experiment.

There is one point of view, however, in which such a system would acquire an evident advantage over that which has hitherto obtained: viz. that it would, in every session, be liable to the revision of Parliament, and to the immediate correction of every error which might be observed, and to such further continual improvements as experience might direct; not being embarrassed by the compact of a Charter.

GRACCHUS.

LETTER VIII.

Wednesday, February 17, 1813.

It is very observable, that the objections which have been made

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by the East India Company to the admission of ships, returning from India, to import and dispose of their cargoes at any other place than the Port of London, are not founded so much upon any statement of the injury which the trade of the Company would sustain `by admitting them, as upon a provident regard for the adventurers themselves, and a caution held out to them not to entertain an expectation of benefiting by any commercial speculation in India; since the long experience of the Company has enabled them to show, that it must be ultimately ruinous to the speculator. The sum of the experience, alleged by those who have come forward to defend this point, is "That it is not practicable to extend the consumption of

European manufactures generally in India ;" and the facts which they have asserted in support of this experimental argument, and upon which they rest its strength, are these four following :

1. That the natives of India entertain a strong characteristic aversion to engage in commercial transactions with foreigners.

2. That their religious prejudices, customs, habits, and tastes, render it impossible that they should ever become consumers of our manufactures, to any extent.

3. That their poverty opposes an insuperable bar to such consumption.

4. That these facts and their consequences are demonstrated in the examples of the Portuguese and the Dutch, who were not able to carry their export eommerce with India to any considerable ex

tent.

Let us take these several propositions in their order; and examine, how far they possess that force of truth, which the Company has supposed to belong to them.

1. In the infancy of the European intercourse with India, the sole object of those who engaged in its commerce was, to procure the produce and commodities of the East. In this pursuit, so far were the natives from opposing any obstacles to their endeavours, that they were found disposed to afford every facility to a traffic, which brought them specie in exchange for their manufactures, and for the productions of their soil. This fact, which is established by every writer who treated upon the subject of the India commerce during that period, would of itself constitute a complete answer to those who advance the proposition, that the natives of India are averse, through an established prejudice, to engage in commercial transac tions with foreigners.

When the ingenuity of the French and German artists enabled the speculators in this traffic to introduce works of fancy, we learn from Tavernier, who made six several journeys, between the years 1645 and 1670, from France to India, by various routes, that the Rajahs of Hindostan and of the Deccan, as well as the Mahomedan princes of those countries, admitted him into their states; that the articles of manufacture which he introduced were received and purchased with an avidity which encouraged him to continue, for so many years, the pursuit of that commerce; that he found the natives

of India, spread over the whole range of country from the Indus to the Caspian Sea, engaged in the active prosecution of foreign traffic; and that the number of Banyans (the chief commercial cast of Hindoos) at that time established at Ispahan, were not less than ten thousand. Forster, who, in a more recent period, followed Tavernier in one of the routes which he had traversed, informs us, that in the year 1783, he found Banyans established at Astrachan, within the Russian empire. And we further learn from Bruce, that the principal agents of commerce at Mocha and Jedda, in the Red Sea, were Banyans; and that they had even extended themselves into Abyssinia. No stronger evidence, therefore, can be required to make it manifest, that foreign as well as internal trade has been in all ages, and still continues to be at the present day, a common practice, and a favorite pursuit of the Hindoos.

e. With regard to the restrictive operation of the religious prejudices and customs of the Hindoos, against the adoption of foreign articles of manufacture; Mr. Colebrooke, lately a member of the Supreme Council, and an eminent Oriental scholar, has furnished us with information upon this subject, equally important and decisive. In an unpublished work, on the Agriculture and Commerce of Bengal, cited in The Edinburgh Review, for November, 1812, that gentleman observes, that, according to the sentiments of the Hindoos, "All things come undefiled from the shop;" or, in the words of Menu, "The hands of an Artist employed in his art are always pure; and so is every vendible commodity when exposed to sale; that woollens are purified by a single exposure to air, while water is necessary to purify other clothes." Proceeding with these principles, he further informs us, "That the rainy season and winter of India afford real occasion for the use of woollens; that the fabrics of Europe are always preferred; and, if the articles were adapted in the manufacture to the Indian use, and the price reduced, the consumption would descend from the middle even to the more numerous classes. That the natives of India do not want a taste for porcelaine, and other elegant wares; that they require vast quantities of metallic vessels, and of hardware; that, considering the greatness of the population, and the disposition of the natives to use European manufactures, it cannot be doubted that a great vend might be found, and that the demand will increase with the restoration of wealth."