tion of the Imperial Legislature. Then, what was thought a great change was effected. Every remnant of commercial privilege, and even of commercial character in the East India Company was abolished, and the entire India and China trade was opened to the commercial enterprise of Great Britain, save that, for purposes of revenue, the trade with China in opium was retained exclusively in the hands of the Indian government. Twenty years previously, the trade to India Proper had partially been opened; but the process of change or reform, call it which you will, was less marked and decided in 1813 than in 1833. The progress of the national mind since that period, whether tested by the legislative changes in the administration of the law, in commercial policy, and in municipal and colonial rule, or by the advances in manufacturing art, in locomotion, in literature, science, and the fine arts, has no parallel in the previous history of England, and it was, therefore, only philosophic to expect that when the subject of India, its government and resources, the wants of its 150 millions of people, and the responsibilities of its rulers, came again under consideration, very different criteria of judgment on all these matters would be applied, than on any former occasion of review and of emendation in the policy of the governing nation. One result, too, of the complete opening of the India trade to private enterprise was to interest more persons in matters pertaining to India, whilst the possible capability of that vast territory to yield a large supply of cotton for the factories of Lancashire, and thus, in part at least, to obviate the dangers incidental to an almost total dependence on the American supply of that important raw material, has directed attention to the East, amongst the energetic and indomitable men of Manchester, by whom the subject will never be abandoned so long as the problems, social, commercial, and political, which it involves, are unsolved.

It was no matter of surprise, then, that, for the last two or three years, there have been significant indications that an unusual degree of interest would attach to the discussion of the present year, in reference to the renewal of the East India Company's charter. The committee on the Cultivation of Cotton in India,' obtained by Mr. Bright, threw great light on the vexed question of the land-tax, on the extent of the means of internal transit, and the general capabilities of the soil. Dr. Royle's work on the Culture of Cotton,' and Mr. Chapman's on the Cotton and Commerce of India,' helped greatly to sustain the public interest; and, as preparatory to the struggle in Parliament when the question of revival of the charter should come on, a committee of the Commons was appointed to 'in

quire into the operation of the Act of 3 and 4 Wm. IV. c. 85, 1833, for the better Government of His Majesty's Indian Territories. This committee has proposed for itself a work of no common magnitude, having divided the subject into eight separate heads, viz. :

1. The authorities and agencies for administering the government of India, at home and in India respectively.

2. The military and naval establishments of India, character, extent, and cost.

3. The income and expenditure of the British Indian Empire, showing the produce of the territorial revenues, and of all other sources of income, and the modes of assessing and levying each, in the respective presidencies and districts; also, the progress of trade and navigation in India.

4. The judicial establishments of British India, European and Native, the modes of administering justice, civil and criminal, and the working of the system, as exhibited by tables of appeals and decisions.

5. The measures adopted, and the institutions established and endowed for the promotion of education in India.

'6. Works of local improvement executed, in progress, and now under consideration.

7. Ecclesiastical provision for the diffusion of Christian spiritual instruction.

The committee has taken evidence on the first head, and published the same with a very brief report. It is now occupied on the other branches of inquiry, and the evidence is being published from time to time. The press, too, has contributed its share to the excitement, and an Indian Reform Society has been established, and which may or may not become an East Indian league, for effecting a thorough reform in the government of India at HOME and IN INDIA,-if the Government measure of this month should fail to command approval out of doors with the general public.

Whilst, from all these cirumstances combined, the subject of a renewal of the Company's charter possessed an unusual interest, there were present to the minds of thoughtful men certain new conditions in the state of India itself, and of its people, which suggested the absolute necessity of establishing new relations between the ruling nation and the millions of India, and afforded matter for grave and somewhat anxious speculation as to the permanence of British rule in the East. Foremost in importance of these new conditions, is the great fact, that the British rule, directly or indirectly, is now, only now, coextensive with the geographical and natural limits of Hindoostan. This could not have been asserted three or four years ago,

when the issue of the Sikh war was uncertain. Now, from Calcutta to Peshawar, and from the Himalayas to Cape Comorin, a portion of the world's surface, stretching over 20 degrees of longitude, and 25 degrees of latitude, rich in resources, and densely peopled-British authority is supreme! The magnitude of the sovereignty exercised by Great Britain, and the vast personal, social, and political interests which it involves, for good or for evil, will be best shown in a tabular form.

NATIVE STATES not under the direct Rule, but within the Limits of the Political Supremacy of the East India Company: showing Area, Supposed Population, and Estimated Revenue."

These figures show an area four-fold that of Great Britain, Ireland, and France united, and a larger population by 150 per cent. The revenue given is the land revenue only. The total gross revenue is calculated by Mr. Campbell at 48 millions sterling, and of this the share received by the supreme govern ment of India in the year 1849-50 was £27,757,853, and a more recent annual statement ranges upwards of 29 millions sterling. Relatively to the revenues of France or England, 48 millions may seem a small sum, but if the comparative productiveness of labour be taken into account,-if it be considered that the industry of Hindoostan is almost exclusively agricultural, and that after the most primitive fashion,—it is a very large amount, much larger, in fact, relatively to the total annual produce of India, than the revenue of France or Great Britain, relatively to their annual productiveness respectively.

The next important new condition,-for such it was until the mischievous war with Burmah was commenced,-was that the whole of our Indian Empire was at peace internally and externally, and, as respects its internal quietude, likely to remain

So.

The last of these conditions was the fact of considerable progress in general intelligence amongst the more influential classes of the nation, and more especially in the presidency

towns.

Until 1833, the government patronage was sparingly given to scholastic institutions and colleges, which gave instruction either in English, or according to the system which prevailed in the country,— that is to say, to Mahomedans through the medium of the Persian and Arabic languages; to Hindoos, in Sanscrit and the vernacular languages. In the latter institutions English was taught to those who desired it, in addition to their usual scholastic course. But soon after the passing of the Act of 1833, Lord W. Bentinck came to the resolution to withdraw prospectively all support to education in the native form and discontinuing any cultivation of Eastern literature, to confine the government patronage and superintendence exclusively to seminaries which taught the science and literature of Europe, through the medium of the English language.'-(Prinsep, pp. 62, 63.)

Subsequently vernacular instruction was added to that of English, but this did not satisfy the professors of the native seminaries which had heretofore enjoyed the government contributions, and ultimately the matter was compromised by Lord Auckland, who allowed them to retain these contributions, merely stipulating that English should be included in the things taught. In all the schools supported by Government, it was provided that no minister of religion shall be employed as a teacher, nor the scripture of any sect be used as a class-book. For twenty years,' says Mr. Prinsep (pp. 64, 65), this system has been at work, and more than one thousand youths have been annually turned out of the government and private seminaries, at each presidency, who have had a course of instruction similar in all respects to that communicated in the schools and universities of England. The first-class scholars pass nearly as good an examination as the young men of Haileybury, Oxford, or Cambridge; but it is exclusively English literature and science that these young men acquire.'

These young men affect a sort of semi-European style of intellectual or literary character, and if they become authors, write in English. But there is another class of students, educated in the vernacular language and literature, through whom European ideas are being fast inculcated in the popular form of newspapers, circulated in the languages of the country,

and read by as many of the population as can read and write.

To estimate aright the importance of this new element, intro- . duced into the social and political fabric of Indian society, it must be noted, that the press of India is now absolutely free, that it is somewhat licentious, and that, up to this hour, the government has taken no steps to form a public opinion, by having its own newspaper organs, or any other mode of influencing the general mind and judgment by means of the press. It throws itself proudly, though not wisely, back on its public acts and conduct, and leaves these to speak in its vindication, in reply to all impugners, slanderers, or questioners. It scarcely ever condescends to notice the most offensive and almost treasonable attacks, and forbids its servants, even anonymously, to undertake its defence, or to justify its acts, legislative or administrative; and besides all this vis inertia in reference to direct assaults upon it, the government does not even make public such matters of state as relate to legislation, police, revenue, &c., and thereby forfeits any advantage or credit it might derive from a correct statement of its actual procedure in state matters.*

It requires no extraordinary sagacity to discover in these circumstances, extended education, a free press, and an indifference to the legitimate use of that press by the government,elements of vast influence, either for good or for evil, just as the two former are wisely directed, and the latter is as wisely abandoned. These elements are working! In our August number for 1852, p. 145, the certainty of this evolving of power was distinctly and strongly put. It is admitted now by Mr. Prinsep and by Mr. Campbell, that such is the fact. The words of the former (p. 69) are emphatic, though they only re-echo those just alluded to. "It is undoubtedly a new status to be taken into account, as an element in future arrangements, that we are fast creating in India both a free press and a reading public.' In what manner that reading public' thinks and speaks, is now no secret! Several petitions by natives, in reference to our rule in India, have been presented this year to the legislature, the most remarkable of which was that introduced by the Earl of Harrowby, and commented upon with extraordinary talent and earnestness by the Earl of Albemarle and Lord Ellenborough. The petition may or may not be, in part or whole, the concoction of an European brain, though there is nothing in it which a cultivated Hindoo, conversant with English literature and politics, might not write. One thing is quite certain, it bears

Campbell's India, p. 257.