purpose by the strictures of Dr. Johnson, on Pope's intended poem, and that, in more open defiance of the critic's opinion, he determined to write it in blank verse, although he originally proposed to adopt the heroic measure in rhyme. I should have been happy to gratify the curiofity of my readers with his reafons for this determination, but they do not appear.

Notwithstanding all that might have been expected from the genius, tafte, and erudition of Sir William Jones on a fubject like this, I cannot, for my own part, lament the application of his time and labour to other ftudies, calculated to inftruct as well as to delight the public; we have far more reafon to lament, that he did not live to return to his native country through Perfia, and that we have loft for ever that information which would have been supplied by his researches and obfervations during the journey. The ftrength of a constitution, never vigorous, was unequal to the inceffant exertion of his

mental faculties: and whilft we admire the boundless activity of his mind, we anticipate with forrow its fatal effects upon his health.

I have frequently remarked, that it was the prevailing wifh of Sir William Jones to render his talents and attainments ufeful to his country. The tenour of his correfpondence fhews, that his principal studies were directed to this object; and nearly two years preceding the period at which I am arrived, he describes the mode in which he propofes to give effect to his wishes, and expreffes his determination to accomplish it, with an energy which marks his fenfe of the importance of the work he then meditated.

Having now qualified himself, by his knowledge of the Sanscrit and Hindu laws, for the execution of his plan, he determined to delay it no longer; and as he could not prudently defray the expense of the undertaking from his own finances, he deemed it proper to apply to the government of Bengal for their affistance. The following letter which he addreffed to the Governor-General, Lord

Cornwallis, on this fubject, contains all the explanations neceffary.

MY LORD,

It has long been my wish to address the government of the British dominions in India on the administration of juftice among the natives of Bengal and Bahar, a subject of equal importance to the appellate jurisdiction of the fupreme court at Calcutta, where the judges are required by the legislature to decide controverfies between Hindu and Mohammedan parties, according to their refpective laws of contracts, and of fucceffion to property; they had, I believe, fo decided them, in most cases before the ftatute to which I allude, had paffed; and the parliament only confirmed that mode of decifion, which the obvious principles of justice had led them before to adopt. Nothing indeed could be more obviously juft, than to determine private contefts according to thofe laws, which the parties themselves had ever confidered as the rules of their conduct and engagements in civil life; nor could any thing be wiser, than, by

a legislative act, to affure the Hindu and Muffulman subjects of Great Britain, that the private laws which they severally held facred, and a violation of which they would have thought the moft grievous oppreffion, should not be fuperfeded by a new fyftem of which they could have no knowledge, and which they must have confidered as imposed on them by a spirit of rigour and intolerance.

So far the principle of decifion between the native parties in a cause appears perfectly clear; but the difficulty lies (as in most other cafes) in the application of the principle to practice; for, the Hindu and Muffulman laws are locked up for the most part in two very difficult languages, Sanfcrit and Arabic, which few Europeans will ever learn, because neither of them leads to any advantage in worldly pursuits: and if we give judgment only from the opinions of the native lawyers and scholars, we can never be fure, that we have not been deceived by them.

It would be abfurd and unjust to pass an indifcriminate cenfure on fo confiderable a

body of men; but my experience juftifies me in declaring, that I could not with an eafy confcience concur in a decifion, merely on the written opinion of native lawyers, in any cause in which they could have the remotest intereft in misleading the court; nor, how vigilant foever we might be, would it be very difficult for them to mislead us; for a single obfcure text, explained by themselves, might be quoted as exprefs authority, though perhaps in the very book from which it was felected, it might be differently explained or introduced only for the purpose of being exploded. The obvious remedy for this evil had occurred to me before I left England, where I had communicated my fentiments to fome friends in parliament, and on the bench in Westminster-Hall, of whofe difcernment I had the highest opinion: and those sentiments I propofe to unfold in this letter, with as much brevity as the magnitude of the subject will admit.

If we had a complete digeft of Hindu and Mohammedan laws, after the model of Juf