pectation of his friends. It has been seen that it was not with him, capax imperii nisi imperasset. The letter* written by Sir

Sir J. Malcolm does not always do himself justice, or has not always justice done him. Therefore we rejoice in the publication of the above letter. It must remove any suspicion, wherever the suspicion had been entertained, that he is a man to view with jealousy the advancement or the fame of others in his own career. One such letter is more honourable to him than all the chapters of his History of Malwa-though Munro writes to him of one of the said chapters: I have weighed the ninth 'chapter in my hand; and I could not help thinking, when poising it, as 'Sancho did when poising Mambrino's helmet in his hand, "what a prodigious head the Pagan must have, whose capacious skull could con'tain thirteen such ponderous chapters as this!" I look at it with reverence when I open the drawer in which it lies deposited.'-(Vol. ii. p. 75.) Munro held as high an opinion of his Political History of India. Have you seen the Last Man? He ought to die reading your last chap'ter. Your new edition will be by far the most valuable book in our language on our Indian empire, to every person who takes any interest in its stability.-(Vol. ii. p. 163.) These volumes contain equal evidence of Munro's anxiety to see Malcolm a governor in India. In the late unfortunate discussion between him, as governor of Bombay, and the Supreme Court, we conceive that the blame rests much more on the law, and on those who have left the law in this condition, than on either of the immediate parties, who with equal good faith supported or opposed the jurisdiction of the court. Surely it is time to settle the limits of this jurisdiction beyond the possibility of mistake. This dispute has now run the round of every presidency. It had convulsed Bengal as early as Warren Hastings. It disturbed Madras during the govern ment of Munro. His opinion, that this jurisdiction should be strictly defined, and that the court should be completely debarred from all cognizance, in any shape, of the acts of government, is expressed in a letter to Mr Canning, and in a very able minute, arising out of the grant of an Altamgha Jagheer, in the strongest terms. The natives don't un'derstand our refinements. Where we intend protection, they experience only complication. Where we mean checks, they see only divisions. The 'threads cross, break, and the empire, which threads only have supported, 'falls.' The tone of Lord Ellenborough's incredible despatch from the menagerie of the India Board, is indeed a different matter. Every drop of judicial blood flowing in his veins should have taught him better. It reminded us of Sir John's account of the squabbles of former times. 'During such contentions at home, the state of the Company's affairs ' abroad may be imagined. The spirit of the principles upon which these were regulated will be collected from an extract of a letter from their 'governor at home to an officer who had been appointed judge for civil 'affairs in India. "I expect," said this commercial despot," my will ' and orders shall be your rule, and not the laws of England, which are a heap of nonsense, compiled by a number of country gentlemen who hardly know how to govern their own families, much less the regulating

John Malcolm to Secretary Adams on this occasion is in the true spirit of generous and admiring friendship :

I send you a copy of a public letter from Tom Munro Saheb, written for the information of Sir Thomas Hislop. If this letter makes the same impression upon you as it did upon me, we shall all recede as this extraordinary man comes forward. We use common vulgar means, and go on zealously, and actively, and courageously enough; but how different is his part in the drama! Insulated in an enemy's country, with no military means whatever, (five disposable companies of sepoys were nothing,) he forms the plan of subduing the country, expelling the army by which it is occupied, and collecting the revenues that are due to the enemy, through the means of the inhabitants themselves, aided and supported by a few irregular infantry whom he invites from the neighbouring provinces for that purpose. His plan, which is at once simple and great, is successful in a degree that a mind like his could alone have anticipated. The country comes into his hands by the most legitimate of all modes, the zealous and spirited efforts of the natives to place themselves under his rule, and to enjoy the benefits of a government which, when administered by a man like him, is one of the best in the world. Munro, they say, has been aided in this great work by his local reputation, but that adds to his title to praise. His popularity, in the quarter where he is placed, is the result of long experience of his talents and virtues, and rests exactly upon that basis of which an able and good man may be proud. Confess, after reading the enclosed, that I have a right to exult in the eagerness with which I pressed upon you the necessity of bringing forward this master-workman. You had only heard of him at a distance; I had seen him near. Lord Hastings, however, showed on this, as on every other occasion, that he had only one desire-how best to provide for every possible exigency of the public service.'-(Vol. i. p. 530.)

We have been detained so long over Munro's personal biography, that we have not room at present to go into the supposed peculiarities of his Indian system. The reader, who has received a quarter of the delight which the contemplation of such a character ought to convey, can testify his gratitude in no manner that would be half so acceptable to the subject of it, as in taking up this question in a sober, enquiring, but determined spirit. The cycle, too, has nearly brought us to the hour when the English public is periodically awakened into a momentary interest rcspecting India. We mean to avail ourselves of the moment, to

companies and foreign commerce. Having now the power of con demning the Company's enemies, or such as shall be deemed so, parti 'cularly those that shall question the Company's power over all the British subjects in India, I expect my orders from time to time shall 'be obeyed, and received as statute laws."-Political History of India, vol. i. p. 26.

catch it as it flies, and to beg for a hearing, at least, once in twenty years, in the name of humanity and justice. We plead for eighty millions of human beings, whom, on the other side of the globe, a mysterious providence has subjected to our power. A foreign dominion is in itself a hardship. One in which every individual native is excluded from every possible office of emolument or power, is a degradation. One in which it can be stated as a fact that its taxation decreases population, that its police increases crime, that its courts of justice are more dreaded than no law-is a dominion that we dare not designate. The Fifth Report has now been before the public nearly twenty years. Parliament and the Company have since published bulky volumes. Up to the point, thus already placed within the reach of a worse than incurious public, how does the evidence stand? Materials enough exist, by which this evidence may be carried down to the present year. Are there not men amongst the Directors (a body whose general excellence of intention it is the extreme of ignorance or calumny to doubt)-are there not men in Parliament (which Parliament holds the keys to open and to shut for the English people)-who will look after these things? Burke failed to make out an Indian Verres. But a system, which has baffled the goodness of Cornwallis and the energy of Munro, may be worse than all the proconsuls Rome ever turned loose on the Asia of her rule. What can possibly be the state of things where the administration of that which goes by the name of justice, is averred to be in reality an administration of

*It is a thousand pities that the acrimony of an almost personal hostility should appear so early and so prominently in discussions, where we should hope that all parties are equally interested for truth and justice. The task is one which requires all the calmness and the caution that a nation in solemn council can command. However fearfully our experiments may have failed, we think that, in their summary condemnations, Mr Crawford, Mr Rickards, and Mr Buckingham, have not made the reasonable allowances for the original difficulties of the case, and for the zealous good intentions which the Directors and their servants have exerted as a body to meet these difficulties. The administration of justice in India is, we believe, at present a crying evil. A belief so general is great reason for serious investigation; but none for calumniating either Cornwallis or Munro-or the Directors, whose benevolence of purpose was acknowledged by Mr Mill, while yet simply their his torian-or the great majority of Indian civilians, whom the impracticability of the system alone has beat. We perfectly agree with Mr Mangles, as observed in his late excellent pamphlet, that the materials out of which this investigation must be carried on are to be found in the juditial selections so accurately and honestly returned—and only there.

expensive delay, of elaborate ignorance, and of indiscriminate chance? What are the courts of English jurisdiction from which the Mahratta flies in despair to his own wild and irregular tribunals;-in respect of which the trembling subject of the Nizam congratulates himself that, amidst all his miseries, English justice is a grievance that he has as yet escaped?

Parliament must enquire. European servants are not to be had in sufficient numbers. The revenue of India could not maintain them. If there was one in every village, they have not, and cannot have, the requisite experience and knowledge. They ought, therefore, to be confined to the moral control of a general and appellant superintendence. Native servants we can have to any number, for we can afford to pay them such salaries as will command their services, and will make it their policy to be honest. We are bound to make for them the same experiment which was alone found to answer with ourselves. In any given case, adjudication by a native is not only desirable, but indispensable for correct decision. None but a native can see the way through the turns of native evidence. In a political point of view, it will improve their condition, raise their character, and conciliate them to our rule. Were it nothing but mere justice, it is our duty to extend to them every means of improvement and of happiness that we can give them with safety to ourselves. No less is it for our honour so to train them up, that when the charmed wand of our power is broken, we may leave behind us, like the Romans, some seeds of political and moral cultivation, to compensate for a foreign sway. It is more like Tartars than Englishmen not to seek to fit them for the government of themselves, so that they may one day pass, and gratefully, from a servitude, which has been only discipline, into national independence.

No. CII. will be published in July.

NOTE to Article on Southey's Colloquies.

In our review of Dr Southey's Colloquies there is (No. C. p. 557) an error respecting the Northumberland Household Book. It appears from that record, that the servants of the Northumberland family had, contrary to our statement, bread with their meat. We were led into a mistake on this subject by Hume, who has, strangely enough, stated the consumption of wheat in the establishment at only one-twentieth part of what it really was. We think it right to mention this inaccuracy, though it does not materially affect our argument.