notion that every member of this favored body is entitled to £900 a year for life, in an elegant European retreat, immediately on completing his quarter of a century of Indian Service. In point of fact the Government gives him considerably less than £300 a year; and this he seldom gets before his thirtieth year of service. The Annuity, in reality, consists of two portions of £ 500 a year each one made up partly from public money, and partly from a sort of tontine on lapsed subscriptions of members who have died before retiring. These subscriptions are compulsory, being deducted from the monthly pay of every officer to the tune of some five per cent. The other moiety is the value of the subscriber's payments at ten per cent., per annum. A large fine is demanded that the annuity may be paid quarterly in advance; and the subscriptions of any member, whose payments, owing to length of service and unusually high rates of salary, may have exceeded £5000, are forfeited. The first of these, if it were untrammelled by the second, is a fair provision. If every Civil officer could get £500 a year for life after his twenty five years of service, all would be well. The provision, though modest, would be not inadequate; and worn out, disappointed public servants, although they might have held poor posts, and saved no money, could be got rid of without cruelty. Instead of which, what is the working of the present system? The fund only provides a certain number of annuities in each year, and an officer out of employ must simply starve until it comes to his turn to obtain one. No wonder if some useless men encumber the service, owing to a natural reluctance on the part of their superiors to turn them entirely adrift.

There is another fund, the "Civil Fund" as it is called, out of which the widows and orphans of Civil Officers are provided for, which must of course be kept up. We cannot at the end of a paper on Administrative Reform, enter into the details of this subject; but would just mention, that it would be better for all parties if the former fund (that for Annuities) were entirely abolished, Government taking so much of the accumulations as was found necessary to guarantee the pension of £500 a year, and returning the balance to subscribers ad valorem on their past contributions. If only as a kind of compensation for all the injury it is bringing on the service, Government is bound to take up this matter in a liberal spirit. As for the Civil fund, we will only here observe, that even whig statesmen are, for the most part, English gentlemen; and that, were they not, the service may surely commit, in all confidence, the sacred cause of the fatherless and the widow, to a Monarch who is herself, both wife and mother.

ART. II.-British Settlers.-Report of the Commissioners on Indigo Planting. 1860.

THE

THE condition of colonies depends in a great measure on the character of their local government. Wise rulers frame equitable laws, and, appointing proper executive officers, keep the courts of justice pure, encourage enterprising capitalists to develope the mineral, agricultural and commercial resources of the country, afford every facility for the transport of traffic on roads, rivers and seas, and behold in the increasing numbers of settlers from the mother country, a wall of strength, a safeguard against anarchy, and the fairest prospect of preserving in a loyal and prosperous state the foreign possessions of their Sovereign. The results of their administration are seen in reclaimed wastes waving with corn, populous cities standing on the sites of primeval forests, flourishing manufactures, crowded marts, merchant fleets, and well attended schools, colleges and churches. Under their auspices colonies, larger than many kingdoms, passing over the intervening stage of youth, shoot up from infancy into manhood, and attain at once all the characteristics of ancient commonwealths. We speak not of fabled regions: this sudden rise and rapid progress are exemplified in the Australian settlements and other dependencies of the British crown, where Anglo-Saxons, putting forth indomitable energy, have turned the wilds of nature into great and wealthy states, which in the race of social and moral advancement vie with the mother country, and in their educational and ecclesiastical polity leave her far in the rear.

The effects of an unenlightened, weak and wavering government, are seen in the depression of agriculture, trade and commerce, and the departure of capitalists and labourers to other lands.

Emigration from a country may be a proof of its numerical strength, wealth and prosperity, as at present illustrated by the groups of well conditioned people that leave Great Britain for its distant dependencies; but emigration may likewise be a proof of the misery of a country, and the incapacity of the men to whom its destinies are confided. In the plains of India and on the declivities of her mountains, the jungles, capable of being cleared and made highly productive, are larger than the whole area of England. Why are they not brought under tillage, is a question which will naturally arise in every inquiring mind. Is it owing to the few

ness of the inhabitants, and the want of labourers? On the contrary the increase of the population has been remarkably great, and many thousands of labourers have been sent to Ceylon, the Mauritius and the West Indian isles,-men in abject poverty, and conveyed to their destination at the expense of their future employers. With the most fertile land lying waste at their own doors, they have left their homes to supply the labour-market of foreign countries. This indicates something radically wrong in the laws or their administration, and is a fact which speaks volumes against our rule. It clearly shows that though the chief ' edible commodities of the people are selling at prices almost unprecedented, and extended cultivation would therefore yield ample profit, there is no adequate inducement to reclaim these vast wildernesses, and the labouring poor consequently resort to exile as their only refuge. Six thousand are to be shipped for the French colonies-six thousand living proofs of the bad Government of India, and of the wretchedness of its inhabitants. Not only do our senators 'facilitate the shipment of native labourers, but appear likely to effect the exodus of British settlers also. Indeed from the date of the battle of Plassey to the present time, nearly every year has witnessed legislation more or less antagonistic to European residents. Indifferent alike to the material prosperity of the country, the evangelization of its inhabitants, and to a free press, that powerful auxiliary in the administration of public affairs, the late East India Company, with a zeal worthy of the dark ages, occupied itself in deporting merchants, editors and clergymen. The few non-official English who stayed remained on sufferance, liable to be banished whenever capricious tyranny dictated. The reasonable request to be allowed to become owners of the land was not granted them. Natives might purchase estates, but the most to which Christians could aspire, was to be tenants of Hindoo and Mohommedan proprietors. When Parliament compelled the Company to adopt more liberal policy, the local authorities, with the sanction of the Court of Directors, used their utmost endeavours to neutralize it, by throwing all possible impediments in the way of capitalists: every administration, except that of Lord Bentinck, was either hostile or apathetic; and Arms Bills, Black Acts, and the gagging of the press show but too plainly that the ancient spirit animates the present government. Legislators, on whom nature has not deigned to bestow the far-reaching minds of statesmen, not having a clear perception of what they are doing, may frame laws whose tendency is to discourage, ruin and expel British settlers, but the people for whose welfare they are enacted will be the first to deplore their results.

If a manufacture of incalculable benefit to the country be attended with partial evils, which all persons admit to be the case, it is the province of the state to make provision for the removal of the evils, not to destroy the manufacture itself. The most perfect work of art may chance to be out of order, but while susceptible of repair, no person, unless a child or maniac, would dash it to pieces. It may be said that for uprightness of intention, and solicitude to promote the prosperity of India, full credit should be given to the Members of Council: but these are not the only attributes requisite to govern an empire; wisdom is quite as necessary, and without it legislation must be little better than groping in the dark, and will seldom prove otherwise than burtful to the realm. Virtue, of the most exalted character, cannot be accepted as an adequate apology for ignorance and wrong doing. Some of the greatest evils which have afflicted the world have sprung from motives and aspirations that would be honourable even to angels. Before giving credit to the government for a spirit of equity to British settlers, it may be well to inquire when it has been merited, and whether in the indigo crisis the acts of the executive deserved praise or condemnation. To form a right judgment on this important matter, it will be necessary to bear in mind that in 1857, while mutiny and rebellion shook the empire to its base lower Bengal was tranquil, and the planters, though ten, twenty and thirty miles apart from each other, remained on their estates with their wives and children unapprehensive of danger. No troops, policemen, or guards of any description surrounded their solitary dwellings. Had they been the tyrants they have been pictured, how was it that the pent up passions of the people they had oppressed did not, when so favourable an opportunity presented itself, burst forth in deeds of rapine and bloodshed? The temptation to anarchy was great, yet not a single murder was committed, not a shred of property stolen, nor the least change made in the respectful demeanour of their tenantry. During the whole period of the rebellion, the counties of Jessore, Pubna, Nuddea, Moorshedabad, Rajshaye, and Malda continued quiet, and no traveller in passing through them could have imagined, that the North Western portions of the empire were then in a blaze: but in the early part of last year these peaceful districts began to assume a different aspect; discontent and turbulence gradually appeared, and at length developed themselves in riots, which resulted in the flight, ruin and imprisonment of thousands of the peasantry, and the bankruptcy of enterprising capitalists. As no change had been made in the system of indigo-cultivation, and the planters are not even accused of having done any thing

to outrage the feelings of the farmers, the question naturally arises, how was this disastrous state of things brought about? Several causes may have been at work, and to each in its proper place we shall advert.

In making his financial statement Mr. Wilson embraced the opportunity to speak about indigo-cultivation, and to give expression to the enlightened sentiments embodied in the following language: 'It is one of the few cultivations in India which attract British 'capital and skill to direct native labour. That is the kind of industry which, above all others, the Government would wish to encourage, and on that account alone they would feel precluded from placing any impediment in the way of its extension. It 'would be more in consonance with our views to remove what little duty there now is as soon as circumstances will permit. The value of the influence of European gentlemen settled in 'our county districts cannot, in our opinion, be overestimated, and it will be the steadfast policy of the Government to encourage it in every way we can.' Scarcely had these sentiments been uttered when Mr. Grant fell under suspicion, whether deservedly or not we shall presently inquire, of labouring to frustrate the design of that distinguished and now lamented statesman. A crusade was commenced against planters, productive of evils which malevolent persons doubtless contemplated with feelings of pleasure. Indeed there was much cause for exultation, for every day's proceedings proved increasingly destructive to the interests of British settlers. Speaking of the excitement and hostility of the peasantry, the Manager of the Sindoori Concern, under date of the 21st of February, writes: The ryots are fully under the impression that the Government wish to suppress the cultivation of indigo, and will support 'them against the planter, and they certainly have every reason for saying so, for they are often told so by the police.' And

on the 29th he writes: The ryots are at present in a state of 'great excitement; in fact they are mad, and ready for any mis'chief. They daily try to burn our factory and seed-golahs. 'Most of our servants have left us from fear, as the ryots have threatened to murder them and burn their houses; and I fear 'that the few that are still with us will soon leave, for the ryots prevent them getting food from the neighbouring bazars. If some most stringent steps are not taken by the Government at once, none of us will be able to remain in the Mofussil, and then there will be a general loot of the factories-rather a 'serious state of affairs when you consider what is at stake. Even now it is not safe to ride from factory to factory. The 'whole country is up, and if it go on much longer in this way