pendent of them, and, therefore, under no obligation to pay the smallest attention to their remonstrances, provided they retain the support of the King, the Parliament, and the public. The opinions of these three bodies, right or wrong, are those only which ministers acknowledge as a check on their proceedings. Nor are the disadvantages under which they labour, in examining questions of Indian policy, by any means so great as Sir John Malcolm would fain persuade us. The names of " things" may be translated, and made as intelligible to" the

English reader" as they are to the native, or to the Englishman who has spent thirty years in India. If that were not the case, how did Lord Cornwallis and Lord Wellesley, in the first week of their administration, take into their hands the reins of government with as much confidence, and as much skill and success, as if they had been nursed and dandled into a knowledge of the languages of India, or spent days and nights in their acquisition? How are such facts reconcilable with the importance which Sir John Malcolm attaches to "local knowledge;" an importance which constitutes the foundation of his whole system, and of the principal arguments by which he supports it? It is true that the names of "persons and places" cannot be trans

lated, but what is there more

confusing to the "sense" in the name of Tippoo than in the name of Bonaparte? in the names of Plassy, Laswary, and Assye, than in the names of Blenheim, Salamanca, and Waterloo?

Besides the futility of the objection, founded on the foreign sound of Indian words, it is to be observed that the objection is not applicable to the British community in India. Their knowledge is not acquired through the spectacles of books, but by local observation. Their interest in the subject is not deadened by distance, nor distracted by the obtrusion of nearer objects and louder solicitations. Their ability, therefore, to assist the Parliament and people of England, in thoroughly understanding the circumstances and interests of India, is indisputable. To give to them the liberty of unlicensed printing would be to provide the most effectual and cheapest security against local mal-administration which it is possible to establish. But Sir John Malcolm goes farther in quest of a check, and fares worse. He shuts the mouth of the Indian public, and leaves open (because he dare not propose to shut) that of the English public, which, by his own showing, is disqualified for the task of usefully commenting on the affairs of India. He also leaves to Parliament its freedom of investigation

with the same acknowledgement of its incompetence, and maintains, at an incalculable expense, an establishment for the express purpose of controlling the Board of Control, by sending up probationary drafts of paragraphs, on which the latter "hold the pen of correction," running with unlimited freedom and absolute authority; and we may imagine with what spirit an unseen controversy is supported ubi tu pulsas, ego vapulo

tantum.

While the Indian public is silenced and excluded, and that of England depreciated and distrusted, it is evidently the object of Sir John Malcolm to give to men, who have performed approved services in India, a monopoly of claims to hold high office connected with the government of India, both in England and in India. Since they alone have a true understanding of Indian affairs, and know how far and in what instances they ought to be exempted from the influence of principles which are commonly held to be of universal application, a certain number of them must be active members of the Board of Control; and, since the Board must be counterpoised by the Court, another party of them must infallibly be Directors, so that half the parterre should just reflect the other. That such persons should be considered eligible, according to their

qualifications and opportunities of making them known, for high office in every department of government is most reasonable; but, that they should be esteemed the only depositaries of knowledge regarding India, and that the existence of the East-India Company, with its monopoly of the tea-trade and its legion of clerks, should be prolonged for the sole purpose of providing comfortable places for them, wherein they are to assist in the drafting of despatches, which may not be adopted, and to sign despatches of which they have not approved, is a degree of extravagance to which the well-earned reputation of Sir John Malcolm will never reconcile the members of both houses of Parliament, to whom, in spite of their alleged incompetence, the decision of this matter will soon be committed.

It may be said, that whatever may be deficient in the qualifications of the Directors for the discharge of their political functions, is supplied by those of their secretaries and examiners, who are men of acknowledged ability and information. But whatever may be the merit of these gentlemen, they labour under great and depressing disadvantages; nor is it possible that they can proceed with any degree of alacrity and sustained zeal while smarting under the censorship exer

cised on their productions by the antagonist-clerks of the Board of Control.

Indeed, most people would rather be charged with duties distinctly ministerial, than be mocked with the name and semblance of

power, while the substance is in other hands. If there were the slightest utility in this double apparatus, why is the management of Indian affairs the only department of government to which it is applied? Why not give to every other department two sets of administrative officers, one ostensibly directing, but really directed,—the other nominally controlling, but really directing?

Let us see, too, how Sir John Malcolm attempts to reconcile the respect which ought to be entertained for the Court of Directors with the power vested in the Board of Control. Of the importance which he attaches to the upholding of the respectability of the Directors, the following passages are sufficiently illustrative. "It is to a system of depression they (i. e. "those who aim at the destruction of the Company) trust for ultimate success; but nothing can be more hazardous to the interests of the "Indian empire than this mode of killing, as it

were, by inches the body through whom it is "governed. The Court of Directors should not only be maintained in all their rights and pri