another the great departments of Indian administration; the army expenditure, the land revenue, the civil courts, the police, salt, opium, and spirituous liquors; and as regards each he adduces evidence to prove that the institutions we have set up are unsuited to the people of India, and that their great cost is with difficulty provided by means of excessive taxation. Summing up his case he maintains that 'after making full allowance for the not inconsiderable benefits conferred on India by its connection with this country, the balance is still woefully against our Indian Government; that it is still an alien bureaucracy living chiefly for itself, with little or no sympathy with the people; that, while sadly unsuitable to the wants of the people, it is ruinously expensive; that its ruinous expense is now only defrayed by a resort to the most merciless expedients, and that the result is poverty, ruin, and starvation to the people.' So miserably poor are these our Indian fellow-subjects after all these years of our rule, that forty millions, or one-fifth of the whole population, go through life on insufficient food, while it is officially admitted that upwards of six millions of men, women, and children, have died from actual starvation during the last seven years. Such is the accusation, and such are the facts brought forward in evidence. And the appeal is made to the people of this country on behalf of two hundred millions of their law-abiding and inoffensive fellow-subjects, who are unrepresented and unable to help themselves or even to make their voice heard.
Now let us try to approach this great question in a businesslike way. An independent Englishman of undoubted personal acquaintance with India has brought these charges. As public accuser he has done his part. What is now our duty as members of the English public? What can we do in order that this appeal may be heard by a competent tribunal, and decided in accordance with justice and those broad principles of public morality which have been accepted by the English people, and set forth in the memorable words of the Queen's Proclamation in 1858?
In former days the whole administration of India was subjected by Parliament at prescribed intervals to an impartial, intelligent, and searching inquiry. On each occasion before the East India Company's Charter was renewed, there was a reckoning and stock was taken; so that once at least in twenty years the British nation looked into Indian affairs, and scanned narrowly the conduct of their agents in the East, a terror to evil-doers and a praise to them who did well. Then every grievance was sifted before the House of Commons. The veil of secrecy was removed, and a Burke and a Fox arose to judgment. A wholesome jealousy also existed of the powers and privileges of the Company, and this sentiment operated in favour of the Indian races. If periodical inquiries of this scope and solemnity were held at the present day, we might well be content to await the
