But the disorders of Persia, since the
death of Kouli Khan, have wholly destroyed the trade
And the of that country; and the trade to Turkey, by
trade to
Turkey.
death of Kouli Khan, have wholly destroyed the trade
And the of that country; and the trade to Turkey, by
trade to
Turkey.
Edmund Burke
ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA.
41
the crown, the great cementing regulation Inspectionof
of the whole act of 1773, has, along with has failedin
effect.
all the others, entirely failed in its effect.
Your Committee, in observing on the fail- Failure in
ure of this act, do not consider the intrinsic the act.
defects or mistakes in the law itself as the sole cause
of its miscarriage. The general policy of the nation
with regard to this object has been, they conceive,
erroneous; and no remedy by laws, under the prevalence of that policy, can be effectual. Before any
remedial law can have its just operation, the affairs
of India must be restored to their natural order.
The prosperity of the natives must be previously
secured, before any profit from them whatsoever is
attempted. For as long as a system prevails which
regards the transmission of great wealth to this country, either for the Company or the state, as its principal end, so long will it be impossible that those who are the instruments of that scheme should not
be actuated by the same spirit for their own private
purposes. It will be worse: they will support the
injuries done to the natives for their selfish ends by
new injuries done in favor of those before whom they
are to account. It is not reasonably to be expected
that a public rapacious and improvident should be
served by any of its subordinates with disinterestedness or foresight.
II. -CONNECTION OF GREAT BRITAIN WITH INDIA.
IN order to open more fully the tendency of the
policy which has hitherto prevailed, and that the
House may be enabled, in any regulations which
may be made, to follow the tracks of the abuse, and
? ? ? ? 42 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
to apply an appropriated remedy to a particular distemper, your Committee think it expedient to consider in some detail the manner in which India is connected with this kingdom, --which is the second
head of their plan.
The two great links by which this connection is
maintained are, first, the East India Company's commerce, and, next, the government set over the natives by that company and by the crown. The first of these principles of connection, namely, the East
India Company's trade, is to be first considered, not
only as it operates by itself, but as having a powerful influence over the general policy and the particular measures of the Company's government. Your Committee apprehend that the present state, nature,
and tendency of this trade are not generally understood.
Trade to In- Until the acquisition of great territorial
dia formerly
carried on revenues by the East India Company, the
chiefly in
silver. trade with India was carried on upon the
common principles of commerce, - namely, by sending out such commodities as found a demand in the
India market, and, where that demand was not adequate to the reciprocal call of the European market
for Indian goods, by a large annual exportation of
treasure, chiefly in silver. In some years that export has been as high as six hundred and eighty
thousand pounds sterling. The other European companies trading to India traded thither on the same
footing. Their export of bullion was probably larger
in proportion to the total of their commerce, as their
commerce itself bore a much larger proportion to
the British than it does at this time or has done
for many years past. But stating it to be equal to
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 43
the British, the whole of the silver sent annually
from Europe into Hindostan could not'fall very short
of twelve or thirteen hundred thousand pounds a
year. This influx of money, poured into India by
an emulation of all the commercial nations of Europe, encouraged industry and promoted cultivation
in a high degree, notwithstanding the frequent wars
with which that country was harassed, and the vices
which existed in its internal government. On the
other hand, the export of so much silver was sometimes a subject of grudging and uneasiness in Europe, and a commerce carried on through such a medium to many appeared in speculation of doubtful
advantage. But the practical demands of commerce
bore down those speculative objections. The East
India commodities were so essential for animating
all other branches of trade, and for completing the
commercial circle, that all nations contended for it
with the greatest avidity. The English company
flourished under this exportation for a very long series of years. The nation was considerably benefited
both in trade and in revenue; and the dividends of
the proprietors were often high, and always sufficient
to keep up the credit of the Company's stock in heart
and vigor.
But at or very soon after the acquisition How trade
carried on
of the territorial revenues to the English since.
company, the period of which may be reckoned as
completed about the year 1765, a very great revolution took place in commerce as well as in dominion;
and it was a revolution which affected the trade of
Hindostan with all other European nations, as well
as with that in whose favor and by whose power it
was accomplished. From that time bullion was no
? ? ? ? 44 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
longer regularly exported by the English East India
Company to Bengal, or any part of Hindostan; and
it was soon exported in much smaller quantities by
any other nation. A new way of supplying the market of Europe, by means of the British power and
influence, was invented: a species of trade (if such
it may be called) by which it is absolutely impossible that India should not be radically and irretrievably ruined, although our possessions there were to be ordered and governed upon principles diametrically opposite to those which now prevail in the
system and practice of the British company's administration.
Ivestments. A certain portion of the revenues of Bengal has been for many years set apart to
be employed in the purchase of goods for exportation to England, and this is called the Investment.
The greatness of this investment has been the standard by which the merit of the Company's principal
servants has been too generally estimated; and this
main cause of the impoverishment of India has been
generally taken as a measure of its wealth and prosperity. Numerous fleets of large ships, loaded with
the most valuable commodities of the East, annually
arriving in England, in a constant and increasing
succession, imposed upon the public eye, and naturally gave rise to an opinion of the happy condition
and growing opulence of a country whose surplus
productions occupied so vast a space in the commercial world. This export from India seemed to im
ply also a reciprocal supply, by which the trading
capital employed in those productions was continually strengthened and enlarged. But the payment
of a tribute, and not a beneficial commerce to that
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 45
country, wore this specious and delusive appearance.
The fame of a great territorial revenue, Increaseof
exaggerated, as is usual in such cases, be- expenses.
yond even its value, and the abundant fortunes of the
Company's officers, military and civil, which flowed
into Europe with a full tide, raised in the proprietors
of East India stock a premature desire of partaking
with their servants in the fruits of that splendid adventure. Government also thought they could not be too early in their claims for a share of what they
considered themselves as entitled to in every foreign
acquisition made by the power of this kingdom,
through whatever hands or by whatever means it
was made. These two parties, after some struggle,
came to an agreement to divide between them the
profits which their speculation proposed to realize
in England from the territorial revenue in Bengal.
About two hundred thousand pounds was added to
the annual dividends of the proprietors. Four hundred thousand was given to the state, which, added to the old dividend, brought a constant charge upon
the mixed interest of Indian trade and revenue of
eight hundred thousand pounds a year. This was to
be provided for at all events.
By that vast demand on the territorial fund, the
correctives and qualifications which might have been
gradually applied to the abuses in Indian commerce
and government were rendered extremely difficult.
The practice of an investment from the Progress of
revenue began in the year 1766, before investments.
arrangements were made for securing and appropriating an assured fund for that purpose in the treasury, and for diffusing it from thence upon the
? ? ? ? 46 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
manufactures of the country in a just proportion and
in the proper season. There was, indeed, for a short
time, a surplus of cash in the treasury. It was in
some shape to be sent home to its owners. To send it
out in silver was subject to two manifest inconveniences. First, the country would be exhausted of its circulating medium. A scarcity of coin was already
felt in Bengal. Cossim Ali Khan, (the Nabob whom
the Company's servants had lately set up, and newly
expelled,) during the short period of his power, had
exhausted the country by every mode of extortion; in
his flight he carried off an immense treasure, which
has been variously computed, but by none at less than
three millions sterling. A country so exhausted of
its coin, and harassed by three revolutions rapidly
succeeding each other, was rather an object that stood
in need of every kind of refreshment and recruit than
one which could subsist under new evacuations. The
next, and equally obvious inconvenience, was to the
Company itself. To send silver into Europe would
be to send it from the best to the worst market.
When arrived, the most profitable use which could
be made of it would be to send it back to Bengal for
the purchase of Indian merchandise. It was necessary, therefore, to turn the Company's revenue into its commerce. The first investment was about five
hundred thousand pounds, and care was taken afterwards to enlarge it. In the years 1767 and 1768 it arose to seven hundred thousand.
Consequen- This new system of trade, carried on
cesofthem. through the medium of power and public
revenue, very soon produced its natural effects.
The loudest complaints arose among the natives,
and among all the foreigners who traded to Bengal.
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 47
It must unquestionably have thrown the whole mercantile system of the country into the greatest confusion. With regard to the natives, no expedient
was proposed for their relief. The case was serious
with respect to European powers. The Presidency
plainly represented to the Directors, that some agreement should be made with foreign nations for providing their investment to a certain amount, or that
the deficiencies then subsisting must terminate in an
open rupture with France. The Directors, pressed
by the large payments in England, were not free to
abandon their system; and all possible means of diverting the manufactures into the Company's investment were still anxiously sought and pursued, until the difficulties of the foreign companies were at length removed by the natural flow of the fortunes
of the Company's servants into Europe, in the manner which will be stated hereafter.
But, with all these endeavors of the Presidency,
the investment sunk in 1769, and they were even
obliged to pay for a part of the goods to private merchants in the Company's bonds, bearing interest.
It was plain that this course of business could not
hold. The manufacturers of Bengal, far from being
generally in a condition to give credit, have always
required advances to be made to them; so have the
merchants very generally, - at least, since the prevalence of the English power in India. It was necessary, therefore, and so the Presidency of Calcutta
represented the matter, to provide beforehand a
year's advance. This required great efforts; and
they were made. Notwithstanding the famine in
1770, which wasted Bengal in a manner dreadful
beyond all example, the investment, by a variety
? ? ? ? 48 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
of successive expedients, many of them of the most
dangerous nature and tendency, was forcibly kept
tip; and even in that forced and unnatural state it
gathered strength almost every year. The debts contracted in the infancy of the system were gradually
reduced, and the advances to contractors and mnanufacturers were regularly made; so that the goods
from Bengal, purchased from the territorial revenues,
from the sale of European goods, and from the produce of the monopolies, for the four years which ended
with 1780, when the investment from the surplus revenues finally closed, were never less than a million sterling, and commonly nearer twelve hundred thousand pounds. - This million is the lowest value of the goods
sent to Europe for which no satisfaction is made. *
Remittances About an hundred thousand pounds a year
from Bengal
to China is also remitted from Bengal, on the Comand the Presidencies.
of the product of that money flows into the direct
trade from China to Europe. Besides this, Bengal
sends a regular supply in time of peace to those Presidencies which are unequal to their own establishment. To Bombay the remittance in money, bills, or
goods, for none of which there is a return, amounts
to one hundred and sixty thousand pounds a year at
a medium.
Exports The goods which are exported from Eufrom Eng- rope to India consist chiefly of military and
India. naval stores, of clothing for troops, and of
other objects for the consumption of the Europeans
residing there; and, excepting some lead, copper uten* The sale, to the amount of about one hundred thousand pounds
annually, of the export from Great Britain ought to be deducted from
this million.
pany's account, to China; and the whole
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 49
sils and sheet copper, woollen cloth, and other commodities of little comparative value, no sort of merchandise is sent from England that is in demand for the wants or desires of the native inhabitants.
When an account is taken of the inter- Badeffects
of investcourse (for it is not commerce) which is ment.
carried on between Bengal and England, the pernicious effects of the system of investment from revenue
will appear in the strongest point of view. In that
view, the whole exported produce of the country, so
far as the Company is concerned, is not exchanged in
the course of barter, but is taken away without any
return or payment whatsoever. In a commercial
light, therefore, England becomes annually bankrupt.
to Bengal to the amount nearly of its whole dealing;
or rather, the country has suffered what is tantamount to an annual plunder of its manufactures and
its produce to the value of twelve hundred thousand
pounds.
In time of peace, three foreign companies Foreign
appear at first sight to bring their contri- companies.
bution of trade to the supply of this continual drain.
These are the companies of France, Holland, and
Denmark. But when the object is consid- Consequences of
ered more nearly, instead of relief, these their trade.
companies, who from their want of authority in the
country might seem to trade upon a principle merely
commercial, will be found to add their full proportion
to the calamity brought upon Bengal by the destructive system of the ruling power; because the greater
part of the capital of all these companies, and perhaps
the whole capital of some of them, is furnished exactly as the British is, out of the revenues of the country. The civil and military servants of the English VOL. VIII. 4
? ? ? ? 50 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
East India Company being restricted in drawing bills
upoll Europe, and none of' them ever making or proposing an establisllment in India, a very great part
of their fortunes, well or ill gotten, is in all probability thrown, as fast as required, into the cash of these
companies.
In all other countries, the revenue, following the
natural course and order of things, arises out of their
commerce. Here, by a mischievous inversion of that
order, the whole foreign maritime trade, whether
English, French, Dutch, or Danish, arises from the
revenues; and these are carried out of the country
without producing anything to compensate so heavy
a loss.
Foreign Your Committee have not been able to
companies'
investments. discover the entire value of the investment
made by foreign companies. But, as the investment
which the English East India Company derived from
its revenues, and even from its public credit, is for
the year 1783 to be wholly stopped, it has been proposed to private persons to make a subscription for
an investment oil their own account. This investment is to be equal to the sum of 800,0001. Another
loan has been also made for an investment on the
Company's account to China of 200,0001. This makes
a million; and there is no question that much more
could be readily had for bills upon Europe. Now, as
there is no doubt that the whole of the money remitted is the property of British subljects, (none else haviiig any interest in remitting to Eiurope,) it is not unfair to suppose that a very great part, if not the whole, of what may firnd its way into this new channel is not
newly created, but only diverted from those channels
in which it formerly rall, that is, the cash of the foreign trading companies.
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 51
Besides the investment made in goods by Ofthe silver
foreign companies from the funds of British china.
subjects, these subjects have been for some time in
the practice of sending very great sums in gold and
silver directly to China on their own account. In
a memorial presented to the Governor-General and
Council, in March, 1782, it appears that the principal money lent by British subjects to one company
of merchants in China then amounted to seven millions of dollars, about one million seven hundred
thousand pounds sterling; and not the smallest particle of silver sent to China ever returns to India.
It is not easy to determine in what proportions this
enormous sum of money has been sent from Madras
or from Bengal; but it equally exhausts a country
belonging to this kingdom, whether it comes from
the one or from the other.
But that the greatness of all these drains, Revenue
above the
and their effects, may be rendered more investment,
visible, your Committee have turned their how applied.
consideration to the employment of those parts of
the Bengal revenue which are not employed in the
Company's own investments for China and for Europe. What is taken over and above the investment (when any investment can be made) from the gross revenue, either for the charge of collection or
for civil and military establishments, is in time of
peace two millions at the least. From the portion of
that sum which goes to the support of civil government the natives are almost wholly excluded, as they
are from the principal collections of revenue. With
very few exceptions, they are only employed as servants and agents to Europeans, or in the inferior
departments of collection, when it is absolutely im
? ? ? ? 52 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
possible to proceed a step without their assistance.
For some time after the acquisition of the territorial
Allowance revenue, the sum of 420,0001. a year was
to Nabob of
Bengal. paid, according to the stipulation of a treaty,
to the Nabob of Bengal, for the support of his government. This sum, however inconsiderable, compared to
the revenues of the province, yet, distributed through
the various departments of civil administration, served
in some degree to preserve the natives of the better
sort, particularly those of the Mahomedan profession,
from being utterly ruined. The people of that persuasion, not being so generally engaged in trade, and not
having on their conquest of Bengal divested the ancient Gentoo proprietors of their lands of inheritance,
had for their chief, if not their sole support, the share
of a moderate conqueror in all offices, civil and military. But your Committee find that this arrangement
was of a short duration. Without the least regard to
the subsistence of this innocent people, or to the faith
of the agreement on which they were brought under
the British government, this sum was reduced by a
How re- new treaty to 320,0001. , and soon after, (upduced. on a pretence of the present Nabob's minority, and a temporary sequestration for the discharge of his debts,) to 160,0001. : but when he arrived at his
majority, and when the debts were paid, ( if ever they
were paid,) the sequestration still continued; and so
far as the late advices may be understood, the allowance to the Nabob appears still to stand at the
reduced sum of 160,0001.
Native The other resource of the Mahomedans,
officers. and of the Gentoos of certain of the higher
castes, was the army. In this army, nine tenths of
which consists of natives, no native, of whatever de
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 53
scription, holds any rank higher than that of a Subahdar Commandant, that is, of an -officer below the rank
of an English subaltern, who is appointed to each
company of the native soldiery.
Your Committee here would be under- All lucrative
employstood to state the ordinary establishment: ments in the
hands of the
for the war may have made some alteration. English.
All the honorable, all the lucrative situations of the
army, all the supplies and contracts of whatever species that belong to it, are solely in the hands of the
English; so that whatever is beyond the mere subsistence of a common soldier and some officers of a
lower rank, together with the immediate expenses of
the English officers at their table, is sooner or later,
in one shape or another, sent out of the country.
Such was the state of Bengal even in time of profound peace, and before the whole weight of the public charge fell upon that unhappy country for the support of other parts of India, which have been desolated in such a manner as to contribute little or
nothing to their own protection.
Your Committee have given this short comparative
account of the effects of the maritime traffic of Bengal, when in its natural state, and as it has stood
since the prevalence of the system of an investment
from the revenues. But before the forma- Former
state of
tion of that system Bengal did by no means trade.
depend for its resources on its maritime commerce.
the inland trade, from whence it derived a very
great supply of silver and gold and many kinds of
merchantable goods, was very considerable. The
higher provinces of the Mogul Empire were then populous and opulent, and intercourse to an immense
amount was carried on between them and Bengal.
? ? ? ? 54 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
A great trade also passed through these provinces
from all the countries on the frontier of Persia, and
the frontier provinces of Tartary, as well as from
Surat and Baroach on. the western side of India.
These parts opened to Bengal a communication with
the Persian Gulf and with the Red Sea, and through
them with the whole Turkish and the maritime parts
of the Persian Empire, besides the commercial intercourse which it maintained with those and many other countries through its own seaports.
During that period the remittances to the Mogul's
treasury from Bengal were never very large, at least
for any considerable time, nor very regularly sent;
and the impositions of the state were soon repaid
with interest through the medium of a lucrative
commerce.
But the disorders of Persia, since the
death of Kouli Khan, have wholly destroyed the trade
And the of that country; and the trade to Turkey, by
trade to
Turkey. Jidda and Bussorah, which was the greatest and perhaps best branch of the Indian trade,
is very much diminished. The fall of the throne
of the Mogul emperors has drawn with it that of
the great marts of Agra and Delhi. The utmost
confusion of the northwestern provinces followed this
revolution, which was not absolutely complete until
it received the last hand from Great Britain. Still
greater calamities have fallen upon the fine provinces
of Rohilcund and Oude, and on the countries of Corah and Allahabad. By the operations of the British arms and influence, they are in many places turned
to mere deserts, or so reduced and decayed as to
afford very few materials or means of commerce.
State of Such is the actual condition of the trade
trade in the
Carnatic. of Bengal since the establishment of the
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 55
British power there. The commerce of the Carnatic,
as far as the inquiries of your Committee have extended, did not appear with a better aspect, even before the invasion of Hyder Ali Khan, and the consequent desolation, which for many years to come must exclude it from any considerable part of the trading
system.
It appears, on the examination of an intelligent person concerned in trade, and who resided at Madras
for several years, that on his arrival there, which
was in the year 1767, that city was in a flourishing
condition, and one of the first marts in India; but
when he left it, in 1779, there was little or no trade
remaining, and but one ship belonging to the whole
place. The evidence of this gentleman purports, that
at his first acquaintance with the Carnatic it was a
well-cultivated and populous country, and as such consumed many articles of merchandise; that at his departure he left it much circumscribed in trade, greatly
in the decline as to population and culture, and with
a correspondent decay of the territorial revenue.
Your Committee find that there has also been from
Madras an investment on the Company's account, taking one year with another, very nearly on the same
principles and with the same effects as that from Bengal; and they think it is highly probable, that, besides
the large sums remitted directly from Madras to China, there has likewise been a great deal on a private
account, for that and other countries, invested in the
cash of foreign European powers trading on the coast
of Coromandel. But your Committee have not extended their inquiries relative to the commerce of the
countries dependent on Madras so far as they have
done with regard to Bengal. They have reason to ap
? ? ? ? 56 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
prehend that the condition is rather worse; but if
the House requires a more minute examination of
this important subject, your Committee is willing to
enter into it without delay.
III. --EFFECT OF THE REVENUE INVESTMENT ON
THE COMPANY.
HITHERTO your Committee has considered this system of revenue investment; substituted in the place
of a commercial link between India and Europe, so
far as it affects India only: they are now to consider
it as it affects the Company. So long as that corporation continued to receive a vast quantity of merchantable goods without any disbursement for the purchase, so long it possessed wherewithal to continue a dividend to pay debts, and to contribute to the
state. But it must have been always evident to considerate persons, that this vast extraction of wealth
from a country lessening in its resources in proportion to the increase of its burdens was not calculated
for a very long duration. For a while the Company's
servants kept up this investment, not by improving
commerce, manufacture, or agriculture, but by forcibly raising the land-rents, on the principles and in
the manner hereafter to be described. When these
extortions disappointed or threatened to disappoint expectation, in order to purvey for the avarice which
raged in England, they sought for expedients in
breaches of all the agreements by which they were
bound by any payment to the country powers, and
in exciting disturbances among all the neighboring
princes. Stimulating their ambition, and fomentin,
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 57
their mutual animosities, they sold to them reciprocally their common servitude and ruin.
The Governor-General, Mr. Hastings, and the
Council, tell the Directors, " that the supply for the
investment has arisen from casual and extraordinary
resources, which they could not expect always to
command. " In an earlier minute he expresses himself still more distinctly: he says, "If the internal resources of a state fail it, or are not equal to its occasional wants, whence can it obtain immediate relief but from external means? " Indeed, the investment
has not been for any long time the natural product
of the revenue of Bengal. When, by the vast charge
and by the ill return of an evil political and military
traffic, and by a prodigal increase of establishments,
and a profuse conduct in distributing agencies and
contracts, they found themselves under difficulties,
instead of being cured of their immoral and impolitic delusion, they plunged deeper into it, and were drawn from expedient to expedient for the supply of
the investment into that endless chain of wars which
this House by its resolutions has so justly condemned.
At home these measures were sometimes countenanced, sometimes winked at, sometimes censured, but always with an acceptance of whatever profit
they afforded.
At length the funds for the investment and for
these wars together could no longer be supplied. In
the year 1778 the provision for the investment from
the revenues and from the monopolies stood very
high. It was estimated at a million four hundred
thousand pounds; and of this it appears that a great
deal was realized. But this was the high flood-tide
of the investment; for in that year they announce
? ? ? ? 58 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
its probable decline, and that such extensive supplies
could not be continued. The advances to the Board
of Trade became less punctual, and many disputes
arose about the time of making them. However,
knowing that all their credit at home depended on
the investment, or upon an opinion of its magnitude,
whilst they repeat their warning of a probable deficiency, and that their " finances bore an unfavorable
aspect," in the year 1779 they rate their investment
still higher. But their payments becoming less and
less regular, and the war carrying away all the supplies, at length Mr. Hastings, in December, 1780, denounced sentence of approaching dissolution to this system, and tells the Directors that "he bore too
high a respect for their characters to treat them with
the management of a preparatory and gradual introduction to an unpleasing report: that it is the only
substantial information he shall have to convey in
that letter. " In confidence, therefore, of their fortitude, he tells them without ceremony, " that there
will be a necessity of making a large reduction, or
possibly a total suspension, of their investment;that they had already been reduced to borrow near
700,0001. This resource," says he, " cannot last; it
must cease at a certain period, and that perhaps not
far distant. "
He was not mistaken in his prognostic. Loans now
becoming the regular resource for retrieving the
investment, whose ruin was inevitable, the Council
enable the Board of Trade, in April, 1781, to grant
certificates for government bonds at eight per cent
interest for about 650,0001. The investment was
fixed at 900,0001.
But now another alarming system appeared. These
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 59
new bonds overloaded the market. Those which had
been formerly issued were at a discount; the Board
of Trade was obliged to advance, therefore, a fourth
more than usual to the contractors. This seemed to
satisfy that description of dealers. But as those who
bought on agency were limited to no terms of mutual
advantage, and the bonds on the new issue falling
from three to eight, nine, and ten per cent discount,
the agents were unable to furnish at the usual prices.
Accordingly a discount was settled on such terms as
could be made: the lowest discount, and that at two
places only, was at four per cent; which, with the
interest on the bonds, made (besides the earlier advance) at the least twelve per cent additional charge upon all goods. It was evident, that, as the investment, instead of being supported by the revenues,
was sunk by the fall of their credit, so the net revenues were diminished by the daily accumulation of
an interest accruing on account of the investment.
What was done to alleviate one complaint thus aggravating the other, and at length proving pernicious to both, this trade on bonds likewise came to its period.
Your Committee has reason to think that the bonds
have since that time sunk to a discount much greater
even than what is now stated. The Board of Trade
justly denominates their resource for that year " the
sinking credit of a paper currency, laboring, from the
uncommon scarcity of specie, under disadvantages
scarcely surmountable. " From this they value themselves " on having effected an ostensible provision, at least for that investment. " For 1783 nothing appears
even ostensible.
By this failure a total revolution ensued, of the most
? ? ? ? 60 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
extraordinary nature, and to which your Committee
wish to call the particular attention of the House.
For the Council-General, in their letter of the 8th of
April, 1782, after stating that they were disappointed in their expectations, (how grounded it does not appear,) " thought that they should be able to spare
a sum to the Board of Trade," -- tell the Court of
Directors, " that they had adopted a new method of
keeping up. the investment, by private subscribers
for eighty lacs of rupees, which will find cargoes for
their ships on the usual terms of privilege, at the risk
of the individuals, and is to be repaid to them according to the produce of the sales in England," - and they tell the Directors, that " a copy of the plan makes a
number in their separate dispatches over land. "
It is impossible, in reporting this revolution to the
House, to avoid remarking with what fidelity Mr.
Hastings and his Council have adhered to the mode
of transmitting their accounts which your Committee
found it necessary to mark and censure in their First
Report. Its pernicious tendency is there fully set
forth. They were peculiarly called on for a most
accurate state of their affairs, in order to explain the
necessity of having recourse to such a scheme, as well
as for a full and correct account of the scheme itself.
But they send only the above short minute by one
dispatch over land, whilst the copy of the plan itself,
on which the Directors must form their judgment, is
sent separately in another dispatch over land, which
has never arrived. A third dispatch, which also contained the plan, was sent by a sea conveyance, and arrived late. The Directors have, for very obvious
reasons, ordered, by a strict injunction, that they
should send duplicates of all their dispatches by
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 61
every ship. The spirit of this rule, perhaps, ought
to extend to every mode of conveyance. In this
case, so far from sending a duplicate, they do not
send even one perfect account. They announce a
plan by one conveyance, and they send it by another
conveyance, with other delays and other risks.
At length, at nearly four months' distance, the
plan has been received, and appears to be substantially that which had been announced, but developing in the particulars many new circumstances of the greatest importance. By this plan it appears that
the subscription, even in idea or pretence, is not for
the use of the Company, but that the subscribers are
united into a sort of society for the remitting their
private fortunes: the goods, indeed, are said to be
shipped on the Company's account, and they are directed to be sold on the same account, and at the usual
periods of sales; but, after the payment of duties, and
such other allowances as they choose to make, in the
eleventh article they provide " that the remainder of
the sales shall revert to the subscribers, and be declared
to be their property, and divided in proportion to their
respective shares. " The compensation which they
allow in this plan to their masters for their brokerage
is, that, if, after deducting all the charges which they
impose, " the amount of the sales should be found to
exceed two shillings and twopence for the current
rupee of the invoice account, it shall be taken by the
Company. " For the management of this concern in
Bengal they choose commissioners by their own authority. By the same authority they form them into
a body, they put them under rules and regulations,
and they empower them also to make regulations of
their own. They remit, by the like authority, the
? ? ? ? 62 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
duties to which all private trade is subject; and they
charge the whole concern with seven per cent, to be
paid from the net produce of the sales in England, as
a recompense to the commissioners: for this the commissioners contract to bear all the charges on the
goods to the time of shipping.
The servants having formed this plan of trade, and
a new commission for the conduct of it, on their private account, it is a matter of consideration to know
who the commissioners are. They turn out to be
the three senior servants of the Company's Board of
Trade, who choose to take upon them to be the factors of others for large emoluments, whilst they receive salaries of two thousand pounds and fifteen hundred pounds a year from the Company. As the Company have no other fund than the new investment from whence they are to be paid for the care of their
servants' property, this commission and those salaries
being to take place of their brokerage, they in effect
render it very difficult, if not impossible, for them to
derive advantage from their new occupation.
As to the benefit of this plan: besides preventing
the loss which must happen from the Company's ships
returning empty to Europe, and the stopping of all
trade between India and England, the authors of it
state, that it will " open a new channel of remittance,
and abolish the practice, by precluding the necessity,
of remitting private fortunes by foreign bottoms, and
that it may lead to some permanent mode for remittaiice of private fortunes, and of combining it with
the regular provision of the Company's investment,
- that it will yield some profit to the Company without risk, and the national gain will be the same as
upon the regular trade. "
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 63
As to the combination of this mode of remittance
with the Company's investment, nothing can be affirmed concerning it until some satisfactory assurance
call be held out that such an investment can ever be
realized. Mr. Hastings and the gentlemen of the
Council have not afforded any ground for such an
expectation. That the Indian trade may become a
permanent vehicle of the private fortunes of the Comparly's servants is very probable, -that is, as permanent as the means of acquiring fortunes in India; but that some profit will accrue to the Company is absolutely impossible. The Company are to bear all the
charge outwards, and a very great part of that homewards; and their only compensation is the surplus
commission on the sale of other people's goods. The
nation will undoubtedly avoid great loss and detriment, which would be the inevitable consequence of
the total cessation of the trade with Bengal and the
ships returning without cargoes. But if this temporary expedient should be improved into a system, no
occasional advantages to be derived from it would be
sufficient to balance the mischiefs of finding a great
Parliamentary corporation turned into a vehicle for
remitting to England the private fortunes of those for
whose benefit the territorial possessions in India. are
in effect and substance under this project to be solely
lield.
By this extraordinary scheme the Company is totally overturned, and all its relations inverted. From
bleitig a body collcerned in trade on their own account, and employing their servants as factors, the
servants have at one stroke taken the whole trade
into their own hands, on their own capital of
800,0001. , at their own risk, and the Company are
? ? ? ? 64 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
become agents and factors to them, to sell by com
mission their goods for their profit.
To enable your Committee to form some judgment
upon the profit which may accrue to the Company
from its new relation and employment, they directed
that an estimate should be made of the probable proceeds of an investment conducted on the principles
of that intended to be realized for 1783. By this estimate, which is subjoined,* it appears to your Com* Estimate of the Sale Amount and Net Proceeds in England of the Cargoes to be sent from Bengal, agreeable to the Plan received by Letter dated the 8th April, 1782.
This calculation supposes the eighty lac investments will be equal to
the tonnage of five ships.
b 2. To custom. . ~320,000
o 3. " freight. . 200,000
d' 4. " 5 per cent duty on
~ 1,300,000. . 65,000
e 5. " 2 do. warehouse
room do. . . 26,000
7 do. commission
on ~ 604,500. 42,315
~ 653,315. 6. " Balance. . 562,185
~ 1,215,500 ~ 1,215,500
1. The sale amount is computed on an average of the sales of the two
last years' imports.
b 2. The custom is computed on an average of what was paid on piecegoods and raw silk of said imports, adding additional imposts.
3. The ships going out of this season, (1782,) by which the above investment is expected to be sent home, are taken up at 471. 5s. per ton, for
the homeward cargo; this charge amounts to 35,8151. each ship; the additional wages to the men, which the Company pay, and a very small
charge for demurrage, will increase the freight, &c. , to 40,0001. per ship,
agreeable to above estimate.
d 4. The duty of five per cent is charged by the Company on the gross
sale amount of all private trade licensed to be brought from India: the
amount of this duty is the only benefit the Company are likely to receive
from the subscription investment.
e 5. This charge is likewise made on private trade goods, and is little,
if anything, more than the real expense the Company are at on account
of the same; therefore no benefit will probably arise to the Company
from it on the sale of the said investment.
r 6. This is the sum which will probably be realized in England, and
is only equal to is. 5d. per rupee, on the eighty lacs subscribed.
1. By sale amount of piece-goods and
raw silk. . ~1,300,000 Discount 61 per
cent allowed the buyers. . . 84,500
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 65
mittee, that, so far from any surplus profit from this
transaction, the Bengal adventurers themselves, instead of realizing 2s. 2d. the rupee, (the standard
they fix for their payment,) will not receive the is.
9d. which is its utmost value in silver at the Mint,
nor probably above is. 5d. With this certain loss
before their eyes, it is impossible that they can ever
complete their subscription, unless, by management
among themselves, they should be able to procure the
goods for their own account upon other terms than
those on which they purchased them for their masters, or unless they have for the supply of the Company on their hands a quantity of goods which they cannot otherwise dispose of. This latter case is not,
very improbable, from their proposing to send ten
sixteenths of the whole investment in silk, -- which,
as will be seen hereafter, the Company has prohibited
to be sent on their account, as a disadvantageous article. Nothing but the servants being overloaded can
rationally account for their choice of so great a proportion of so dubious a commodity.
On the state made by two reports of a committee
of the General Court in 1782, their affairs were even
then reduced to a low ebb. But under the arrangement announced by Mr. Hastings and his colleagues,
it does not appear, after this period of the servants'
investment, from what fund the proprietors are to
make any dividend at all. The objects of the sale
from whence the dividend is to arise are not their
goods: they stand accountable to others for the
whole probable produce. The state of the Company's commerce will therefore become an object of
serious consideration: an affair, as your Committee
apprehends, of as much difficulty as ever tried the facVOL. VIII. 5
?
the crown, the great cementing regulation Inspectionof
of the whole act of 1773, has, along with has failedin
effect.
all the others, entirely failed in its effect.
Your Committee, in observing on the fail- Failure in
ure of this act, do not consider the intrinsic the act.
defects or mistakes in the law itself as the sole cause
of its miscarriage. The general policy of the nation
with regard to this object has been, they conceive,
erroneous; and no remedy by laws, under the prevalence of that policy, can be effectual. Before any
remedial law can have its just operation, the affairs
of India must be restored to their natural order.
The prosperity of the natives must be previously
secured, before any profit from them whatsoever is
attempted. For as long as a system prevails which
regards the transmission of great wealth to this country, either for the Company or the state, as its principal end, so long will it be impossible that those who are the instruments of that scheme should not
be actuated by the same spirit for their own private
purposes. It will be worse: they will support the
injuries done to the natives for their selfish ends by
new injuries done in favor of those before whom they
are to account. It is not reasonably to be expected
that a public rapacious and improvident should be
served by any of its subordinates with disinterestedness or foresight.
II. -CONNECTION OF GREAT BRITAIN WITH INDIA.
IN order to open more fully the tendency of the
policy which has hitherto prevailed, and that the
House may be enabled, in any regulations which
may be made, to follow the tracks of the abuse, and
? ? ? ? 42 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
to apply an appropriated remedy to a particular distemper, your Committee think it expedient to consider in some detail the manner in which India is connected with this kingdom, --which is the second
head of their plan.
The two great links by which this connection is
maintained are, first, the East India Company's commerce, and, next, the government set over the natives by that company and by the crown. The first of these principles of connection, namely, the East
India Company's trade, is to be first considered, not
only as it operates by itself, but as having a powerful influence over the general policy and the particular measures of the Company's government. Your Committee apprehend that the present state, nature,
and tendency of this trade are not generally understood.
Trade to In- Until the acquisition of great territorial
dia formerly
carried on revenues by the East India Company, the
chiefly in
silver. trade with India was carried on upon the
common principles of commerce, - namely, by sending out such commodities as found a demand in the
India market, and, where that demand was not adequate to the reciprocal call of the European market
for Indian goods, by a large annual exportation of
treasure, chiefly in silver. In some years that export has been as high as six hundred and eighty
thousand pounds sterling. The other European companies trading to India traded thither on the same
footing. Their export of bullion was probably larger
in proportion to the total of their commerce, as their
commerce itself bore a much larger proportion to
the British than it does at this time or has done
for many years past. But stating it to be equal to
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 43
the British, the whole of the silver sent annually
from Europe into Hindostan could not'fall very short
of twelve or thirteen hundred thousand pounds a
year. This influx of money, poured into India by
an emulation of all the commercial nations of Europe, encouraged industry and promoted cultivation
in a high degree, notwithstanding the frequent wars
with which that country was harassed, and the vices
which existed in its internal government. On the
other hand, the export of so much silver was sometimes a subject of grudging and uneasiness in Europe, and a commerce carried on through such a medium to many appeared in speculation of doubtful
advantage. But the practical demands of commerce
bore down those speculative objections. The East
India commodities were so essential for animating
all other branches of trade, and for completing the
commercial circle, that all nations contended for it
with the greatest avidity. The English company
flourished under this exportation for a very long series of years. The nation was considerably benefited
both in trade and in revenue; and the dividends of
the proprietors were often high, and always sufficient
to keep up the credit of the Company's stock in heart
and vigor.
But at or very soon after the acquisition How trade
carried on
of the territorial revenues to the English since.
company, the period of which may be reckoned as
completed about the year 1765, a very great revolution took place in commerce as well as in dominion;
and it was a revolution which affected the trade of
Hindostan with all other European nations, as well
as with that in whose favor and by whose power it
was accomplished. From that time bullion was no
? ? ? ? 44 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
longer regularly exported by the English East India
Company to Bengal, or any part of Hindostan; and
it was soon exported in much smaller quantities by
any other nation. A new way of supplying the market of Europe, by means of the British power and
influence, was invented: a species of trade (if such
it may be called) by which it is absolutely impossible that India should not be radically and irretrievably ruined, although our possessions there were to be ordered and governed upon principles diametrically opposite to those which now prevail in the
system and practice of the British company's administration.
Ivestments. A certain portion of the revenues of Bengal has been for many years set apart to
be employed in the purchase of goods for exportation to England, and this is called the Investment.
The greatness of this investment has been the standard by which the merit of the Company's principal
servants has been too generally estimated; and this
main cause of the impoverishment of India has been
generally taken as a measure of its wealth and prosperity. Numerous fleets of large ships, loaded with
the most valuable commodities of the East, annually
arriving in England, in a constant and increasing
succession, imposed upon the public eye, and naturally gave rise to an opinion of the happy condition
and growing opulence of a country whose surplus
productions occupied so vast a space in the commercial world. This export from India seemed to im
ply also a reciprocal supply, by which the trading
capital employed in those productions was continually strengthened and enlarged. But the payment
of a tribute, and not a beneficial commerce to that
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 45
country, wore this specious and delusive appearance.
The fame of a great territorial revenue, Increaseof
exaggerated, as is usual in such cases, be- expenses.
yond even its value, and the abundant fortunes of the
Company's officers, military and civil, which flowed
into Europe with a full tide, raised in the proprietors
of East India stock a premature desire of partaking
with their servants in the fruits of that splendid adventure. Government also thought they could not be too early in their claims for a share of what they
considered themselves as entitled to in every foreign
acquisition made by the power of this kingdom,
through whatever hands or by whatever means it
was made. These two parties, after some struggle,
came to an agreement to divide between them the
profits which their speculation proposed to realize
in England from the territorial revenue in Bengal.
About two hundred thousand pounds was added to
the annual dividends of the proprietors. Four hundred thousand was given to the state, which, added to the old dividend, brought a constant charge upon
the mixed interest of Indian trade and revenue of
eight hundred thousand pounds a year. This was to
be provided for at all events.
By that vast demand on the territorial fund, the
correctives and qualifications which might have been
gradually applied to the abuses in Indian commerce
and government were rendered extremely difficult.
The practice of an investment from the Progress of
revenue began in the year 1766, before investments.
arrangements were made for securing and appropriating an assured fund for that purpose in the treasury, and for diffusing it from thence upon the
? ? ? ? 46 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
manufactures of the country in a just proportion and
in the proper season. There was, indeed, for a short
time, a surplus of cash in the treasury. It was in
some shape to be sent home to its owners. To send it
out in silver was subject to two manifest inconveniences. First, the country would be exhausted of its circulating medium. A scarcity of coin was already
felt in Bengal. Cossim Ali Khan, (the Nabob whom
the Company's servants had lately set up, and newly
expelled,) during the short period of his power, had
exhausted the country by every mode of extortion; in
his flight he carried off an immense treasure, which
has been variously computed, but by none at less than
three millions sterling. A country so exhausted of
its coin, and harassed by three revolutions rapidly
succeeding each other, was rather an object that stood
in need of every kind of refreshment and recruit than
one which could subsist under new evacuations. The
next, and equally obvious inconvenience, was to the
Company itself. To send silver into Europe would
be to send it from the best to the worst market.
When arrived, the most profitable use which could
be made of it would be to send it back to Bengal for
the purchase of Indian merchandise. It was necessary, therefore, to turn the Company's revenue into its commerce. The first investment was about five
hundred thousand pounds, and care was taken afterwards to enlarge it. In the years 1767 and 1768 it arose to seven hundred thousand.
Consequen- This new system of trade, carried on
cesofthem. through the medium of power and public
revenue, very soon produced its natural effects.
The loudest complaints arose among the natives,
and among all the foreigners who traded to Bengal.
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 47
It must unquestionably have thrown the whole mercantile system of the country into the greatest confusion. With regard to the natives, no expedient
was proposed for their relief. The case was serious
with respect to European powers. The Presidency
plainly represented to the Directors, that some agreement should be made with foreign nations for providing their investment to a certain amount, or that
the deficiencies then subsisting must terminate in an
open rupture with France. The Directors, pressed
by the large payments in England, were not free to
abandon their system; and all possible means of diverting the manufactures into the Company's investment were still anxiously sought and pursued, until the difficulties of the foreign companies were at length removed by the natural flow of the fortunes
of the Company's servants into Europe, in the manner which will be stated hereafter.
But, with all these endeavors of the Presidency,
the investment sunk in 1769, and they were even
obliged to pay for a part of the goods to private merchants in the Company's bonds, bearing interest.
It was plain that this course of business could not
hold. The manufacturers of Bengal, far from being
generally in a condition to give credit, have always
required advances to be made to them; so have the
merchants very generally, - at least, since the prevalence of the English power in India. It was necessary, therefore, and so the Presidency of Calcutta
represented the matter, to provide beforehand a
year's advance. This required great efforts; and
they were made. Notwithstanding the famine in
1770, which wasted Bengal in a manner dreadful
beyond all example, the investment, by a variety
? ? ? ? 48 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
of successive expedients, many of them of the most
dangerous nature and tendency, was forcibly kept
tip; and even in that forced and unnatural state it
gathered strength almost every year. The debts contracted in the infancy of the system were gradually
reduced, and the advances to contractors and mnanufacturers were regularly made; so that the goods
from Bengal, purchased from the territorial revenues,
from the sale of European goods, and from the produce of the monopolies, for the four years which ended
with 1780, when the investment from the surplus revenues finally closed, were never less than a million sterling, and commonly nearer twelve hundred thousand pounds. - This million is the lowest value of the goods
sent to Europe for which no satisfaction is made. *
Remittances About an hundred thousand pounds a year
from Bengal
to China is also remitted from Bengal, on the Comand the Presidencies.
of the product of that money flows into the direct
trade from China to Europe. Besides this, Bengal
sends a regular supply in time of peace to those Presidencies which are unequal to their own establishment. To Bombay the remittance in money, bills, or
goods, for none of which there is a return, amounts
to one hundred and sixty thousand pounds a year at
a medium.
Exports The goods which are exported from Eufrom Eng- rope to India consist chiefly of military and
India. naval stores, of clothing for troops, and of
other objects for the consumption of the Europeans
residing there; and, excepting some lead, copper uten* The sale, to the amount of about one hundred thousand pounds
annually, of the export from Great Britain ought to be deducted from
this million.
pany's account, to China; and the whole
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 49
sils and sheet copper, woollen cloth, and other commodities of little comparative value, no sort of merchandise is sent from England that is in demand for the wants or desires of the native inhabitants.
When an account is taken of the inter- Badeffects
of investcourse (for it is not commerce) which is ment.
carried on between Bengal and England, the pernicious effects of the system of investment from revenue
will appear in the strongest point of view. In that
view, the whole exported produce of the country, so
far as the Company is concerned, is not exchanged in
the course of barter, but is taken away without any
return or payment whatsoever. In a commercial
light, therefore, England becomes annually bankrupt.
to Bengal to the amount nearly of its whole dealing;
or rather, the country has suffered what is tantamount to an annual plunder of its manufactures and
its produce to the value of twelve hundred thousand
pounds.
In time of peace, three foreign companies Foreign
appear at first sight to bring their contri- companies.
bution of trade to the supply of this continual drain.
These are the companies of France, Holland, and
Denmark. But when the object is consid- Consequences of
ered more nearly, instead of relief, these their trade.
companies, who from their want of authority in the
country might seem to trade upon a principle merely
commercial, will be found to add their full proportion
to the calamity brought upon Bengal by the destructive system of the ruling power; because the greater
part of the capital of all these companies, and perhaps
the whole capital of some of them, is furnished exactly as the British is, out of the revenues of the country. The civil and military servants of the English VOL. VIII. 4
? ? ? ? 50 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
East India Company being restricted in drawing bills
upoll Europe, and none of' them ever making or proposing an establisllment in India, a very great part
of their fortunes, well or ill gotten, is in all probability thrown, as fast as required, into the cash of these
companies.
In all other countries, the revenue, following the
natural course and order of things, arises out of their
commerce. Here, by a mischievous inversion of that
order, the whole foreign maritime trade, whether
English, French, Dutch, or Danish, arises from the
revenues; and these are carried out of the country
without producing anything to compensate so heavy
a loss.
Foreign Your Committee have not been able to
companies'
investments. discover the entire value of the investment
made by foreign companies. But, as the investment
which the English East India Company derived from
its revenues, and even from its public credit, is for
the year 1783 to be wholly stopped, it has been proposed to private persons to make a subscription for
an investment oil their own account. This investment is to be equal to the sum of 800,0001. Another
loan has been also made for an investment on the
Company's account to China of 200,0001. This makes
a million; and there is no question that much more
could be readily had for bills upon Europe. Now, as
there is no doubt that the whole of the money remitted is the property of British subljects, (none else haviiig any interest in remitting to Eiurope,) it is not unfair to suppose that a very great part, if not the whole, of what may firnd its way into this new channel is not
newly created, but only diverted from those channels
in which it formerly rall, that is, the cash of the foreign trading companies.
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 51
Besides the investment made in goods by Ofthe silver
foreign companies from the funds of British china.
subjects, these subjects have been for some time in
the practice of sending very great sums in gold and
silver directly to China on their own account. In
a memorial presented to the Governor-General and
Council, in March, 1782, it appears that the principal money lent by British subjects to one company
of merchants in China then amounted to seven millions of dollars, about one million seven hundred
thousand pounds sterling; and not the smallest particle of silver sent to China ever returns to India.
It is not easy to determine in what proportions this
enormous sum of money has been sent from Madras
or from Bengal; but it equally exhausts a country
belonging to this kingdom, whether it comes from
the one or from the other.
But that the greatness of all these drains, Revenue
above the
and their effects, may be rendered more investment,
visible, your Committee have turned their how applied.
consideration to the employment of those parts of
the Bengal revenue which are not employed in the
Company's own investments for China and for Europe. What is taken over and above the investment (when any investment can be made) from the gross revenue, either for the charge of collection or
for civil and military establishments, is in time of
peace two millions at the least. From the portion of
that sum which goes to the support of civil government the natives are almost wholly excluded, as they
are from the principal collections of revenue. With
very few exceptions, they are only employed as servants and agents to Europeans, or in the inferior
departments of collection, when it is absolutely im
? ? ? ? 52 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
possible to proceed a step without their assistance.
For some time after the acquisition of the territorial
Allowance revenue, the sum of 420,0001. a year was
to Nabob of
Bengal. paid, according to the stipulation of a treaty,
to the Nabob of Bengal, for the support of his government. This sum, however inconsiderable, compared to
the revenues of the province, yet, distributed through
the various departments of civil administration, served
in some degree to preserve the natives of the better
sort, particularly those of the Mahomedan profession,
from being utterly ruined. The people of that persuasion, not being so generally engaged in trade, and not
having on their conquest of Bengal divested the ancient Gentoo proprietors of their lands of inheritance,
had for their chief, if not their sole support, the share
of a moderate conqueror in all offices, civil and military. But your Committee find that this arrangement
was of a short duration. Without the least regard to
the subsistence of this innocent people, or to the faith
of the agreement on which they were brought under
the British government, this sum was reduced by a
How re- new treaty to 320,0001. , and soon after, (upduced. on a pretence of the present Nabob's minority, and a temporary sequestration for the discharge of his debts,) to 160,0001. : but when he arrived at his
majority, and when the debts were paid, ( if ever they
were paid,) the sequestration still continued; and so
far as the late advices may be understood, the allowance to the Nabob appears still to stand at the
reduced sum of 160,0001.
Native The other resource of the Mahomedans,
officers. and of the Gentoos of certain of the higher
castes, was the army. In this army, nine tenths of
which consists of natives, no native, of whatever de
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 53
scription, holds any rank higher than that of a Subahdar Commandant, that is, of an -officer below the rank
of an English subaltern, who is appointed to each
company of the native soldiery.
Your Committee here would be under- All lucrative
employstood to state the ordinary establishment: ments in the
hands of the
for the war may have made some alteration. English.
All the honorable, all the lucrative situations of the
army, all the supplies and contracts of whatever species that belong to it, are solely in the hands of the
English; so that whatever is beyond the mere subsistence of a common soldier and some officers of a
lower rank, together with the immediate expenses of
the English officers at their table, is sooner or later,
in one shape or another, sent out of the country.
Such was the state of Bengal even in time of profound peace, and before the whole weight of the public charge fell upon that unhappy country for the support of other parts of India, which have been desolated in such a manner as to contribute little or
nothing to their own protection.
Your Committee have given this short comparative
account of the effects of the maritime traffic of Bengal, when in its natural state, and as it has stood
since the prevalence of the system of an investment
from the revenues. But before the forma- Former
state of
tion of that system Bengal did by no means trade.
depend for its resources on its maritime commerce.
the inland trade, from whence it derived a very
great supply of silver and gold and many kinds of
merchantable goods, was very considerable. The
higher provinces of the Mogul Empire were then populous and opulent, and intercourse to an immense
amount was carried on between them and Bengal.
? ? ? ? 54 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
A great trade also passed through these provinces
from all the countries on the frontier of Persia, and
the frontier provinces of Tartary, as well as from
Surat and Baroach on. the western side of India.
These parts opened to Bengal a communication with
the Persian Gulf and with the Red Sea, and through
them with the whole Turkish and the maritime parts
of the Persian Empire, besides the commercial intercourse which it maintained with those and many other countries through its own seaports.
During that period the remittances to the Mogul's
treasury from Bengal were never very large, at least
for any considerable time, nor very regularly sent;
and the impositions of the state were soon repaid
with interest through the medium of a lucrative
commerce.
But the disorders of Persia, since the
death of Kouli Khan, have wholly destroyed the trade
And the of that country; and the trade to Turkey, by
trade to
Turkey. Jidda and Bussorah, which was the greatest and perhaps best branch of the Indian trade,
is very much diminished. The fall of the throne
of the Mogul emperors has drawn with it that of
the great marts of Agra and Delhi. The utmost
confusion of the northwestern provinces followed this
revolution, which was not absolutely complete until
it received the last hand from Great Britain. Still
greater calamities have fallen upon the fine provinces
of Rohilcund and Oude, and on the countries of Corah and Allahabad. By the operations of the British arms and influence, they are in many places turned
to mere deserts, or so reduced and decayed as to
afford very few materials or means of commerce.
State of Such is the actual condition of the trade
trade in the
Carnatic. of Bengal since the establishment of the
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 55
British power there. The commerce of the Carnatic,
as far as the inquiries of your Committee have extended, did not appear with a better aspect, even before the invasion of Hyder Ali Khan, and the consequent desolation, which for many years to come must exclude it from any considerable part of the trading
system.
It appears, on the examination of an intelligent person concerned in trade, and who resided at Madras
for several years, that on his arrival there, which
was in the year 1767, that city was in a flourishing
condition, and one of the first marts in India; but
when he left it, in 1779, there was little or no trade
remaining, and but one ship belonging to the whole
place. The evidence of this gentleman purports, that
at his first acquaintance with the Carnatic it was a
well-cultivated and populous country, and as such consumed many articles of merchandise; that at his departure he left it much circumscribed in trade, greatly
in the decline as to population and culture, and with
a correspondent decay of the territorial revenue.
Your Committee find that there has also been from
Madras an investment on the Company's account, taking one year with another, very nearly on the same
principles and with the same effects as that from Bengal; and they think it is highly probable, that, besides
the large sums remitted directly from Madras to China, there has likewise been a great deal on a private
account, for that and other countries, invested in the
cash of foreign European powers trading on the coast
of Coromandel. But your Committee have not extended their inquiries relative to the commerce of the
countries dependent on Madras so far as they have
done with regard to Bengal. They have reason to ap
? ? ? ? 56 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
prehend that the condition is rather worse; but if
the House requires a more minute examination of
this important subject, your Committee is willing to
enter into it without delay.
III. --EFFECT OF THE REVENUE INVESTMENT ON
THE COMPANY.
HITHERTO your Committee has considered this system of revenue investment; substituted in the place
of a commercial link between India and Europe, so
far as it affects India only: they are now to consider
it as it affects the Company. So long as that corporation continued to receive a vast quantity of merchantable goods without any disbursement for the purchase, so long it possessed wherewithal to continue a dividend to pay debts, and to contribute to the
state. But it must have been always evident to considerate persons, that this vast extraction of wealth
from a country lessening in its resources in proportion to the increase of its burdens was not calculated
for a very long duration. For a while the Company's
servants kept up this investment, not by improving
commerce, manufacture, or agriculture, but by forcibly raising the land-rents, on the principles and in
the manner hereafter to be described. When these
extortions disappointed or threatened to disappoint expectation, in order to purvey for the avarice which
raged in England, they sought for expedients in
breaches of all the agreements by which they were
bound by any payment to the country powers, and
in exciting disturbances among all the neighboring
princes. Stimulating their ambition, and fomentin,
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 57
their mutual animosities, they sold to them reciprocally their common servitude and ruin.
The Governor-General, Mr. Hastings, and the
Council, tell the Directors, " that the supply for the
investment has arisen from casual and extraordinary
resources, which they could not expect always to
command. " In an earlier minute he expresses himself still more distinctly: he says, "If the internal resources of a state fail it, or are not equal to its occasional wants, whence can it obtain immediate relief but from external means? " Indeed, the investment
has not been for any long time the natural product
of the revenue of Bengal. When, by the vast charge
and by the ill return of an evil political and military
traffic, and by a prodigal increase of establishments,
and a profuse conduct in distributing agencies and
contracts, they found themselves under difficulties,
instead of being cured of their immoral and impolitic delusion, they plunged deeper into it, and were drawn from expedient to expedient for the supply of
the investment into that endless chain of wars which
this House by its resolutions has so justly condemned.
At home these measures were sometimes countenanced, sometimes winked at, sometimes censured, but always with an acceptance of whatever profit
they afforded.
At length the funds for the investment and for
these wars together could no longer be supplied. In
the year 1778 the provision for the investment from
the revenues and from the monopolies stood very
high. It was estimated at a million four hundred
thousand pounds; and of this it appears that a great
deal was realized. But this was the high flood-tide
of the investment; for in that year they announce
? ? ? ? 58 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
its probable decline, and that such extensive supplies
could not be continued. The advances to the Board
of Trade became less punctual, and many disputes
arose about the time of making them. However,
knowing that all their credit at home depended on
the investment, or upon an opinion of its magnitude,
whilst they repeat their warning of a probable deficiency, and that their " finances bore an unfavorable
aspect," in the year 1779 they rate their investment
still higher. But their payments becoming less and
less regular, and the war carrying away all the supplies, at length Mr. Hastings, in December, 1780, denounced sentence of approaching dissolution to this system, and tells the Directors that "he bore too
high a respect for their characters to treat them with
the management of a preparatory and gradual introduction to an unpleasing report: that it is the only
substantial information he shall have to convey in
that letter. " In confidence, therefore, of their fortitude, he tells them without ceremony, " that there
will be a necessity of making a large reduction, or
possibly a total suspension, of their investment;that they had already been reduced to borrow near
700,0001. This resource," says he, " cannot last; it
must cease at a certain period, and that perhaps not
far distant. "
He was not mistaken in his prognostic. Loans now
becoming the regular resource for retrieving the
investment, whose ruin was inevitable, the Council
enable the Board of Trade, in April, 1781, to grant
certificates for government bonds at eight per cent
interest for about 650,0001. The investment was
fixed at 900,0001.
But now another alarming system appeared. These
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 59
new bonds overloaded the market. Those which had
been formerly issued were at a discount; the Board
of Trade was obliged to advance, therefore, a fourth
more than usual to the contractors. This seemed to
satisfy that description of dealers. But as those who
bought on agency were limited to no terms of mutual
advantage, and the bonds on the new issue falling
from three to eight, nine, and ten per cent discount,
the agents were unable to furnish at the usual prices.
Accordingly a discount was settled on such terms as
could be made: the lowest discount, and that at two
places only, was at four per cent; which, with the
interest on the bonds, made (besides the earlier advance) at the least twelve per cent additional charge upon all goods. It was evident, that, as the investment, instead of being supported by the revenues,
was sunk by the fall of their credit, so the net revenues were diminished by the daily accumulation of
an interest accruing on account of the investment.
What was done to alleviate one complaint thus aggravating the other, and at length proving pernicious to both, this trade on bonds likewise came to its period.
Your Committee has reason to think that the bonds
have since that time sunk to a discount much greater
even than what is now stated. The Board of Trade
justly denominates their resource for that year " the
sinking credit of a paper currency, laboring, from the
uncommon scarcity of specie, under disadvantages
scarcely surmountable. " From this they value themselves " on having effected an ostensible provision, at least for that investment. " For 1783 nothing appears
even ostensible.
By this failure a total revolution ensued, of the most
? ? ? ? 60 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
extraordinary nature, and to which your Committee
wish to call the particular attention of the House.
For the Council-General, in their letter of the 8th of
April, 1782, after stating that they were disappointed in their expectations, (how grounded it does not appear,) " thought that they should be able to spare
a sum to the Board of Trade," -- tell the Court of
Directors, " that they had adopted a new method of
keeping up. the investment, by private subscribers
for eighty lacs of rupees, which will find cargoes for
their ships on the usual terms of privilege, at the risk
of the individuals, and is to be repaid to them according to the produce of the sales in England," - and they tell the Directors, that " a copy of the plan makes a
number in their separate dispatches over land. "
It is impossible, in reporting this revolution to the
House, to avoid remarking with what fidelity Mr.
Hastings and his Council have adhered to the mode
of transmitting their accounts which your Committee
found it necessary to mark and censure in their First
Report. Its pernicious tendency is there fully set
forth. They were peculiarly called on for a most
accurate state of their affairs, in order to explain the
necessity of having recourse to such a scheme, as well
as for a full and correct account of the scheme itself.
But they send only the above short minute by one
dispatch over land, whilst the copy of the plan itself,
on which the Directors must form their judgment, is
sent separately in another dispatch over land, which
has never arrived. A third dispatch, which also contained the plan, was sent by a sea conveyance, and arrived late. The Directors have, for very obvious
reasons, ordered, by a strict injunction, that they
should send duplicates of all their dispatches by
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 61
every ship. The spirit of this rule, perhaps, ought
to extend to every mode of conveyance. In this
case, so far from sending a duplicate, they do not
send even one perfect account. They announce a
plan by one conveyance, and they send it by another
conveyance, with other delays and other risks.
At length, at nearly four months' distance, the
plan has been received, and appears to be substantially that which had been announced, but developing in the particulars many new circumstances of the greatest importance. By this plan it appears that
the subscription, even in idea or pretence, is not for
the use of the Company, but that the subscribers are
united into a sort of society for the remitting their
private fortunes: the goods, indeed, are said to be
shipped on the Company's account, and they are directed to be sold on the same account, and at the usual
periods of sales; but, after the payment of duties, and
such other allowances as they choose to make, in the
eleventh article they provide " that the remainder of
the sales shall revert to the subscribers, and be declared
to be their property, and divided in proportion to their
respective shares. " The compensation which they
allow in this plan to their masters for their brokerage
is, that, if, after deducting all the charges which they
impose, " the amount of the sales should be found to
exceed two shillings and twopence for the current
rupee of the invoice account, it shall be taken by the
Company. " For the management of this concern in
Bengal they choose commissioners by their own authority. By the same authority they form them into
a body, they put them under rules and regulations,
and they empower them also to make regulations of
their own. They remit, by the like authority, the
? ? ? ? 62 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
duties to which all private trade is subject; and they
charge the whole concern with seven per cent, to be
paid from the net produce of the sales in England, as
a recompense to the commissioners: for this the commissioners contract to bear all the charges on the
goods to the time of shipping.
The servants having formed this plan of trade, and
a new commission for the conduct of it, on their private account, it is a matter of consideration to know
who the commissioners are. They turn out to be
the three senior servants of the Company's Board of
Trade, who choose to take upon them to be the factors of others for large emoluments, whilst they receive salaries of two thousand pounds and fifteen hundred pounds a year from the Company. As the Company have no other fund than the new investment from whence they are to be paid for the care of their
servants' property, this commission and those salaries
being to take place of their brokerage, they in effect
render it very difficult, if not impossible, for them to
derive advantage from their new occupation.
As to the benefit of this plan: besides preventing
the loss which must happen from the Company's ships
returning empty to Europe, and the stopping of all
trade between India and England, the authors of it
state, that it will " open a new channel of remittance,
and abolish the practice, by precluding the necessity,
of remitting private fortunes by foreign bottoms, and
that it may lead to some permanent mode for remittaiice of private fortunes, and of combining it with
the regular provision of the Company's investment,
- that it will yield some profit to the Company without risk, and the national gain will be the same as
upon the regular trade. "
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 63
As to the combination of this mode of remittance
with the Company's investment, nothing can be affirmed concerning it until some satisfactory assurance
call be held out that such an investment can ever be
realized. Mr. Hastings and the gentlemen of the
Council have not afforded any ground for such an
expectation. That the Indian trade may become a
permanent vehicle of the private fortunes of the Comparly's servants is very probable, -that is, as permanent as the means of acquiring fortunes in India; but that some profit will accrue to the Company is absolutely impossible. The Company are to bear all the
charge outwards, and a very great part of that homewards; and their only compensation is the surplus
commission on the sale of other people's goods. The
nation will undoubtedly avoid great loss and detriment, which would be the inevitable consequence of
the total cessation of the trade with Bengal and the
ships returning without cargoes. But if this temporary expedient should be improved into a system, no
occasional advantages to be derived from it would be
sufficient to balance the mischiefs of finding a great
Parliamentary corporation turned into a vehicle for
remitting to England the private fortunes of those for
whose benefit the territorial possessions in India. are
in effect and substance under this project to be solely
lield.
By this extraordinary scheme the Company is totally overturned, and all its relations inverted. From
bleitig a body collcerned in trade on their own account, and employing their servants as factors, the
servants have at one stroke taken the whole trade
into their own hands, on their own capital of
800,0001. , at their own risk, and the Company are
? ? ? ? 64 NINTH REPORT OF SELECT COMMITTEE
become agents and factors to them, to sell by com
mission their goods for their profit.
To enable your Committee to form some judgment
upon the profit which may accrue to the Company
from its new relation and employment, they directed
that an estimate should be made of the probable proceeds of an investment conducted on the principles
of that intended to be realized for 1783. By this estimate, which is subjoined,* it appears to your Com* Estimate of the Sale Amount and Net Proceeds in England of the Cargoes to be sent from Bengal, agreeable to the Plan received by Letter dated the 8th April, 1782.
This calculation supposes the eighty lac investments will be equal to
the tonnage of five ships.
b 2. To custom. . ~320,000
o 3. " freight. . 200,000
d' 4. " 5 per cent duty on
~ 1,300,000. . 65,000
e 5. " 2 do. warehouse
room do. . . 26,000
7 do. commission
on ~ 604,500. 42,315
~ 653,315. 6. " Balance. . 562,185
~ 1,215,500 ~ 1,215,500
1. The sale amount is computed on an average of the sales of the two
last years' imports.
b 2. The custom is computed on an average of what was paid on piecegoods and raw silk of said imports, adding additional imposts.
3. The ships going out of this season, (1782,) by which the above investment is expected to be sent home, are taken up at 471. 5s. per ton, for
the homeward cargo; this charge amounts to 35,8151. each ship; the additional wages to the men, which the Company pay, and a very small
charge for demurrage, will increase the freight, &c. , to 40,0001. per ship,
agreeable to above estimate.
d 4. The duty of five per cent is charged by the Company on the gross
sale amount of all private trade licensed to be brought from India: the
amount of this duty is the only benefit the Company are likely to receive
from the subscription investment.
e 5. This charge is likewise made on private trade goods, and is little,
if anything, more than the real expense the Company are at on account
of the same; therefore no benefit will probably arise to the Company
from it on the sale of the said investment.
r 6. This is the sum which will probably be realized in England, and
is only equal to is. 5d. per rupee, on the eighty lacs subscribed.
1. By sale amount of piece-goods and
raw silk. . ~1,300,000 Discount 61 per
cent allowed the buyers. . . 84,500
? ? ? ? ON THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA. 65
mittee, that, so far from any surplus profit from this
transaction, the Bengal adventurers themselves, instead of realizing 2s. 2d. the rupee, (the standard
they fix for their payment,) will not receive the is.
9d. which is its utmost value in silver at the Mint,
nor probably above is. 5d. With this certain loss
before their eyes, it is impossible that they can ever
complete their subscription, unless, by management
among themselves, they should be able to procure the
goods for their own account upon other terms than
those on which they purchased them for their masters, or unless they have for the supply of the Company on their hands a quantity of goods which they cannot otherwise dispose of. This latter case is not,
very improbable, from their proposing to send ten
sixteenths of the whole investment in silk, -- which,
as will be seen hereafter, the Company has prohibited
to be sent on their account, as a disadvantageous article. Nothing but the servants being overloaded can
rationally account for their choice of so great a proportion of so dubious a commodity.
On the state made by two reports of a committee
of the General Court in 1782, their affairs were even
then reduced to a low ebb. But under the arrangement announced by Mr. Hastings and his colleagues,
it does not appear, after this period of the servants'
investment, from what fund the proprietors are to
make any dividend at all. The objects of the sale
from whence the dividend is to arise are not their
goods: they stand accountable to others for the
whole probable produce. The state of the Company's commerce will therefore become an object of
serious consideration: an affair, as your Committee
apprehends, of as much difficulty as ever tried the facVOL. VIII. 5
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