great injury, and the poor natives in many instances very cruel oppressions.

The toleration of perquisites is likewise detrimental to the discipline of the service, for even when there is only an implied permission to take them, it is not easy to punish abuses, as after a beginning is suffered, distinct limits are with difficulty prescribed for the practice; but when liberal salaries are allowed and accepted as a complete compensation for services a Government can, without scruple, disgrace and remove from their offices all those servants who shall be detected in deviation from the straight line of private honour and of public duty. (Cornwallis Correspondence, i. 555.)

79. NEW SYSTEM OF LOCAL JURISDICTION

Governor-General to Court of Directors.

March 6, 1793.

In this country, as in every other, security of property must be established by a system upheld by its inherent principles, and not by the men who are to have the occasional conduct of it. The body of the people must feel and be satisfied of this security before industry will exert itself, or the moneyed men embark their capitals in agricultural or commercial speculations. There are certain powers and functions which can never be vested in the same officers without destroying all confidence in the protection of the laws. This remark is particularly applicable to the various functions vested in the present collectors. All causes relating to the rights of the several descriptions of landholders and cultivators of the soil, and all claims arising between them and their securities, have been excepted from the cognisance of the regular courts of justice, and made exclusively cognisable by the collector of the revenue. Where the power to redress oppressions and functions that must always have a tendency to promote or screen the commission of them, are united in the same person, a strict adherence to the principles of justice cannot be expected, and still less can it be hoped that the people will feel a confidence of obtaining justice. Upon these and other grounds we resolved to abolish the Revenue Courts and to withdraw from the Board of the Revenue and the collectors, all judicial powers, thereby confining their duties and functions to the mere collection of the public dues, and to transfer the

cognisance of the causes hitherto tried in these courts to the courts of justice.

Courts of justice are to be continued in each collectorship as heretofore, which are to be denominated Zilla or District Courts, and the judge thereof is to have cognisance over civil causes of all descriptions that may arise in his jurisdiction, whether of the nature of those termed revenue causes, and hitherto tried in the Revenue Courts, or of the description of those which have been cognisable in the courts of Diwani Adalat. We have resolved, likewise, that the collectors of revenue and their officers, and indeed all the officers of Government, shall be amenable to the courts for acts done in their official capacities, and that Government itself, in cases in which it may be a party with its subjects in matters of property, shall submit its rights to be tried in these courts under the existing laws and regulations. That these courts may have complete authority over all persons residing in their jurisdictions, and that natives may be able to procure redress against Europeans with the same facility as the latter can obtain it against the former, we have determined that no British subject (excepting King's officers and the civil and the military covenanted servants of the Company) shall be allowed to reside beyond the limits of Calcutta, without entering into a bond to make himself amenable to the court of justice of the district in which he may be desirous of taking up his abode, in all civil causes that may be instituted against him by natives. The judges of these courts are also to be vested with the powers of magistrates to preserve the peace, and to apprehend and commit offenders to take their trials before the Courts of Circuit.

We have likewise resolved to establish four provincial Courts of Appeal at the cities of Patna, Dacca, Murshidabad, and Calcutta; each of these courts to be superintended by three judges; an appeal to lie to them in all cases whatsoever from the decisions of the Zilla or District and the City Courts within their respective jurisdictions.

(Cornwallis Correspondence, i. 559.)

80. THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE NEW SYSTEM

Sir John Shore to Bensley.

December, 1794.

But what has occupied so large a portion of my time, is, giving currency to the Regulations of my predecessor, and

stability to the arrangements formed by him. I am happy to reflect that my attention to these points has not been unsuccessful, and that his plans are fairly and usefully administered. He advanced with a confidence which I should have wanted d; but he advanced wisely. With a little more previous preparation, the execution of his arrangements would have been easier: but that difficulty is now surmounted, and the Judicial System proceeds well. People who reason from former practice and experience only, rather than from principles, have objected to his arrangements; but the principles are just; and although the practice was not familiar to the natives, they have accommodated themselves to it. But we are to remember that the race which existed when we acquired the government of the country have nearly died away, and that the new generation will adopt the practices and principles of Administration and grow familiar to them. Two objections of importance only occur to the arrangements-the additional business imposed upon the Supreme Authority, and the difficulty of finding a sufficient number of able officers for the execution of them.

(Teignmouth's Life and Correspondence, i. 309.)

81. THE INDUSTRY AND PURITY OF THE SERVICE

Shore to Inglis, 1794.

When you were in Bengal, the business was transacted between the hours of nine and two. At present, the interval of occupation, in almost every department, is between seven and four; and I doubt if there is more regularity in any Government in the world and I will venture to say there is as little peculation, or sinister emoluments. In this respect, the reform is not only considerable, but visible. Our present system is an effectual war to those intrigues which affected the Commerce, the Revenues, and every branch of the Public Administration. A dishonest Government, however, in one year, might undo the labours of the last eight years.

(Teignmouth's Life and Correspondence, i. 329.)

CHAPTER VI

THE COMPANY BECOMES PARAMOUNT POWER IN INDIA

Wellesley 1798-1806

THE Governor-Generalship of the Marquess Wellesley represents a very important stage in the development of the British power: a stage which has been summarised in the phrase that under his direction the British Empire in India was transformed into the British Empire of India. The period of Clive had seen the Company of traders become king-makers in two regions, Bengal and the Carnatic, but as yet without any desire to assume the responsibilities of territorial sovereignty. After an interval of very ineffective dual government, direct responsibility for the government of Bengal had been assumed under Warren Hastings; and the immensely difficult task of organising a just and efficient system had been begun by Hastings himself, and by the British Parliament in the Act of 1773. The Act of 1784 and the reforms of Cornwallis had carried this development further; and the British territories had come to be, beyond all comparison, the most justly and firmly governed state in India, capable of dealing on more than equal terms with any Indian power or combination of powers. One great state, Oudh, had been brought into a condition of vassalage; another, that of the Nizam, was ready to enter into such a condition as a means of protection against its neighbours, as soon as the Company was willing; and the Carnatic had been a vassal state since 1753. But the direct

territorial authority of the Company was still almost limited to Bengal. There had been no important acquisition of territory, except Benares in 1775 and the districts taken from Mysore by Cornwallis. The Company was anxious that there should be no further acquisitions and no further assumption of responsibility for the protection of vassal states. Their representatives were instructed to avoid intervention in Indian politics. The Act of 1784 itself had laid it down (§ 34) that "to pursue schemes of conquest and extension of dominion in India are (sic) measures repugnant to the wish, honour, and policy of this nation."

But circumstances made this policy of restraint impracticable. The British power in India, in the midst of States which were in a perpetual unrest, must fight in self-defence if not in aggression, and found that it was faced by the alternative of expansion or destruction. Lord Cornwallis, sent out to give effect to the policy of quiescence, and sincerely believing in it, had nevertheless found himself forced into a war with Tipu Sahib, and into the annexation of territories as a safeguard against future attack. He made a permanent defensive alliance with the Nizam and the Mahrattas, and hoped by this means to establish peace. But in the time of his successor, Sir John Shore, one of the Allies, the Nizam, was attacked by the other, the Mahrattas. Shore, honestly anxious to carry out the policy of the Directors, decided that the Company was not required to intervene. The result was a collapse of British prestige, and the creation of a very dangerous situation. The Nizam was completely defeated and reduced to vassalage by the Mahrattas. Indignant at what he considered the Company's betrayal, he welcomed French officers to organise an army for him. Tipu, thirsting for revenge, was already in open negotiations with the French. The Mahrattas, who saw the supremacy over all India within their reach, and regarded the Company as their chief obstacle, also obtained the aid of French officers, since they realised that European military methods were essential for success. The French republic had entered upon its career of conquest, and was bent