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that it was the duty of Government to have be said on the one hand with truth, that Goconsulted the Landholders' Society on this vernment, by having refrained, from adopting matter of Resumptions. We cannot, how-those energetic measures since 1793, which ever, but think that an impartial re-consider-are now employed for the purpose of settling ation of the subject, will lead him to perceive the question or ever, has given the majority that he has been expecting far more than in reason and equity he had any right to hope for.

of the holders, the benefit of a revenue for nearly half a century, of which they would inevitably have been deprived, if the examination had been pursued at that early period. As the petition and the letter which were On the other hand it is no less true, that, in the read at the meeting continue to be withheld lapse of time, some title deeds which were from the public, we can gather the sentiments valid, have been lost through the frailty of the and the views of this Society only from the materials on which they were written, and by speeches which were dilivered at the Meet-various accidents; and that a certain portion ing. We find, on consulting the report in the of the rent-free holders mu t suffer from this Reformer, that the rent free holders were des- delay. It is, therefore, greatly to be desired, cribed as having a better title to their lands that the compromise which the Court of Di than the British Government had to its pos-rectors is understood to have recommended, sessions in India; that Government did not could by some means or other be brought blush to take advantage of its own wrong, about. We were much disappointed accordand that it had abused its power; that the ingly, when we perceived the tone which the system pursued by Government was a moc- Landholder's Society had adopted, and the kery of the sacred name of justice; and that hostile position which it had taken up. We the tyranny of the English Government exceed think that the prospect of relief would have ed that of the Mahomedans, for it was taking been more certain and more immediate, if a away that which the benevolence of the Ma-more concilliatory line of policy had been homedans had given to the Hindoos. We adopted; and some hope hd been held out simply quote, without comment, the sentiments that the influence of this body would have delivered at the Meeting, reserving ourselves been employed in endeavouring to procure an for a close investigation of their accordance amicable settlement of the question. We had with truth, when we are favoured with the fondly hoped that its leading members would petition and the letter. We find it, moreover, have seen the propriety of proposing to their asserted at the Meeting. that if Government constituents, to make some such proposal to the should not abandon the Resumptions, the case public authorities as this; that the rent of all would be appealed to the Directors, and that tenures hitherto held free, should, on their the complaints against this Government would being uncon itionally surrendered to Governbe eventually carried before Parliament itself. ment, be permanently fixed with the persons Such appear to be the feelings entertained by in possession and their heirs for ever, at a the leading members of the Landholders' So- lower rate than that of the surrounding land; ciety towards Government, on the subject of that this modified rent should descend graduResumptions, which the seconder of the moally on the hol 'er and his successors; that for tion stated was "the primary object of the the first twenty years only a third of the rent establishment of the Society." How could the should be exacted; that two thirds should be Reformer imagine in these circumstances that demanded in the succeeding twenty years, and there was any room for a friendly communi- that the full demand should not be levied till cation on the part of Government? After this a period of thirty or forty years had elapsed particular measure had been denounced in after the settlements.

Some such amicable terms of no equivocal hostility, and after the termination of this vexatious question is greatSociety had declared its determination to pur-ly to be desired for the peace and comfort of sue Government through every stage of appeal, all parties; and we had indulged a hope that would there have been no compromise of dig- the Landholder's Society might have become nity, as well as of authority, if the Governor-instrumental in bringing about an arrange, General had humbly sued for a consultation ment, which would have entitled them to the with the Society on this point?

gratitude of their fellow conntrymen. Of this, however, we can see but little prospect, since the Members of the Society have adopted such extreme opinions on the question, loading the Government with the most opprobrious epithets, and threatening, if they are defeated in this country, to pursue the war in England, first at the India House, and, finally, within the walls of Parliament.-Friend of India, Nov. 15.

For our own part, after having given the sub. ject all the attention in our power, we have been led to the conclusion, that the great bulk of these tenures was acquired by fraudulent collusion with the Native Officers who managed the revenues between 1765 and 1772, and that the right of Government to the rent of the majority of them will not admit of the shadow of a doubt. We have always considered that an equal assessment all lands, those excepted which the British Government had We have to apologize to our correspondent bound itself to exempt,-was the most equita GAUNTLET, for keeping back his letter so long, ble and the least onerous mode of raising a but we have not been able to make room earwe the other hand revenue. On have lier for so lengthy a communication. We are lways in advocated great lenity, the not about to argue the question of resumption aanagement of the Resumptions. It may with him, since it has been so fully and so

on

recently discussed. But we will observe that he upon it as a mere argument ad hominem. That admits all that the other side require, namely, is his expression of dislike to the transit dutiet that the claim of Government ceases where it of Madras and Bombay, the salt duty of Bens has transferred its right for a term or in perpe-gal, and the taxes on justice. He would reuity. The question between the lakarajdras sume the rent-free lands that these obnoxious and the Government, is not whether equal tax- imposts may be repealed. If we had the assuration be a just principle, for no one disputes ance of this intention from the same quarter, that in the abstract, but whether the proceed- but under a more convincing signature than ings of Government for reclaiming what is al- the nom de querre of our correspondent, it would leged to be its right, are conformable to the law go far to reconcile us to the intentions of the of the land, or whether they are not rather revenue department. But when did any body harsh, oppressive and inquisitorial, and such as ever hear of a Government voluntarily relincannot easily he resisted by the subject how-quishing a tax? Has not the abolition of the ever firm his title, however antient his posses-transit duty, in Bengal, though proved to be sion. The attempt of Government, says our almost unproductive, drawn down upon him, correspondent, is to distinguish between the to whose courage we are indebted for it, the real lakherajdar and him who possesses no title marked and lasting displeasure of the Court but impudent assumption. Granted, but sup- of Directors? Suppose the two crores estimatpose the Gevernment in its anxiety to distin-ed to be obtainable from the lakrajdars were guish between the true man and the thief, were really in pocket, is there any man in the Comto order the police to take up on suspicion. pany's service green enough to believe, that every passenger, and to make him prove his they would not find uses for the money? We innocense,or punish him in failure of proof, should hear just as much of taking off the would our correspondent be ready to justify salt duty as we do now.

such proceedings, which would be strictly

analogous to those of resumption? Amongst Since writing the above, we have received the most vexatious of these proceedings the the Friend of India, in which is an article headpetitioners have enumerated the requisition to ed Landholders' Society, which calls for a few attend courts held at great distances from their remarks. The Society is accused of having homes-their being obliged to follow the in. adopted an improper tone and assumed a hos vestigating officer from one station to another tile position towards Government. Nothing -the limitation of their right to appeal to can be more untrue. The Society has merethree months, whilst the Government indulges ly forwarded the petition of a large body itself with twelve-the cutting off of their appeal to the Sudder Dewannee Adaulut in the teeth of an Act of Parliament, and the practiceof the Government vakeels to appeal all suits indiscriminately, which may have been decided against them.

These, we think, are sufficient reasons for appealing against the practice, whatever may be thought of the justice of the resumption measure in theory.

(about 20,000 landholders) accompanied with an argumentative letter, which only prays for a suspension of proceedings till the whole question can be referred to the Court of Directors. The Society are falsely accused by the Serampore editor of loading the Government with opprobrious epithets. They are not answerable for the language held by individuals, and have proceeded with the utmost deliberation, and all proper respect for the public authorities. Neither is our contemporary's expression "threaten to pursue the Our correspondent brings forward the ex war in England" a proper one, as applied to ample of Colbert in the case of the French no- petitioners seeking a constitutional remedy bility. We do not know the nature of the pro- for grivenaces. If petition be war, the Goceedings, which were taken by the all-power vernment ought, for its own credit, to put it ful minister of an absolute monarch, and we down; but it is the first time we ever heard it could not for a moment admit them as a prece- so designated, and regret to find such sentident for British legislators. But our correspon-ments held by a journal, which has been in gedent says, that only the frudulent claimants were neral considered liberal.—Englishman, Nov. 16. taxed, which, if their titles were fairly examined, is no more than every one allows to be right. GAUNTLET refers to the French revolution for the extinction of all feudal privileges. We would ask him whether he would be willing to let the state of India go through the same course of experimental physic. In such a rough catharsis it is probable, that the lakrajdars would not be the only sufferers. France, as a nation, has made wonderful progress by clearing off the privileged orders with the assistance of the guilotine, but some grievances and inequalities are better borne than got rid

of at such a risk.

There is one passage in our correspondent's Jetter, which we should most cordially approve, we thought him sincere, and did not look

"Gratiano speaks an infinite deal of nothing, more than any man in all Venice. His reasons are two grains of wheat hid in two bushels of chaff; you shall seek all day 'ere you find them; and when you have them, they are not worth the search."-Merchant of Venice.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE ENGLISHMAN.

Friday last, has been forestalled. Mr. DicSir,-The wish expressed in my letter of kens has published his speech, or some kind friend and partial admirer has published it for him. I rejoice that his sentiments have been thus laid before the public, and I am quite confident that the result of the discussion, which will probably ensue, will be a verdict

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in favour of the Government on the part of belong, and never had belonged, either to one. every honest man, who will take the trouble or the other. to examine the subject, and who is not bound hand and foot as the champion of the Land holders' Society, or who is not personally a lakhirajdar.

ceeds, "under the native government, grants But," as the preamble above quoted prowere occasionally made of the government's share of the produce of lands for the support Mr Dickens made his speech, he tells us, of the families of persons who had performed because he " deemed it absolutely incumbent public services, for religious or charitable on him (me) to shew he (we) had answers to purposes, for maintaining troops, and for give to the arguments that have been urged other services." When the government of the by the advocates of resumption, and good and day was weak or careless, such grants were cogent reasons for his (our) opposition.' In likewise made, though in defiance of the another part of his speech, he states that he fundamental principle of the land-tax, (to. proceeds to grapple with the arguments on quote another law of the same æra), "not only which this measure has been based." by the zemindars, but by the officers of goNow, I mean no discourtesy, and speak but perintendence of the collections of the revevernment appointed to the temporary suthe simple truth, when I declare, that I have nue, under the pretext that the produce of the read his speech from end to end, without dis cevering that he has fairly met, still less an-table uses." "Of these grants," (the preamble lands was to be applied to religious or chariswered, one of the really valid arguments by to Reg. XIX. of 1793 proceeds), some were which the proceedings of Government com- applied to the purposes for which they were plained of, are, in my opinion, abundantly professed to have been made, but, in general, justified. Indeed, the topics of Mr. Dickens's misnamed "oratio pro lakhirajdars", appear to be principally himself, the Charter, and Mr. Macaulay, upon which subjects, especially the first, he speaks with so much grace and energy, that it is greatly to be regretted that they did not occupy the whole, instead of only the better half, of his speech.

My opinion above-mentioned is one, which, like Mr. Dickens", or any other man's, is worth what I can prove to thinking and disinterested men that it is worth:-" provoco ad populum."

they were given for the personal advantage of the grantee, or with a view to the clandestine appropriation of the produce to the use of the grantor, or sold to supply his private exigencies.

Now, the common law of the land, before the date of British supremacy, was (with partial exceptions of indulgence.) as to Royal Grants, that no severeign could give away that which belonged indefeasibly to the state for a term extending beyond his own life; and if such grants were in some instances, allowed to remain unresumed, a large fine was, I beIt will save time in the end to start by exa- to the throne. The grants of zemindars, or of lieve, invariably levied upon every succession mining our ground; to explain briefly the na-subordinate revenue officers, were always reture of the great Indian tax; the light in garded as abuses, and were which lakhiraj tenures were practically known, permitted to stand, when the govern regarded by our predecessors in dominion ment was powerful enough to assert it rights. over Hindoostan, and by the common law of the land, and, finally, the position in which parties claiming a right to hold lands under such tenures, were placed by the laws of 1793.

never, when

But these abuses, as well as the equal abuse of reckless royal grants, were naturally most vife, to an extent far beyond all parallel, in the troublesome times when the Mogul dynasty ter the accession of the Company to the Dewas put away, and immediately before and afwanny in 1765. The sovereigns who were losing or had actually lost, their lien upon the revenue, were not scrupulous about alienating it; and during the "regni no vitas," the struggles, the ignorance, and the corruption of the early years of British ascendancy, it is no marvel that grants by zemindars, petty rajahs and native tiplied. revenue officers, were greatly mul

The first point cannot be more clearly and undeniably (as a historical truth) laid down, than in the words of the preamble of one of those laws, Regulation XXXVII. of 1793 By the ancient law of the country, the ruling power is entitled to a certain proportion of the produce of every beegah of land, unless it transfers its right thereto for a terin, or in perpetuity. As a necessary consequence of this law, every grant, or alienation of Government's proportion of the produce of lands, without its sanction, was considered "null and void." That these abuses, cutting away the best In fact, the rent of land had been set apart fibres of the sinews of good government, were from time immemorial as the great primary most leninently dealt with, the tenor of Regs. fund from which all the expenses of Govern-XIX and XXXVII of 1793 above quoted ment were to be defrayed. And this fund was from, will amply demonstrate. By these daws as much the right and property-as one of the all grants dated prior to the 12th August, 1765, community, and as held by the government of vere made valid quoad the original grantee, the day in trust for his benefit-of the shop ind hereditary in perpetuity, if so by the tenkeeper in the town, or of the merchant or of the grant. All grants of a latter date, sailor at the seaport, as of the zemindar o not made or confirmed by the British Governof the ryot. As private property, it did not ment, were declared to be invalid; but

I mention this last particular, in order to shew how little Mr. Dickens is at present qualified to discuss, with any profit to any one, the important subject into which he has launched so holdly.

extremely indulgent terms of settlement were Now, Mr. Dickens is right just so far, that guaranteed to parties whose titles were older the law of 1793 did declare that the Governthan 1771-72. The same laws also required ment would resume all tenures claimed as registration of all tenures by parties claiming rent-free, which were not duly registered, (the to hold them free of revenue, in order that registry being opened again by Reg. VIII. Government might know the extent, locality, of 1800), but the converse is very far from and personality, of such claims; but it was being equally true, though Mr. Dickens seems expressly declared that such registry was not to think so himself, (for he speaks of the dito be considered as an admission of the right ligence of the lakhirajdars in respect to regisof the claimant to that immunity. tration not being allowed to avail them at the the present day, and the whole tenor of the passage, the only one in which he attempts to lead those who do not understand the subto meet the question of right) is calculated ject, to suppose that a tenure duly registered, became "ipso facto," valid in perpetuity. But the law which the lawyer would do well to have studied, before he got up to harrangue I transcribe the following passage from his about it, is simply what i have above stated it to be. speech" Our opponents urge against us, Indeed, all that regisSir, that no snch prescription or possession of try does, or was intended by the law of 1793 73 years, can be said to have existed, or can to do for a lakhirajdar, is to give his claim to avail the owners of rent free tenures, because, exemption, a right to be tried upon its merof what? The possession was broken and the its, as defined by those and subsequent laws. land resumed by Government? No, indeed, The lache of failing to register, renders, and but Government in 1793, by Regulation 19, said has always rendered, a tenure liable to resumpthey had a right to do it, and would resume tion without investigation as to the nature such tenures,unless the owners registered them or validity of the grant under which it is as rent-free tenures, and the grants and titles assumed to be held. on which they rested, and brought in and sub- Such is the law;-but this Mr. Dickens will mitted these latter to examinaiion and verifi- say, when a few rays of light as to the real state cation. I boldly deny that this law calling for of the case have stolen in upon his mind,—is registry, was ever duly and honestly carried the very grievance of which I complain, beinto execution in any one important particu- cause proper notice and opportunity of regis Jar, and whose fault was it that it was not? tration have not been given." This objection Why the fault of Government, and of its ser- to the present proceedings of the Government vants, and on their heads should fall the loss would, as the Vankees say, "be important if and penalty; instead of this, the people are to true":-but how stands the fact? In many be made responsible for the defaults of Go-districts, thousands,-in Cuttack, 1,57,725 tevernment, and the Revenue Officers of Govern- nures are registered, which could hardly be ment, as well as their own; while even their di- the case if the law was not "ever duly and ho ligence and that of their ancestors, is not allow-nestly promulgated, or carried into execution," ed, as I shall shew here after, to avail them. I as Mr. Dickens" boldly" asserts. For some disaffirm, and I court and challenge denial, that no tricts there were confessedly laches on the part such thing as a complete, full, legal, and authen- of the local revenue authorities, which should, tic register, pursuant to the regulation inques in equity, exonerate the lakhirajdars from all tion, is now existence, nor, (as I fully believe) responsibility in the matter. In other districts ever was in existence, in any one collectorate of there have been accidents by fire or otherwise. Bengal, Behar, and Orissa; and if this most And how have the Government, which Mr. notorious fact should be disputed, I could Dickens vilifies, acted on the occasion? Why, verify it by the minutes and writings of every they have ordered the requisition for registrawell informed Revenue Officers of Govern- tion to be waived and every case in those disment for the last 12 years, including many who tricts, where full and fair opportunity was are among the keenest of the hunters after rent-not afforded to the lakhirajdars to register free lands. This fact, the non-existence of their tenures, or where accidents have occurregisters by the fault of Government, ought red, to be tried upon its merits. to be decisive of the whole controversy, ; for if

the fact be conceded, and I should be curious I return to the law of 1793,-the charter of to see the bold man who denied it,-there is an the lahkirajdars,—which, as well as the conend at once of all pretence for saying that the flicting claims of the state, and of the former lapse of time, which constitutes a title by pre-parties, are thus characterised by Lord Hast. scription has been broken by an intermediate ings, in his Revenue Minute of Sept. 21, 1815, assertion of adverse claims by Government, Of all subjects of taxation, I should conceive and by the default of the people. The only the profits of the rent-free lands the most legidefaulters were the Government, who did not timate. The holders of land of this descripsupply either honest or any means of registry, tion, are at present exempted from all contriand who do not now balsh to take advantage butions, whether to the local police or Goof their own wrong, and abuse the power which vernment, by which they are protected, or to never has long co-existed with the practice the public works from which their estates of such maxims as we here behold in action." derive equal benefit with the rest of the

community. They are indebted for the exemp I have already explained what the claim of tion either to the superstition, to the false chari the lak hirajdars is,-a claim that other people ty, or to the ill-directed favors of the heads of shall bear all the expense of protecting them former Governments, and other men in power, from foreign and domestic injury, of maintainand have little personal claim upon ourselves ing, for the common benefit, tribuuals for the for a perpetual exemption from the obligations dispensation of civil justice, (including the they owe as subjects. Most of the tenures may be Supreme Court, the general advantage of which considered invalid. Indeed, the scruples Mr. Dickens would be the last to deny,) of exwhich have saved the whole of these landsecuting or keeping upall public works of utility, from indiscriminate resumption, have given and of upholding, in short, that fabric of Bri cause to admire as much the simplicity, as the tish power, the downfall of which would be the extreme good faith of all our actions and most bitter affliction that could befall a land proceedings." still groaning under the effects of long centuries of the most unmitigated temporal and

Such, in the opinion of one whom most men will admit to be a competent, as well as an bo-spiritual tyranny.

nest judge, was the hyper-indulgent/charac- To such a claim on the part of the few, noter of the law of 1793,-which His Lordship thing but the most benighted and besotted proceeded to say," appeared," (at that time) ignorance on the part of the many," the to have slept as a dead letter, or at least never great bulk of the people,"-can possibly induce to have been acted upon consecutively. The them to give the smallest support. Nay, nomode of drawing a revenue from this source, thing but that ignorance, fostered, in many and the degree in which this may be 'practica cases, by the interested agency of the spiri ble without a breach of our existing pledges, tual tyranny above alluded to, could have should be taken into an early and deliberate prevented the great bulk of the people" consideration." I have called the law of 1793 groaning for long years under the late aboa charter to the lakhirajdars. It truly is so, ninable Transit Duties, and still grievously creating for them immunities, which they ne- wronged by taxes upon justice, not to insist ver possessed before, in a manner which Lord upon the shifting of those burthens upon the Hastings correctly describes as exccedingly broad shoulders of Mr. Dickens's friends the "simple." lakhirajdars. It is really no exaggeration to But by this charter, indulgent as it is, the la-say, that the state of things which has existed, khirajdars, and Mr. Dickens, their mouth piece, in favour of the lakhirajdars, since 1793, are by no means content to abide. All parties would have raised a popular insurrection are agreed that what the charter makes valid for equal taxation in any country where" the shall remain valid; but Mr. Dickens demands great bulk of the people" have even a faint, that the tenures which the Law of 1793 (the only glimmering notion of their own rights and inbulwark, be it observed, which stands between terests. And yet Mr. Dickens would have us the lakhirajdars and the common law of believe that a people so wronged, and whom, the land, under "which the ruling power is en-though still blind, the Government are now titled to a certain proportion of the produce of endeavouring to right, are aggrieved by those every beegah of land,") declares to be invalid, measures. What would they say in England shall be valid, and that too in perpetuity. So to a claim on the part of a considerable and that the law of 1793, is to be respected as far as is it confers a boon (and that a very iniquitous boon, in relation to the community in general,) upon a privileged class; but it is to be regarded as so much waste paper when it proceeds to define who shall, or who shall not, be considered to belong to that class.

This may be good logic for a tribune of the people, harranguing at the Town Hall, with nobody to gainsay his assertions; but I think that it cuts a very sorry figure when it is put down in plain English, or foolscap paper, and

submitted to the test of common sense.

But Mr. Dickens talks of " the interest which the people of this country take in the measure we are about to protest against," of "popular support," and of the fact, that the great bulk of the people regard the measures in progress for the resumption of rent-free tenures, with alarm, with distrust, and will, if persevered in, regard them with hatred." There is much more in his speech to the same purport.

Now, all that this position has of verisimilitude is founded on the lamentable ignorance "of the great bulk of the people, of their own most palpable interests."

very wealthy part of the community, that on the strength of this or the other old abusive grant, neither they nor any of their descendants should pay any taxes to the end of time? for nothing less than this is the claim of the lakhirajdars. What did they say in France, to such a claim when advanced by their that body for the comparison. The pretennoblesse? But I must pause to apologize to sions of the lakhirajdrrs are much more monstrous than any advanced by the noblesse of France. A Lakhirajdar pays absolutely nothing but a pittance to the salt monopoly, and a stamp duty now and then. "The noblesse," says Burke," paid the capitation. They paid also a land-tax, called the twentieth penny, to the height some times of three, sometimes of four, shillings in the pound; both of them direct impositions of no light nature, and no trivial produce." And what man of this century will be bold enough to say, that "the bulk of the people" of France did not act both wisely and justly in saying to their noblesse, what the Government is now saying (on behalf of the ignorant and Bramin-ridden great bulk of the people"), to the lakhirajdars of India-" Gentlemen, you have enjoyed this