in the Punjab. The irruption of the Sikhs was in a great measure a religious movement, and, when the spoil was divided, there was no lack of hungry spiritual advisers to receive some portion of the bounty of their ignorant disciples. These were the Bedís and the Sodhís, the descendants of the Gurús, and the numerous fanatical professors of the religion, all of whom received rich offerings, which they held free of service, liable to no resumption, to descend to their children's children. jít Singh, as he was all of plunderers the most unscrupulous, so of all he was the most devotional, and in his time the professors of his religion tasted deep enough of the fat things of the earth, and the fleshpots of Egypt, to pray for the success of this most successful of plunderers, and the most lavish bestower of favour on idle mendicants.

Run

In the domestic habits and manner of living of the Sikh chief, there is much to remind us of the tales of the feudal Chieftain, who held his state in his castellated mansion, and lorded it bravely over his neighbours and his servants. Visit the Sikh Jaghírdar in his estate, and you will find much, that speaks of affluence and rude comfort: little of civilization or improvement. Through fields promising abundant harvests, you will find your way to the entrenched fort, which is at once the title deed of his estate, the asylum of his family, and the store-house of his plunder. You will be met by the Singh himself on the draw-bridge, a venerable figure, with a beard of which Abraham or any of the twelve Patriarchs might have been proud: by his side are his sons and his sons' sons, and a train of followers, a patriarchal group, from the centre of which the old man will make his offerings of sweets and rupees, and will wonder why they are not accepted. He will show you over his fort, which exhibits on all sides signs of rural abundance, and, albeit it cannot be concealed, that the so-called fort was once a Mosque or Mahommedan tomb, the unabashed Sikh feels no qualm in displaying it from the highest point of the fort he will show you not only the villages, of which he is still in possession, but with an upbraiding tone he will point out those, which Runjit Singh according to him most unjustly seized,forgetting that his own father, whose white cenotaph appears in the neighbouring garden, had himself appropriated these villages from the Mahommedan Kardar, and that Runjit Singh's right was at least as good as his. But this the old man cannot or will not comprehend; he remonstrates at the dismantling of his fort, and the recusancy of the zemindars in the payment of their dues, now that he has no longer power to imprison and to torture and all this with so much good humour, that you

cannot be angry with him, and with the air of a man who had been deeply injured, complaining of the deprivation of an established right, instead of the son of a highway-man who would have not the least scruple to enrich himself at the expense of his neigh-bour, should opportunity offer or powerful friends protect him.

The Sikh Chief, as Ochterlony remarked in 1810, is dead to the voice of honour, shame, or affection, as long as his own interests are effected, and true it is of him still, though nearly forty years have elapsed: ideas of justice he has none, except that the strongest has a right to appropriate, and that it is the privilege of the weakest to submit

For why, because the good old rule,
Sufficeth there, the simple plan,

That they should take, who have the power,

And they should keep, who can.

Dissensions with his wives, or his brothers, occupy his youth and manhood, and in his old age, he is obliged to divide his property among his own sons, who take vengeance upon him for his conduct to his own father: his hand has been against all, and the hands of all have been against him, and it is only by the number of his family, his hired menials, his ditch, and walls, that he has held his own and been able to collect the fruits of the earth in the season of harvest :-it is only by force of arms and by bloodshed, that he has been enabled to maintain the boundaries of his own villages, and it is no unusual sight to see forts erected within musket shot of each other to mantain a disputed boundary.

Were no others but themselves affected by this unsettled state of things, it would be comparatively a matter of indifference, if these Jaghírs were estates in the English sense of the word, cultivated by their own tenants or servants: so long as their carelessness did not extend beyond their own boundary, the world at large would be unaffected: within the limits of his own jungle the wild beast may be allowed his pleasure, his ravages are confined to himself, and those of his own kind. But in estimating the injurious effect of the state of things, it must be borne in mind, that these Jaghirs comprehended only the share of the produce, which immemorial usage has vested in the hands of Government as the protector of the soil, which had been formerly expended in the maintenance of the Imperial Court of Dehli, the pay of the Civil and Military establishment, and the expenses of the empire, but was now misappropriated by these Jut freebooters for the necessaries of their own unprofitable existence. In each village of these Jaghírs exist the undoubted village proprietors, a numerous and

industrious race, who have manfully stood up, but with varying success, for their rights against the Sikh upstart and his hirelings. Year after year was renewed the struggle between these hereditary enemies about the division of the crops,-bloodshed constantly, fierce contentions, imprisonment and maltreatment always accompanying the glad period of the ripening harvest. Here ends the similarity between the European and Asiatic feudal system in Europe the whole estate was possessed by the feudal Lord, who tilled it by his own servants and villains, and of which he was the proprietor: in India the land is the property of others, it is the share only, which is the prescriptive right of Government for the purpose of enforcing order and rule, that is thus misappropriated.

In considering the subject of Jaghírs and free tenures, under whatever name they are known, and in whatever form they appear, it should always be borne in mind, that they are virtual deductions from that portion of the produce of the soil, known by the name of revenue, and the prescriptive right of the ruling power for the sole purpose of maintaining good order, and the other sacred functions, which according to the organization of Society are vested in the hands of the Ruler. Under no other pretence, and for no other purpose can the right to exact any proportion of the produce of the soil from the admitted proprietor be defended; for no other purpose would it be permitted in a free state, where the revenue-payer has a voice in the disposal of the taxes levied from his estate. Standing in this position, the system of alienation of the sources of public revenue previous to their collection is as unwarrantable, and as hardly justified, as the mal-appropriation, or lavish expenditure of the funds in the public Treasury. Every sixpence that passes to other than public purposes, whether in the shape of land free from assessment or payments after receipt, is an equal injury to the state; and as to the state so to good Government, and the common weal. But the provision of relatives, dependants, and supporters, is a weakness to which all rulers in all climes have been subject. In England, where the alienation of the royal domains was exhibited by Parliament, royal profligacy found ample provision for the maintenance of its mistresses, its courtiers, and parasites in pensions and sinecures, till the days that the pound, shilling, and pence view taken of the matter by the Joseph Hume school of financiers, cleared the Augean stables. In India the revenues of Native Administration have been for ages frittered away in Jaghír assignments, and religious grants to the detriment of justice and good order, and leading generally to the insolvency and destruction of the Dynasty. The continuation of such

grants can be in no way incumbent even upon an hereditary successor; and if so, what shall be said of the grants made by Nazims and Kardars whose ephemeral connection generally ended in their own catastrophe, who were unable to preserve their own? And, if such is the tenure upon actual grants, what right can remain to the deliberate plunderers and appropriators of the sources of public revenue during a season of convulsion? Such however is the Sikh Sirdar; his right is founded on no sunnud, he is the son of a successful free-booter, who ousted and perhaps slew the subordinate of the former Governor, and he has as much claim to the Government share of the produce, as the Highlander may have to the excise duties of a country, of which his grandfather may have in former days robbed the provincial Treasury. The Government of India have taken the same view of the right of the Jaghírdar of the Doab, but its clemency has provided for the gradual, and not immediate extinction of the class, and the lien of the Sikh upon the soil will lapse with the death of the present incumbent. We trust that the same policy may be gradually extended to the protected Sikh states, towards which our relations are more complicated, but to which the grand principle should still extend, that the sovereigns' share of the soil should be appropriated only by those who are capable as well as willing to discharge the duties of the Governor.

We have no sympathy with your ruler unable to discharge the duties of his high station, with your sovereign rejected by his subjects. In the words of one of the most talented of modern writers-" Sceptres were committed, and Governors were insti"tuted for public protection and public happiness, not certainly "for the benefit of Rulers, or the security of particular Dynasties. "No prejudice has less in its favour, and none has been more "fatal to the peace of mankind, than that which regards a nation "of subjects as a family's private inheritance. For as this opinion "induces reigning princes and their courtiers to look on the people as made only to obey them, so when the tide of events "has swept them from their thrones, it begets a strong hope for "restoration, a sense of injury and imprescriptible rights, which give the shew of justice to fresh disturbances of public order, " and rebellions against established authority."

It behoves all these who are concerned in the Supreme administration of India to consider well these words, and to remember well that the people are the strength of the country,that it is apart from duty as well as policy to uphold those, whose capability to rule with advantage to their subjects is gone, the spawn of the moment, who would have been swept away long since, but for the fortuitous interference of our power-who

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are drones for good, but can be wasps for evil-who are incapable of giving assistance, as the last war has fully shown, but are capable of annoying-and who without one quality to recommend them, are freed from the restraint of all law, and are allowed to fatten on the revenue alienated from the Government, which has the protecting of all. Such are many of the Sirdars, who occupy the countries betwixt the Jumna and the Sutlej.

Our remarks apply to measures and not to men, and what we have above written is not for the empty laudation of individuals; but some account of the measures adopted for bringing the territories of the Doab under the system of the English government, is necessary to conclude the history of the country. By the treaty of March 1846, the whole of the Jhelundur Doab, both hill and plain, and without reservation, was ceded to the Company. A Commissioner and Assistants were appointed to go into the land and settle it-build up the form of justice, where it formerly did not exist-smooth down asperities, and conciliate affections-settle revenue, and punish crime-report upon Jaghír tenures, and assign land for military cantonments, and all this, in the month of April, in a houseless country. When once the machine is set a-going, it requires but system, judgment, and regularity to carry on the details of civil government, but in a newly ceded district, we have to create where nothing previously existed, to collect together the heterogeneous components, to meet the thousand and one calls upon time and resources. To those who are inclined to under-estimate the laborious duties of officers thus employed, we recommend that their judgment be suspended, till personal experience has enabled them to form an opinion.

Much has been done within the last two years, though much still remains undone. A light assessment of the Revenue of the country is a blessing which has been widely appreciated, and the benefit of which will not perish with the term of the contract. Peace has been restored to the borders of a country, which never knew a season pass without a foray and bloodshed; the boundaries of every village have been permanently demarcated, and all cause for future contention on that head removed. Straight and wide lines of roads lead in every direction from river to river, and the abolition of all restraint on trade, the security of property and person, and the opening wide the means of communication, have given new life to commerce. Towns are being re-built, and as the den of the robber and the lawless is cleared away, the Serai and the residence of peaceful men spring up in the plain. All forts and defensible places, capable of resisting the police, saving such as are required for the use of Government, have been dis