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no conclusion against the Bunding system can be formed from such a document. What can be expected of a ship that is originally viciously constructed and on false lines, commanded by a man ignorant of navigation, not half equipped, her cordage rotten, masts in the wrong places, and in every respect unseaworthy; and what should we think of a man arguing from the danger he had met with in sailing in her, that we had better return to a state of nature, and either stay on shore, or go to sea on a log of wood?

All that we learn from the Report is,

1st. That the Bunds have been originally constructed in an imperfect manner in every respect.

2nd. That they have cost one hundred and fifteen Rs. a mile per annum.

3rd. That they are not kept in order.

4th. That they are constantly overtopped and breached.

Scarcely one of the essential points in the enquiry is even touched upon. Were the Committee called upon to report on the operations of a Banking Company for a given series of years, and to give an account of the actual position of its affairs, some such statement as the following might probably be put forth as the result of their labours to awaken the unsuspecting shareholders to a conviction of their impending fate:

"A statement of the operations of the Húgly Banking Company from 1835-36 to 1844-45 inclusive, being a period

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Actual position of the affairs of the Húgly Banking Company, September 15, 1846.

Loss on the Banks operations during the last 10 years 34,51,450 12 1 Probable result of further operations (not ascertained.)

Your Committee feel satisfied from the above statements that the system on which this establishment is conducted is an unsound one, and fraught with the most serious evils to the Proprietors, and do not hesitate for a moment to recommend that the whole system be immediately abandoned.”

The question however is in itself no joke. The lives and property of the inhabitants of a tract of most fertile land, protected by 3,000 miles of River Bank, and the Government Revenue derived from it are no trifles, and call most loudly for the most decided measures on the part of Government to

secure their protection. Is it possible that there is not in the presidency one man to be found, able to grapple with this question, not one member of the Civil Service, not one engineer competent to conduct an efficient enquiry into the respective branches of this most important question? Is there nobody even that knows already without any farther enquiry, whether upon the whole the districts have thriven or retrograded under the Bunding system, or who could shew on unanswerable grounds that an expenditure of ten times the sum stated, if placed at the disposal of competent persons, would produce an abundant return to Government, and bring these districts into such a state of fertility and prosperity, as would exceed their present state, as much as that of Tanjore does its state fifty years ago? People in general, indeed, who have not witnessed it, cannot easily imagine what a Delta is capable of being brought to, or of the prodigious returns it will yield to a liberal and skilful system of management, when a well digested system of works is carried out, for controlling the floods, distributing the water, regulating the level of the beds and courses of the rivers, and draining the lands. A complete system of roads with bridges, and, if possible, internal navigation also, are of course necessary to give full effect to the improvements in the management of the water.

But those who have witnessed such operations and their results, know, that so far as the welfare of a people and the security of the existing Government depend upon wealth and plenty, there is nothing which a Government can do that will more effectually secure them, with the same amount of expenditure, than such an improvement of Delta lands. Is it not a dishonour to our Government that such important works should have been so long left in such a confessedly disordered state, as if there were neither funds nor engineering knowledge forthcoming to put them to rights, while they are absolutely necessary to the development of the vast resources of one of the most fertile tracts of country in the world, and where every well-directed effort will certainly be so abundantly rewarded?

A little consideration of this matter will enable any one to perceive that a close examination of the merits of this report is of the greatest importance, not only in respect of the point which it discusses, but also in reference to other questions of still greater national importance.

ART. III.-1. The Government Gazette and Acts of the Legislative Council of India.

2. The Acts of the Legislative Council of India with a Glossary; an Analytical Abstract prefixed to each Act, and Copious Index, by William Theobald, Esq. Barrister at Law and Advocate of the Supreme Court. Calcutta, 1844.

THE 22nd of April, 1834, was the date on which the new Charter Act ought to have come into full operation, and it was passed in the previous August to allow a sufficient interval to make the necessary arrangements for the establishment of the new Legislative Council and other things: yet the superseded system was preserved for some months beyond that period; and the first Legislative Act of the Governor-General in Council was an act to legalize retrospectively the proceedings of the extinct government. The second Act of the Governor-General in Council, passed on the same day, was a fit companion to the first; it was simply an act to correct a misnomer of the Secretaries of government in an act of parliament, and to apply the designation used to the proper persons. We do not refer to these Acts as in any degree marking the character of the Legislative Council; they will scarcely support any kind of inference respecting that body; but they are facts, and proper to be considered, in connection with other circumstances, in estimating the collective character of the machine of government.

The Legislation of the first seven months of the year 1835 was unimportant. The very first act, being the third of the new series, was passed on occasion of the absence of the Governor of Madras from the city, and its object was to make his individual acts or orders while away from council as valid as orders of the Governor and Council. The legality of this Act appears very questionable, on an examination of the parts. of the charter act which relate to the government of those Presidencies which have a Governor and Council: and certainly no second similar act has been passed; which is remarkable; though several times since, the Governors of Madras and Bombay have left the Presidency town and seat of government, and been away from council. The act recites no circumstances; but simply and authoritatively invests the Governor with powers belonging to the Governor in Council: nor does it abridge the powers of the Council: and therefore it would appear to have established two executive governments; that is, the Governor and the Council; leaving them, we may surmise, to arrange with one another for the division and distri

bution of their functions. Giving as we do to this remark the form and tone of an objection, what it may be asked, should in such a case have been done? We feel no difficulty in answering the question. If a political emergency arises which calls a Governor from Council, separate powers should be delegated to him, but only to the extent needed for the special objects of the occasion. If on the other hand the emergency is not political, but the hot steamy atmosphere of the plains disgusts, or the fine climate of the Nilgiri hills attracts him, let, we should say, his Honor be exonerated from the cares of government, in order to enhance his pleasure, or, if out of health, to hasten his convalescence. While in the case of all other public officers and servants absence from duty is permitted only on leave, and under strict regulations, our Governors and Governor-Generals are permitted to quit the helm at discretion; and to leave the Council, and the machine of government scarcely in possession of its faculties and functions. There is another alternative which we have not mentioned; that of the Governor being accompanied by the members of Council.

Next, in the early part of 1835, closely following one another, are two Acts which deserve to be mentioned as types of a class, rather than for their intrinsic importance. Among the territories of British India, are several districts called non-regulation provinces, from being governed, not as the rest of the country, through officers in subordination, the judiciary to the Sudder Dewany Adalut, the revenue to the Revenue Board &c., according to the general regulations of the Presidency, but by officers acting under the immediate orders of the Governor General or local government. The two Acts alluded to, applied to the Tenasserim Provinces, and the Kassya Hills and territory of Cachar, and place those countries or districts under the regular system of government. Acts of this kind supply the place of orders of the GovernorGeneral under the former system; this is a change rather in form than substance; it is doing through the Legislative what was before done through the executive department; the orders by which these objects were accomplished were published as the Acts are now, and the public are no more informed than formerly of the motives and grounds of the proceeding.

For two years after the Charter Act was passed, and upwards of sixteen months after it ought to have been in full operation, it produced none of the expected fruits of legislation. The local journals of the times were full of complaints of the inertness of the government, and chiefly on account

of it a numerous party declined to join in the public congratulation and homage to Sir Charles Metcalfe on his removal in 1834 to Agra after having been acting Governor-General. But Sir Charles was not to blame: the fault was in the Court which was disaffected to the new system. The Court was indisposed to endow the local legislature with that modified independence which certainly was designed by parliament. And it was the influence of this spirit which kept back legislation.

In July 1835, was passed the first Act which indicates in any sure degree the vitality of the new legislative arrangements. The previous Acts would have been passed either as orders or Regulations, if there had been no change of system. A body about to make laws for the first time, proceeding intelligently, would at the beginning provide for the promulgation, proof, and identification of them, and thus save Courts of justice from the embarrassments, which the judges have experienced in England, where legislation had gone on for centuries without any provision of this kind, and consequently the judges had themselves to decide in respect of what Acts of parliament they would require proof, and in respect of what dispense with proof. The Act alluded to,-Act X. of 1835,-was passed to make production of the Government Gazette proof of any Act contained in it, purporting to be an Act of the Governor-General in Council. In some respects this provision is very distinguishable from the law relating to the proof of Acts of parliament. Of the latter, if general, the Courts in England are bound to take judicial notice, irrespective of the fact of any promulgation; by the Act in question on the contrary, the Courts are not bound to take judicial notice of an Act of the Legislative Council, except on its production; such, at least, is the law, though we should by no means think any Court right in requiring as a formal preliminary, the production of any known Act of Council. The Indian Act also does not distinguish between public or general Acts and private Acts, but makes production of the Gazette equally sufficient proof of any kind of Act of Council.

The first Act really worthy of note immediately follows the one just mentioned; and is, the celebrated Act for establishing the liberty of the press* in India on certain conditions. But even this Act was determined on long before, and its merit on general grounds of policy, and its faults of detail, cannot with historic justice be solely imputed to the GovernorGeneral in Council for the time being. This Act repeals all

*Act No. XI. of 1835.

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