The moderation of a Teignmouth, a Cornwallis, or a Bentinck, is deemed mere pusillanimity. Those divine maxims of peace and union which Christianity would disseminate amongst the natives of the countries that we visit, are condemned as the very obstacles to the growth of our power. When we exclaim, “what might not Englishmen have done in India had they endeavoured to pacify and enlighten, instead of to exact and destroy?” we are answered by a smile, which informs us that these are but romantic notions,—that the only wisdom is to get rich!
Rich in the gems of India’s gaudy zone, And plunder, piled from kingdoms not their own, Degenerate trade! thy minions could despise, The heart-born anguish of a thousand cries; Could lock, with impious hands their teeming store, While famished nations died along the shore; Could mock the groans of fellow-men; and bear The curse of kingdoms peopled with despair; Could stamp disgrace on man’s polluted name, And barter, with their gold, eternal shame.
We have in some degree caught a glimpse of the subject of this chapter in the course of the last. The treatment of the native chiefs in our pursuit of territorial possession is in part the treatment of the natives, but it is unhappily a very small part. The scene of exaction, rapacity, and plunder which India became in our hands, and that upon the whole body of the population, forms one of the most disgraceful portions of human history; and while the temptations to it existed in full force, defied all the powers of legislation, or the moral influence of public opinion to check the evil. In vain the East India Company itself, in vain the British Parliament legislated on the subject; in vain did the Court of Directors from year to year, send out the most earnest remonstrances to their servants,—the allurement was too splendid, the opportunities too seducing, the example too general, the security too great, to permit any one to attend to either law, remonstrance, or the voice of humanity. The fame of India, as a vast region of inexhaustible wealth, had resounded through the world for ages; the most astonishing notions of it floated through Europe, before the sea-track to it was discovered; and when that was done, the marvellous fortunes made there by bold men, as it were in a single day, and by a single stroke of policy, seemed more than to warrant any previous belief. Men in power received their presents of ten, twenty, or a hundred thousand pounds. Clive, for the assistance of the British army, was presented with the magnificent gift of a jaghire, or hereditary revenue of 30,000_l._ a year! On another occasion he received his 28,000_l._, and his fellow-rulers each a similar sum. Hastings received his twenty and his hundred thousand pounds, as familiarly as a gold snuff-box or a piece of plate would be given as a public testimony of respect for popular services, in England. Every man, according to his station and his influence, found the like golden harvest. Who could avoid being inflamed with the thirst for Indian service?—who avoid the most exaggerated anticipations of fortune? It was a land, and a vast land, hedged about with laws of exclusion to all except such as went through the doors of the Company. There were there no interlopers,—no curious, because obstructed observers. There was but one object in going thither, and one interest when there. It was a soil made sacred, or rather, doomed, to the exclusive plunder of a privileged number. The highest officers in the government had the strongest motives to corruption, and therefore could by no possibility attempt to check the the same corruption in those below them. When the power and influence of the Company became considerably extended over Bengal, Bahar, Orissa, Oude, the Carnatic, and Bombay, the harvest of presents grew into a most affluent one. Nothing was to be expected, no chance of justice, of attention, of alleviation from the most abominable oppression, but through the medium of presents, and those of such amounts as fairly astonish European ears. Every man, in every department, whether civil, military, or mercantile, was in the certain receipt of splendid presents. When the government had found it necessary to forbid the receipt of presents by any individual in the service, not only for themselves, but for the Company, the highest officers set the laws at defiance, and the mischief was made more secret, but not less existent.