Stated in general terms, the revenue of India has increased from £26,000,000 in 1847-8 to £30,000,000 in 1854-5; and the income of the present year, exclusive of Oudh, has been estimated at the same amount of £30,000,000 sterling. The causes leading up to each act of annexation differed in many cases. Pegu and the Punjab were the fruits of foreign conquest, and thus the case for annexation in each instance can be decided on its own merits. With regard to the other additions of territory, Lord Dalhousie was dealing with States over whose destiny the Company's Government had undertaken in the past a serious responsibility. Evidence, drawn from many sources, goes to prove that the old subsidiary system, which in its day may have been of great value in combating the designs of the French, had since proved evil in its results. The British Government had abstained, possibly through an ultra-conscientious desire to observe its treaties with subsidiary States, from interference with the evils of internal mis-government, but at the same time, from the very protection which it afforded to the rulers themselves and which took away from the people concerned any hope of successful resistance to tyranny and misrule, it had become in reality a party to the evils resulting therefrom. 1 The Development and the Effect of the Subsidiary System. Source.—(i) Evidence of Richard Jenkins 1 before the Select Committee of the House of Commons, 1832. (Parliamentary Papers.) We first appeared in India as traders, but it was as armed traders, and our various contests with our European rivals, the prospect of which rendered a warlike garb necessary to support our peaceful objects, were the origin of our military reputation in that region. Courted even by the Great Moghul as useful instruments to free his coasts from pirates, we acquired, as the price of our aid, many of those commercial advantages which fixed us on the continent of India. Then again the breaking up of the Moghul Empire led to arming our factories, to protect our lives and properties. The same skill and gallantry which had at first won our way to commercial 1 Mr. Jenkins has been Resident at Nagpur for nearly twenty years. settlements, displayed anew, induced the native powers newly arising out of the wrecks of the empire, to court our aid in their contests with one another; and the views of securing and improving our commercial establishments, through the favour of those powers, forbade our refusing to intermeddle with their politics. Here the first step was the decisive one; once committed we could not recede. The French, in the meantime, had made still bolder advances to empire in India, and our destruction or their expulsion became the alternatives. Could we hesitate which to choose? We now began to raise armies. These were to be paid, and could only be paid by the princes whose cause we espoused against the French and their allies; pecuniary payments often failing, territorial assignments took their place, and we were obliged to exercise a civil as well as a military power. Our whole dominion on the coast of Coromandel arose in this way, and much of that on the western coast; and through it, and the armies it enabled us to maintain, the power of Hyder was checked, and that of his son Tippu was annihilated; the French power and influence in the Deccan was destroyed, and the Mahratta Empire brought under subjection. In Bengal, the acquisition of the Diwanni gave us the nucleus of our power in that quarter ; still it was extended, and secured through the same system of subsidiary alliances applied to Oudh; and in fact, if we examine the composition of our territorial acquisitions, we shall find that a very considerable portion of them has accrued to us in payment by the native states of specified numbers of our troops, amounting in revenue to the whole military expenses of Bengal, as the following rough statement will show. The civil charges being deducted, the balance is given as applicable to military purposes. Revenues. Civil Charges. Carnatic, in lieu of subsidy 1,404,343 1827-28. Tanjore ... Balance. 493,279 911,064 394,672 186,638 208,034 ... 584,369 ... ... Oudh ... ... If with these great advantages, and many others, we also experience some inconveniences from our subsidiary alliances, we must not complain; but I really see none of the latter to ourselves at all to be put in competition with the former. I do not believe that we have ever been engaged in a war in defence of our allies which did not call upon us to interfere in their favour whether they were our allies or not. Whilst having the right to guide their political conduct in the minutest points, we are secure from any involvement in hostilities of an offensive nature through their ambition or want of faith, many other advantages of our alliances will be obvious on consideration of the general position of the several states and our own. Our subjects, I presume, derive benefit from any political situation which strengthens our power, and relieves them from the dangers of invasion; and by preserving peace and order among our neighbours, takes from before their eyes the temptation to a life of plunder and irregularity; settles their minds to a determined adherence to peaceable avocations, and opens sources of foreign trade to their industry and enterprise; and such is the result of the subsidiary system. Source.—(ii) Evidence of James Mill before the Select Committee of the House of Commons in 1832. (Parliamentary Papers.) With respect to the effect of the subsidiary system on the people of the country, my opinion is very unfavourable. The substance of the engagement we make with these princes is this; we take their military protection on ourselves, and the military power of the state into our own hands. Having taken from them the military power of government, that is, all the power, we then say to them, we give up to you the whole powers of civil government, and will not interfere with you in the exercise of them. It is well known what the consequences are. In the collection of the revenue, one main branch of the civil administration, they extort to the utmost limits of their power, not only impoverishing, but also desolating the country. In regard to the other great branch of civil government, the administration of justice, there is hardly any such thing. There is no regular establishment for the administration of justice in any native state of India. Whoever is vested with a portion of power, great or small, hears causes when he pleases, and when he does not please, does not hear. The examination of the case is very commonly very summary and hasty, and liable to be erroneous, when the examiner is but appealed to by something more prevailing than the sense of justice, and then the case is not decided according to the motive by which he is actuated. It has been found by experience that misgovernment under this divided rule does go to its utmost extent, far beyond its ordinary limits, even in India. And the causes cannot but be considered equal to the effects. In the ordinary state of things in India, the princes stood in awe of their subjects. Insurrection against oppression was the general practice of the country. The princes knew that when mismanagement or oppression went to a certain extent there would be revolt, and that they would stand a chance of being tumbled from their thrones, and a successful leader of the insurgents put in their place. That check is, by our interference, totally taken away; for the people know that any attempt of theirs would be utterly unavailing against our irresistible power, accordingly no such thought occurs to them, and they submit to every degree of oppression that befalls them. I may refer to the instances of Oudh, of the Nizam's territory, and that of the Peishwa while he was in the state of a subsidiary prince. Misgovernment went to its ultimate excess, and there have hardly been such specimens of misgovernment as exhibited in these countries. Complaint has been frequently made of the effect of these subsidiary alliances, in subduing the spirit and relaxing the springs of the government of these native princes. It appears to me that the subsidiary alliance does take away the spirit of sovereignty by degrees from those princes; this is taken from them, along with the sovereignty, at the first step. It does not remain to be done by degrees. We begin by taking the military power, and when we have taken that, we have taken all. The princes exercise all the power that is left them to exercise, as mere trustees of ours, and unfortunately they are very bad trustees. Faced by these problems, which resulted from the evil effects of this vicious system, Lord Dalhousie very quickly came to a definite conclusion. He saw clearly enough that "the principle of non-interference, combined with a guarantee of protection, entailed a responsibility for misrule which no civilised power could accept." 1 He refused to adopt half measures, such as those suggested from time to time by Lord William Bentinck, Sir Henry Lawrence, and Sir William Sleeman, who advised a system of native rule assisted and guided by British influence and experience rather than a policy of annexation and absorption of revenues. He therefore neglected no opportunity of acquiring territory, and of undertaking the consequent responsibilities for the Life of Marquis of Dalhousie," by Sir W. Lee-Warner. Vol. II., p. III. 1 "" necessary improvement of the administration. There is a very wide difference of opinion regarding the wisdom and justice of this policy of annexation. There are some who consider Lord Dalhousie's policy one of the chief causes of the Mutiny; and again there are others who urge that in the fulfilment of his aims alone could the progress and prosperity of the country be maintained. Policy of Annexation Source.-(i) Sir W. Napier, Life of Sir Charles Napier." Vol. IV., p. 188. (John Murray.) I like him (Lord Dalhousie), for he is seemingly a good fellow, but he has no head for governing this empire and drawing forth all its wondrous resources. What the Koh-i-noor is among diamonds, India is among nations. Were I Emperor of India for twelve years, she should be traversed by railroads and have her rivers bridged; her seat of government at Delhi, or Meerut, or Simla, or Allahabad. Her three armies should occupy three camps, one at Delhi or Meerut, one in Sind, and one on the Brahmaputra, each 50,000 strong. No Indian prince should exist. The Nizam should be no more heard of, Nepaul would be ours, and an ague-fit should become the courtly, imperial sickness at Constantinople, while the Emperor of Russia and he of China should never get their pulses below 100! Source.-(ii) Minute of Lord Dalhousie, dated August 31, 1848, reproduced in the Life of Marquis of Dalhousie,” by Sir W. Lee-Warner. Vol. II., P. 116. (Macmillan.) I take this fitting occasion of recording my strong and deliberate opinion, that in the exercise of a wise and sound policy the British Government is bound not to put aside or neglect such rightful opportunities of acquiring territory or revenue as may from time to time present themselves, when they arise from lapse of subordinate states by the failure of all heirs natural, and when the succession can be sustained only by the sanction of the Government being given to the ceremony of adoption according to Hindu law. The Government is bound, in duty as well as in policy, to act on every such occasion with the purest integrity, and in the most scrupulous observance of good faith. Where even a shadow of doubt can be shown, the claim should at once be abandoned. Such is the general principle that, in my humble opinion, ought to guide the conduct of the British Government in its disposal of independent states where there has been a total |