while such a supplementary crop, in case of the rice failing, may prevent many a famine, and diminish one strong point of the similarity which now exists between the Indian and Irish peasantry, their reliance on a single article of food, and the almost infinite division and subdivision of their farms, which here, as in Ireland, is a fertile source of poverty and wretchedness.

vegetable may be of unmixed utility; | found a miserable wretch, a groom out of employ, who had crept, sick of a dysentery, into his court-yard. He had there remained in a corner on the pavement two days and nights. Perhaps twenty servants had been eating their meals daily within six yards of him, yet none had relieved him, none had so much as carried him into the shelter of one of the out-houses, nor had any taken the trouble to tell their master. When reproved for this, their answer was, "he was not our kinsman;" "whose business was it?". "How did we know that the sahib would like to be troubled?" I do not say that these are every-day instances: I hope and believe not; nor would I be understood as denying that alms are, to religious mendicants, given to great amount in Bengal, or that several of the wealthy inhabitants, in what they consider good works, such as constructing public tanks, making roads to places of pilgrimage, building pagodas and ghâts, are liberal. I only mention these instances because none of those who heard them seemed to think them unusual or extraordinary; because in a Christian country I think they could not have happened, and because they naturally arise from the genius of the national religion, which, by the distinction which it establishes, makes men worse than indifferent to each other. Accordingly, many of the crimes which fall under the cognizance of the magistrate, and many of the ancient and sanctified customs of the Hindoos, are marked with great cruelty. The decoits, or gangs of robbers, who are common all over the country, though they seldom attack Europeans, continually torture to force the peasants to bring out their little treasures.

On the whole they are a lively, intelligent, and interesting people: of the upper classes, a very considerable proportion learn our language, read our books and our newspapers, and show a desire to court our society; the peasants are anxious to learn English, and though, certainly, very few of them have as yet embraced Christianity, I do not think their reluctance is more than might have been expected in any country, where a system so entirely different from that previously professed was offered, and offered by those of whom, as their conquerors, they may well entertain considerable jealousy. Their own religion is, indeed, a horrible one; far more so than I had conceived; it gives them no moral precepts; it encourages them in vice by the style of its ceremonies, and the character given of its deities; and by the institution of caste, it hardens their hearts against each other to a degree which is often most revolting. A traveller falls down sick in the streets of a village (I am mentioning a fact which happened ten days ago), nobody knows what caste he is of, therefore nobody goes near him lest they should become polluted; he wastes to death before the eyes of a whole community, unless the jackalls take courage from his helpless state to finish him a little sooner, and, perhaps, as happened in the case to which I alluded, the children are allowed to pelt him with stones and mud. The man of whom I am speaking was found in this state and taken care of by a passing European, but if he had died, his skeleton would have lain in the streets till the vultures carried it away, or the magistrates ordered it to be thrown into the river.

A friend of mine, some months ago,

and caresses even, which the poor victim lavished on his murderers, were regarded. After this it is hardly worth while to go on to show that crimes of rapine, and violence, and theft, are very common, or that the tendency to lying is such that (as one of the judges here observed) "in a court of justice they cannot even tell a true story without spoiling it." But what I would chiefly urge is, that for all these horrors their system of religion is mainly answerable, inasmuch as whatever moral lessons their sacred books contain, and they are very few, are shut up from the mass of the people, while the direct tendency of their institutions is to evil. The national temper is decidedly good, gentle, and kind; they are sober, industrious, affectionate to their relations, generally speaking, faithful to their masters, easily attached by kindness and confidence, and, in the case of the military oath, are of admirable obedience, courage, and fidelity, in life and death. But their morality does not extend beyond the reach of positive obligations; and where these do not exist, they are oppressive, cruel, treacherous, and everything that is bad. We have heard much in England of their humanity to animals; I can only say that I have seen no tokens of it in Calcutta.

quickness and intelligence, ought to be assisted and encouraged as far as we possibly can in the disposition which they now evince, in this part of the country at least, to acquire a knowledge of our language and laws, and to imitate our habits and examples. By all which I have learned, they now really believe we wish them well, and are desirous of their improvement; and there are many points (that of the burning widows is one) in which a change for the better is taking place in the public mind, which, if we are not in too great a hurry, will probably, ere long, break down the observance of, at least, one horror. Do not suppose that I am prejudiced against the Hindoos. In my personal intercourse with them I have seen much to be pleased with, and all which I hear and believe as to what they might be with a better creed, makes me the more earnest in stating the horrors for which their present creed, as I think, is answerable.

This is an unmerciful letter, but I hope and believe that I shall not have wearied you. Both Emily and I often think and talk of you, and recall to mind, with deep and affectionate interest, our parting on the quarter-deck of the Grenville, with you and your brothers.

We more and more feel how much we have relinquished in leaving such friends behind; but I do not, and hope Emily does not, repent of our undertaking. So long as we are blessed with health, and of this, with due care, I entertain at present few apprehensions, we have, indeed, abundant reason for content and thankfulness around us, and where there is so much to be learned and to be done, life cannot hang heavy on the hands of,

Their high reputation in such matters has arisen, I am assured, from exaggerated statements of particular instances, such as may happen in any country, of overstrained tenderness for animal life, and from the fact that certain sacred animals, such as the bulls dedicated to Brahma, are really treated with as much tenderness and consideration as if they were Brahmins themselves. As yet it remains to be seen how far the schools may produce a change for the better. I am inclined to hope everything from them, particularly from those which Mrs. Wilson has, under the auspices of the Church I believe I have said nothing of the Missionaries, set on foot for females; Mohammedans, who are about as nubut I am sure that a people such as Imerous here as the Protestants are in have described, with so many amiable Ireland. They are in personal aptraits of character, and so great natural pearance a finer race than the Hin

Dear Harriet,

Ever your affectionate Cousin,
REGINALD CALCUTTA.

doos; they are also more universally educated, and on the whole I think a better people, inasmuch as their faith is better. They are haughty and irascible, hostile to the English as to those who have supplanted them in their sovereignty over the country, and notoriously oppressive and avaricious in their dealings with their idolatrous countrymen, wherever they are yet in authority. They are, or are supposed to be, more honest, and to each other they are not uncharitable; but they ave, I fear, less likely at present than the Hindoos to embrace Christianity, though some of them read our Scriptures; and I have heard one or two speak of Christians as of nearly the same religion with themselves. They have, however, contracted in this country many superstitions of castes and images, for which their western brethren, the Turks and Arabs, are ready to excommunicate them; and, what is more strange, many of them, equally in opposition to their own religion and that of the Hindoos, are exceeding drunkards.

TO MRS. HEBER.

The public here is very liberal, but the calls on charity are continual, and the number of five and ten pound subscriptions which are required of a man every month, for inundations, officers' widows, &c. &c., are such as surprise an Englishman on his first arrival, though he cannot but be pleased at the spirit which it evinces. .

I am happy to set you at ease about pirates. There were, as you have been rightly informed, four or five years ago, a good many Arab pirates in the Bombay seas, but none that I have heard of ever ventured into the bay of Bengal, and even those who did exist are said to have been completely driven from the sea by the expedition which was sent some time back from Bombay against the Arabs of the Persian Gulf. But with these seas I shall have little concern, since my journeys in that quarter will be chiefly by land. Those which I have to perform in this part of India will be mostly by the Ganges, on which skulking thieves are sometimes met with, but no robbers bold enough to attack European boats. I should have much preferred marching by land the whole way, as we at first proposed, but I found it impossible to leave Calcutta before the weather would have become too hot for such a journey. At the commencement of the rains we shall set out, and boat it all the way to Cawnpoor. The boats are like houses, and as comfortable as such things well can be; but our progress, by this Calcutta is a very striking place, but method, will be very tedious and weait so much resembles Petersburgh, risome, compared with the amusement though on a less splendid scale, that I of a land-journey with our tents and can hardly help fancying myself some- elephants. We shall, however, escape times in Russia. The architecture of the rains, which is reckoned the only the principal houses is the same, with unhealthy season in Bengal, when Italian porticoes, and all white-washed every road is a puddle, every field a or stuccoed; and the width and straight- marsh, and every river a sea, and when ness of the principal streets, the want a hot sun, playing on a vast surface of of pavement, the forms of the peasants' water and decayed vegetables, is recarts, and the crowds of foot-passen-garded as the cause of almost all the gers in every street, as well as the mul- diseases which are not brought on by titude of servants, the want of furni- intemperance and carelessness. ture in the houses, and above all, the great dinner-parties, which are one

Tittyghur, Jan. 25, 1824. MY DEAREST MOTHER, Our former packets will, I trust, before this time, have communicated to you the intelligence of our safe arrival, and of our subsequent proceedings.

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My morning rides are very pleasant; | and heart-broken; the kings of Oude my horse is a nice, quiet, good-tem- and Hydrabad only hold their places pered little Arab, who is so fearless at our will and pleasure, and their subthat he goes, without starting, close to jects desire nothing so much as that we an elephant, and so gentle and docile should take the government of both that he eats bread out of my hand, and countries into our own hands; while has almost as much attachment and Russia is regarded as so distant a dancoaxing ways as a dog. This seems ger, that, during the latter years of the usual character of the Arab horse, Lord Hastings' government, and in who (to judge from those I have seen fact to the present moment, the army in this country) is not the fiery dashing of India has been allowed to melt away, animal I had supposed, but with more and is now, as I am assured, perhaps rationality about him, and more appa- the least numerous establishment (in rent confidence in his rider, than the comparison with the population, extent, generality of English horses. The and revenues of the country whence it latter, however, bear the highest price is raised and supported) that any here, from their superior size and power civilised empire in the world can show. of going through more work. The It seems, however, that war with a Indian horses are seldom good, and new, and by no means a despicable always ill-tempered and vicious, and it enemy, is now inevitable, and has inis the necessity of getting foreign horses deed already begun. The King of which makes the expense so great as Ava, whose territories, under the name you have heard, while, after all, in this of the "Birman empire," you will see climate, four horses will not do so marked in all the recent maps, has much work as a pair in England. been long playing the same BuonaBelieve me, dearest Mother, partean game in what is called "India beyond the Ganges" (though in fact removed many hundred miles from that river) which we have been playing in Hindostan. His dominions had, till now, been separated from ours by a line of mountains and forests, which prevented almost all intercourse, either peaceable or hostile; but by the recent conquest of the country of Assam and some other mountain rajas, he has pushed himself into the immediate

Your affectionate Son,
REGINALD CALCUTTA.

I rejoice to hear that Mr. Puller is coming out as chief justice. He is a kind and worthy man, and will, I think, be very popular here, as well as be an agreeable and friendly neighbour to us.

TO THE VERY REVEREND THE DEAN neighbourhood of Bengal, and has be

OF ST. ASAPH.

Tittyghur, Jan. 27, 1824.

gun to hold a language about frontiers, neutral grounds, and ancient claims of the" golden empire," which the EngMY DEAR SIR,-In my last letter Ilish in India are quite unaccustomed to promised you that this should be a political one. I know not, after all, now that I am sitting down to the task, that I have been able to acquire any information which will be new to you, or that I am as yet qualified to speak otherwise than with great hesitation as to the real state even of a small part of this great empire. From all external enemies British India (now comprehending either directly or indirectly three-fourths of the whole vast peninsula) appeared, till lately, secure. The Maharattas are completely conquered

hear, and which it would be still more inconvenient to admit for a single moment. I believe, indeed, his actual demands are limited to a little swampy island, no more worth fighting for than that which was the cause of Fortinbras's armament. But this island, such as it is, has been in the hands of the Company, and the soubahdars of Bengal before them, time out of mind, and is also clearly on the western side of the main stream of the little river which divides the empires. Nor is this all, since in the course of the discussion