'It may be objected that under the present state of embarrasment, when the administration is harassed and distressed by the alarming state of defalcation and dilapidation of the finances brought on the country, not by themselves, but by the policy of their most honourable, worthy, and enlightened predecessors, for the last thirty years; a policy which has entailed on generations yet unborn, incalculable, and, I fear, irremediable evils: it may, I say, be objected, that the present is no time for doing any thing demanding an expenditure of money, particularly as the benefit must be remote. I answer, I am asking for national retrenchment, and for a revision of those laws which have long been an opprobrium on the spirit of wisdom, which should direct human institutions generally, and these realms in particular.

'I ask that the savings of those retrenchments be applied to the relief of a people who have long been the wretched victims of misrule, and towards whom the commiseration of the civilised world is directed. A people on whom has been inflicted every scourge that the worst passions of man could engender, fire, sword, spoliation, confiscation, thrice repeated plague, pestilence, famine; and on whom the demoniacal spirit of bigotry, intolerance, and fanaticism has been let loose, and under the mask of religion has spread division, discord, and murder throughout the land! My object is to endeavour to heal some, or all of these, by consigning to the silence of the tomb, all past heart-burnings; and recommending that the civilising bond of mutual interest may be aided, and set into immediate action, by a more enlightened and humane policy; and, finally, that reparation be made for those Acts of Parliament, which suppressed the rising manufacturing energies of the Irish people, by setting them up in business again. This may be contrary to the received notions of what has been misnamed political economy; but all I know of the uses of governors, is, that it is their duty to direct the means, placed at their disposal, so that they may be productive of the greatest possible quantity of good, to the greatest number of the people. If political economy will not do this, under the present social arrangements, I want it not, I want that which will, I care not what name it bears. However, some of the first political economists of the present day, Messrs. Say and Sismondi, have recommended the advance of capital, by the French Government, to encourage the silk trade, even recommending a tax for that exclusive purpose; and their authority was especially urged by Colonel William Maberly, in a luminous and powerful speech, in advocacy of a motion he made in the House of Commons, for an advance of money, to employ the Irish people, a speech replete with sound argument, and breathing philanthropy in every sentence; during which, this young member was repeatedly cheered by the House, and was flatteringly and particularly eulogized by the late Mr. Canning on that occasion.

'By some people it may be deemed that I have dwelt too much in these pages, on the INSECURITY QUESTION; to them I answer, that it is my firm conviction, from long knowledge of the people of Ireland, that permanent peace, tranquillity, or security of property, cannot reign in that country, until the remaining penal laws are erased from the statute book.

'It may be also thought that I have laid too great stress on the Free Trade question. My answer is, that if it be indispensable to employ some millions of people, which I hold it to be, and when I contemplate the immense quantity of manufactured articles millions are capable of producing, even in an hour, and carrying on the contemplation to the produce of a day, a month, or of one year, I feel the necessity of most strongly pointing to the abrogation of those laws, which prevent us at present from finding certain markets for such enormous supplies, which it was necessary for me to be quite sure could be found, otherwise my recommendation, of employing the people on manufactures, might fairly be considered as unsound. If the laws or restrictions of foreign countries prevented our trading with them, an insurmountable difficulty might then be presented; but when our own legislation prevents our own people only, from trading with half the population of the world, too much cannot be said or written on the subject, until the evil is remedied, particularly also when, I trust, I have made the connection between this subject, and the employment of the people of Ireland, clear and unequivocal.

'It may be answered, that it is impossible to interfere with the East India Company's rights. Their rights I think might be adjusted equitably, by giving the bondholders even a larger annuity than their bonds now produce them, until their Charter expires; and if that will not be acceded to, for the present, while manufactories are establishing in Ireland, which could not probably be brought into extensive operation, before the expiration of that Charter, I would propose to let the sugars of our eastern colonies be placed under less severe prohibitions,-take off ten or fifteen shillings a cwt., and then they will make profitable returns to our merchants, who will find it their interest to pay for them in our manufactured goods, for which there would then be ample demand; and also let us relieve our shipping interest, by opening the carrying-trade of the India Seas, and let them compete with foreigners, in the honest spirit of rivalry, and redeem the character of our laws, from that preposterous policy, which showed them to be framed to favour foreigners; for now they are only acting against the interest of Englishmen, and render us the laughing-stock of those who are gaining so immensely by the continuance of such legislation.

A variety of plans for the relief of Ireland have been proposed, and among others a very interesting and benevolent one by William Allen, that of dividing the land into very small portions, on

each of which a comfortable house is to be built. In this way he proves that Ireland could maintain, in a high degree of comfort, millions more than its present population: as far as this plan can be applied to improve the condition of the cottiers, it will do good; but under present tenures, and a thousand other things, it would be a waste of good intentions to expect that it could be applied to benefit the present millions, as speedily as their miserable state requires.

'Another plan for the employment of the people has been put forward, that of forming a ship canal through Ireland, from Dublin to Galway, of cutting Ireland in half! This second edition of the Castlereagh plan appears to have been put forward without reference to the charges for its use, which would, even for the purpose of keep→ ing it in repair, necessarily be so high as to render it useless; as, from a calculation that has been made by intelligent men of business, taking the averages at the lowest rate of tonnage charged on any canals—the hawling, port charges at both ends, and toll tonnage for a ship only going once through it, the whole would amount to more than a vessel could possibly afford to pay out of any rate of freight now to be obtained for a voyage to the West Indies or elsewhere. The other serious objection to it, as an employment for the people, is, that it is local and not a re-productive one; when the work is done, it is done with. Comparatively, it may benefit a few thousand labourers on the line it is to pass through; but what will it benefit those in the South or North of that country?

'My Lord, the plan I here propose of relieving the people of Ireland, by finding re-productive manufacturing employment for them, is neither new nor visionary; for its practical effects we have only to look at home, both in England and Scotland, and contemplate the extensive and valuable results on all the great interests of the empire, the agricultural, the trading, and the commercial, to convince us of the incalculable and important advantages to be derived from thus employing the people. That the time has arrived, when something must be speedily done for Ireland, I am satisfied, and that the first and best thing is to pursue a sound, liberal, just, and enlightened policy towards her, in the full spirit of legislating for the happiness of the many, and not merely for that of the few. That the measures here advocated would wonderfully raise the rate of wages of the majority of the people of Ireland, and that the increased value of their labour would enable them to become far greater consumers of exciseable and all other articles, by which the revenues of the country would be increased some millions in a few years, I have no doubt; and I am satisfied, that thus will be achieved a measure which the Emigration Committee seemed to imply was indispensable to the well-being of both countries, but to accomplish which they suggested no mode whatever, leaving a blank which only their expensive "expedient" of emigration would not in the least fill up or remedy.

Oriental Herald, Vol. 16.

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' And I must add, that it appears really strange that they should have wound up their labours, by recommending a remedy which would cost such an enormous sum of money, without even expressing an opinion of the propriety of making an experiment on any plan proposed, as likely to raise the wages of labour in Ireland, and prevent the further reduction of wages in these parts of the empire.

For myself, I own I am sanguine, excessively sanguine; the measures here proposed would be successful, from the circumstances of success having attended such efforts in every country, where they have been tried. In Spain, Portugal, Poland, Ireland, in short, in all purely agricultural countries around us, poverty exists in the greatest degree, both among the people and their governments; while, on the contrary, the commercial and manufacturing nations are much richer in comparison. Whether we view the ancient or the modern states, the Carthaginians, the Venetians, the Dutch Republics, or the last and most splendid instance, which Britain herself offers; or to refer more immediately at home, to the high poor-rates in the agricultural, and the low poor-rates in the manufacturing counties, we find improvement and education every where the result of manufacturing and commercial industry.

And, as a further confirmation, do we not see our enlightened neighbours, the French, and the active enterprising Americans, exerting every nerve and sinew of their resources, to become manufacturers, satisfied of the great national advantages to be derived from manufactories, trade, and commerce? Their example ought to induce us to stimulate all the energies of Ireland, otherwise those nations will run past us in the general career of the improvement and happiness of the people.

'I conclude, my Lord, saying with Horace :

"Si quid novisti rectius istis, Candidus imperti; si non, his utere mecum."

STATUE TO THE MEMORY OF THE LATE STEPHEN BABINGTON.

THE beautiful statue by Chantrey of the late Stephen Babington, Esq., of the Bombay Civil Service, which many will remember as having been in the Exhibition last year, was safely shipped at Gravesend, on board the Company's ship Abercrombie, Robinson, on the 16th ult:-the Honourable Court of Directors having resolved to send it to India at the public expense. We understand, from good authority, that the celebrated artist considers it one of the happiest efforts of his genius; and we may therefore congratulate the Presidency of Bombay on the possession of the finest specimen of sculpture which will have reached Asia in modern times. An obelisk, ordered by the Native subscribers, to a monument over Mr.

Statue to the Memory of the late Stephen Babington.

417

Babington's remains at Tannah, where he fell, is also placed on board the same vessel.

If any circumstance could, in addition to the tribute which the European Society of Bombay has paid to Mr. Babington's memory, mark the excellence of his private as well as public character, it is the affection which the Natives have, in this unusual manner, shown to their departed friend.

suc

Mr. Babington's talents seem first to have been discovered and called forth by Sir John Malcolm, whom he accompanied on his mission to Persia, and by whom, while yet scarcely arrived at manhood, he was left for some time in charge of the political agency at Bushire. Sir Evan Nepean, doubtless made acquainted with his superior abilities, immediately on landing as Governor of Bombay, appointed him his private secretary; and he afterwards cessively rose to the offices of Political Secretary to Government, Zillah Judge, and lastly, Judge of the Court of Sudder Adawlut, the highest judicial appointment in India. But the most flattering, and at the same time the most arduous duty, it was reserved to the late Governor, Mr. Elphinstone, to select for him, by nominating Mr. Babington President of a Committee for revising the revenue and Judicial Code of Regulations of the Presidency of Bombay, which revision, it was understood, would be made applicable to the other Presidencies; so that, at the early age of thirty-one, this distinguished individual was vested with the singular power of amending and proposing laws intended for the general government of our vast Indian empire. The accident, which deprived the public of the services of this gentleman, is too well known to need a detail at the present time. Its recital would only serve to open wounds yet scarcely

healed.

About one-third of the difficult task, which was imposed on Mr. Babington, was completed at the time of his death; and through the medium of the following statement, made by his successor in office, we are enabled to present to our readers the details of his labours.

LETTER OF MR. BABINGTON'S SUCCESSOR IN THE COMMITTEE.

Bombay, 21st June, 1823.

I enclose a list of the drafts of Regulations prepared by the Committee, and forwarded to Government, while our esteemed friend was President. The first thirteen embrace the whole of the Civil branch of the Code; the fourteenth belongs to the Revenue.

This may be well said to be more than one-third of the whole task of re-modelling the Code, because, independently of the extent of the Civil branch, there are inserted in it at length various funda