had rallied. The artillery of Valdez was taken, his cavalry retired, and his infantry dispersed.'

The Royalists thus repulsed at every point lost all confidence and order, and fled with the utmost precipitation to the heights of Condorkanki; but to retreat further, with any hope of ultimate escape, was impracticable. Shortly before sunset, therefore, General Canterac, on whom the chief command had devolved, sued for terms; and the remains of the Spanish army laid down their arms and became prisoners of war. A capitulation likewise was entered into, by which the castles of Ulloa, and indeed every place of strength then held by the Royalists, were given up to the Patriots; and South America became, to all intents and purposes, independent.

We must not lengthen out our present paper, which has already far exceeded the limits originally designed for it, by extracting any one of the numerous and entertaining adventures to which the subsequent course of events gave birth. Miller was, in due time, rewarded for his exertions, by large grants of land and the rank of General of Division, and, upon the formal termination of the war, the civil government of the department of Potosi was allotted to him. Here, by the integrity of his proceedings, the suavity of his manners, and the good sense which characterised his schemes, he soon became as popular as he had previously been with the army; and his name will long be coupled, in the minds of the inhabitants at large, with all that is just, noble, and generous.

We believe that the brave and meritorious individual, of whose career we have drawn this sketch, is still in England-where he arrived about twelve months ago, the same modest and singleminded person, we are assured, that he was when, in 1817, he quitted it as a mere adventurer. He means, however, ere long, to return to the scene of his exertions, success, and honour; where, as he happens to be a Roman Catholic, there is every likelihood of his becoming the founder of a great family. The work in which his adventures are detailed by his brother, Mr. John Miller, appears to us to be one of the most interesting that have recently issued from the press; calculated, certainly more than any other we could name, to give a lively and distinct notion of the nature of the warfare which has terminated in the independence of the Spanish colonies, and paved the way, we are to hope, for the future civilization and prosperity of those vast regions-regions, on which so much British treasure, we ask not how wisely or profitably, has been lavished; which have drank so deep of the blood of our countrymen; and which, if moral and political good be the result, will owe so heavy a debt of gratitude to their conduct and their gallantry.

ART.

ART. VIII.-1. An Appeal to England against the New Indian Stamp Act; with some observations on the condition of British Subjects in Calcutta, under the Government of the East India Company. London. 1828. 8vo. pp. 141.

2. A View of the Present State and Future Prospects of the Free Trade and Colonization of India. London. 1828. Svo. pp. 124.

AS

S the period approaches, when the renewal of the East India Company's charter, and the relations, political and commercial, of India and China to England must come before parliament, the publications which we propose to examine in this article acquire a practical interest, as evincing the temper and arguments of those by whom a view adverse to the continuance of the present system has been already taken. When the period of discussion in parliament shall arrive, unless public attention be occupied by some engrossing measure of domestic or foreign policy, the East India question will stand paramount in interest, extent, and importance. The years which have elapsed since the last renewal of the Company's charter, have been remarkable for the impulse given to the spirit of inquiry and speculation. The authority of long-established opinions and rules of conduct, has been shaken; indeed, the temper of the time is to require proof, not of the necessity for change, but for the continuing that which already exists; nor are these feelings more largely displayed than on all colonial and commercial questions.

The author of the works now before us (for we apprehend that, though the entry be in different names, the property is in the same hands), has availed himself very freely of the prejudices of the day; his statements and reasonings are addressed, with most gallant disregard of accuracy and fairness, ad captandum. We quote the following passage from the preface to the Appeal, as containing, in fact, the whole case which has been preferred by the petitioning merchants of Calcutta, and submitted to the consideration of the legislature; merely observing, that instead of Mr. James Hogg, Mr. Crawford has been appointed their agent in England. The sinews of war have not been overlooked, for a sum of 3,000l. has been subscribed to remunerate Mr. Crawford for his services. Mr. Crawford is a gentleman who has run a career of honourable and successful service in India. Like another great Indian and Scotch reformer, he commenced in the medical department of the East India Company, which, however, he quitted in 1809 for the political branch of their service. In that branch he has been employed, with an interval of three years passed in England, up to the year 1827, when his mission as

envoy to the court of Ava terminated. In the course of this ser vice, galling as it must have been, under this arbitrary and oppressive government, he has received, in the painful form of nett salary, the sum of fifty thousand six hundred and forty-two pounds sterling. We do not mention these facts in detraction of Mr. Crawford's character or abilities, but as illustrative of the different feelings which appear to prevail on the relation to the government of public servants in this country and in India. That a servant specially favoured and enriched by royal patronage should become the active agent of attack and censure upon his Majesty's government, would excite here a degree of surprise sufficient to deter the most adventurous from taking such means of attracting public notice. It would, however, seem that no such feelings have place in regard to the East India Company; a gentleman may be their confidential servant in 1827, and yet become the remunerated agent of their enemies in 1828, without incurring any disagreeable imputation. So much for the agent; and now to the matter of the agency, as expressed in the preface to the Appeal.'

• From the nature of the Indian revenue, as is explained at length in the following sheets, the existing taxes could not be increased; but it appeared to some of the advisers of the government, that a new tax might be imposed, which would extract some revenue from the inhabitants of Calcutta, who (as they pretended) contributed little or nothing to the wants of the state. The reader of the following pages will judge of the fairness and intellect of the statesmen who could deliberately make this assertion. It is certain that the inhabitants of Calcutta pay a house-tax, town duties, and inland customs, besides the harbour duties and customs upon the whole foreign trade of Bengal; this surely is something. And when it is considered that the Englishmen who inhabit Calcutta are not permitted, by the Company's regulations, to possess an acre of land over the whole of the provinces under their exclusive government; that they cannot go eleven miles from the capital, for pleasure or business, without a passport;_that their licences may be withdrawn, and their persons deported to England, because they have" incurred the displeasure of the government," without any other cause being assigned, it may be doubted whether it is quite fair to call upon them to pay for the glory or distant territory which the Company may acquire by their wars.

It appeared, however, to the Indian government, quite fair and reasonable; and having discovered, what seems to have been unsuspected for thirteen years before, that the 98th and 99th sections of the act of 1813, renewing the charter, conveyed the power of imposing all manner of taxes in Calcutta, with no other checks than the previous sanction of the Court of Directors and the Board of Controul, they obtained this sanction for a stamp tax, which was promulgated in

* 53 Geo. III., c. 155, sect. 98 and 99.

December

December 1826, to take effect from the first of May 1827. This publication of the law was the first notice the inhabitants received of any such intention. Alarmed, as they might well be, at this novel assumption of power by their rulers, they began to examine the grounds on which it was founded. It appeared to them, that the sections in question only related to duties of customs, and taxes of a like nature; and that, if the words seemed to have a wider scope in that section, it was plain, from the whole tenor of the enactment, that this was all that parliament intended. They met, and petitioned the government to forbear from levying the tax; at least until a reference could be made to England: this was refused, and they were plainly told that the clauses in the 53d Geo. III., c. 155, were considered by the government as conferring upon them as full and ample a right to levy taxes in Calcutta, as they already had in the provinces. Upon this, the inhabitants determined to make a stand, to have a public meeting to discuss the matters, and to petition parliament against this encroachment upon their rights and upon their property.

They were prevented from taking this course by hints that some peculiarly vexatious clauses in the tax might be modified, if they would only submit quietly to the rest. If the arbitrary power claimed by the government were submitted to, those clauses might at any time be reenacted, and the stamp duty might be followed by a property tax, or any other oppressive impost. It was not to save the thirty shillings at which he was rated, that Hampden resisted the payment of ship-money. A meeting was accordingly held, in spite of all intimidation, and various attempts to prevent it; petitions to both Houses of Parliament were agreed upon, and a subscription was opened to defray the expenses of a legal resistance to the tax, in India, and in England. Upwards of 3,000l. were subscribed in an hour for this purpose; and the petitions have been signed by nearly all the respectable European and native inhabitants of Calcutta, who are not in the Company's service.'

It is unnecessary to offer any remarks on the alleged illegality of the stamp duty-that point has been abandoned; and we have therefore only to examine the measure as to its general merits and policy. The petitioners have borne for many years, without remonstrance, the imposition of stamp duties throughout the interior of India. This fiscal oppression for some time afflicted only the natives and their property. It would have been a work of supererogation in these Anglo-Indian Hampdens to have called the attention of parliament to this mode of arbitrary taxation, while the favoured precincts of the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court remained secure from its influence; but, alas! in 1826, the necessities of the state-really nothing more nor less than the necessities of the state, produced by a war of unexampled expenditure for its duration required an augmentation of revenue; and as the unjust distinction, on this very head of taxation, between the metropolis and the provinces, had already attracted the notice of the govern

ing authorities in England as well as in India, an extension of the stamp duties to Calcutta was one of the most obvious, and apparently least exceptionable modes of effecting the object in view. Our readers may rely on the accuracy of the following statement of the measures taken by the Bengal government on the occasion. Towards the end of the month of October, in 1826, the Bengal government received a despatch from the Court of Directors, dated 24th May, 1826, conveying their sanction, and the approbation of the Commissioners for the Affairs of India, to a regulation for raising and levying stamp duties in the town of Calcutta, prepared under their instructions of the 29th October, 1817, and which had been transmitted for approval, according to the 98th section of the act 53d Geo. III., c. 155. In that year, the Indian expenditure exceeded the income, and there were demands outstanding against the government, which added greatly to the public embarrassment. The pressure of financial difficulties was therefore immediate, and the local government would have been wanting in their duty, if they had hesitated at once to avail themselves of the authority by which an additional source of revenue had been placed within their reach. It is to be presumed that the government were quite aware that the attempt to enforce the stamp duties in Calcutta would excite much dissatisfaction, and would probably be resisted by all lawful means, as well by the native as European inhabitants: but this anticipation could not be considered as a reason for hesitating to execute the orders received on the subject, knowing as they did that those orders were dictated by a desire to remove the invidious and unequitable distinction which existed between the inhabitants of Calcutta and those of the interior, and to place all, in respect to money transactions, on a footing of perfect equality.

The revised stamp regulations for the interior, Regulation xvi., 1824, corresponding exactly in the rates of duty on deeds, and in all material points with that proposed for Calcutta, had been in force nearly two years. It must be admitted that the regulation had been received at first with dissatisfaction; but when the principle on which it was framed came to be more known, and as its object was perceived to be the establishment of a gradation of duties, according to the nature of the security, and, consequently, in most instances, a reduction, not an enhancement, of the rates previously existing, the dissatisfaction had gradually worn away, and a correspondent advantage had begun to be experienced in the productiveness of the revenue from this source.

The extension of the system to the presidency, with a view to which the complicated forms of the schedule are known to have been framed, was all that was wanting to reconcile the people at

large