in extenso before the Secretary of State. The exception is a strong presumption of a rule in the opposite direction.

Next, we make the same inquiry respecting the native advisers who were taken into Mr Wilson's confidence. Who were they?-and what did they recommend? Again there is an altum silentium, or broken as before only by a single voice. One zemindar, said to be the largest in Bengal, writes to Mr Wilson to express approval of his "admirable system of taxation," and to disclaim any desire to be exempted by reason of the Perpetual Settlement. This letter also is eagerly transmitted to the Secretary of State, and rewarded by the rapturous thanks both of the Calcutta and her Majesty's Governments. What further honours may be in store for the sagacious Maharajah of Burdwan, we know not; but as his opinion is declared to have been both unsolicited and unexpected, he was clearly not one of the native advisers to whose knowledge and capacity Mr Wilson professes so many obligations. How strange, then, that not one of these should be produced! No, not after the authorities of Madras and Bombay had publicly denounced the unpopularity of the taxes, and thereby, as the Calcutta Government complain, greatly added to their difficulties in enforcing it! We are compelled to conclude, that there are no opinions to produce which would be of the least weight with the native community. We have heard an anecdote of a certain prelate, now living, who solicited an interview with a parochial clergyman of much experience, for the purpose of informing himself on certain points with which his lordship's own career had not made him familiar. At the end of an hour the bishop warmly shook the hand of his new friend, and protested that he had never held so interesting and instructive a conversation. Some one afterwards asked the clergyman what he had said to give the bishop so high an opinion of his abilities and experience. "I said nothing!" was the reply; "the bishop talked the whole time himself; told me

his own views (of which I did not think much), but did not allow me to put in a single word!" Perhaps Mr Wilson's interviews with the polite natives were of the same episcopal nature.

Still, his measures were debated and approved in the Legislative Council of India. True; and what is the Legislative Council? Simply the Executive Government of Calcutta, enlarged by the addition of the other Governors, the Judges of the Supreme Court, and a Civil Servant nominated by each of the subordinate governments. The English judges were not likely to be better acquainted with native finance than Mr Wilson himself. The two members for the subordinate Presidencies might speak and vote as they pleased; but when Sir C. Trevelyan sent his minutes to Mr Forbes to enable him to resist the budget, the Supreme Government summoned him before them at Mr Wilson's house, and forbade a compliance with his instructions. It is true that they allowed him to show the papers to the members in private; but they would not permit them to be printed for general circulation, nor read at a legislative meeting where the proceedings are public. It was this order which drove Sir C. Trevelyan to the rash publication which properly occasioned his dismissal. He complained that Mr Wilson culled, from the reports sent up, every passage which was at all in favour of his view, and suppressed the rest; s0 producing an impression exactly the opposite of the facts. He therefore demanded that the whole issue between them should be submitted to the Legislature and the public. Mr Wilson had made his Financial Statement with this avowed object. "We are bound to be frank," he said, "when we are about to appeal to you to aid us in our efforts to retrieve the position in which we now stand. If we call upon the public to bear new burdens, and to make new sacrifices, however slight, we feel that we are at least bound to explain fully their necessity." This statement is printed and circulated throughout India. The Governors of Madras and Bombay accept the challenge. They say the sacrifices are not slight, but great; and they deny in toto the necessity for either of the "three tremendous taxes." Surely it was not an unreasonable request that the arguments and calculations of these distinguished persons charged with the government of half India, and both possessed of far more experience than either Lord Canning or Mr Wilson, should be heard in the same chamber, and submitted to the same investigation with the budget itself. If the Indian Legis lature could not bear this much discussion, we must agree with Sir C. Trevelyan in regarding it as a "sham." An answer, however, was the last thing that could be there al lowed; and the pertinacious Sir Charles sacrificed at once his official duty and his interests in the hope of arresting measures which he deemed fatal to the empire. We do not defend an act of insubordination which could only be visited by dismissal, but it says little for the native acceptance of the budget to mark the alarm which immediately pervaded its supporters. "Oliver asking for more" could not have elicited a severer reproof. Sir Bartle Frere labours for words hard enough to express his indignation at "the Governor of Madras proclaiming himself the champion of disobedience, and the open opponent of the measures of the Government of India;" and Sir Charles Wood dismisses the culprit, with the grave condemnation of the whole Cabinet, for the enormity of preparing "an elaborate answer to the speech by which the proposed measures were introduced into the Legislative Council;" and for appealing, by its publication, to the people of India against those measures. Very proper, no doubt, as a matter of official discipline; but, then, what reliance can we place on the approval of the Legislative Council? and what a farce was the invitation to a "frank and free discussion!

In fact, the only approval that seems to have been secured is that of the European mercantile interest, which obtained the advantage of a great reduction of customs-duties under the new tariff forming part of the budget. This is the interest represented in the columns of the

English journals, and their approval argues nothing at all for the native masses who enjoy no such compensations to set against the new burdens. Beyond this we can discover nothing but the self-complacent assumption of an orator to whom no one has yet replied. The moment Sir C. Trevelyan's answer appeared, Mr Wilson and his colleagues were smitten with terror. They were startled even at the word "critical" applied to their plan in an open telegram. They became earnest in supplications to the subordinate Presidencies, to prevent open opposition;" and when this could not be secured, they are obliged to acknowledge the hollowness of their former confidence. "Up to that time," they say, "the organs of public opinion were, upon the whole, highly favourable to our policy; and the measures proposed obtained a degree of support that we could scarcely have looked for" (not very encouraging expressions, at the best); "but the course taken by the Madras Government swept away even that slender support. Already in those newspapers which are published exclusively in the native interests, a very altered tone is observable in the appeals they make to their readers." Lord Canning now complains of " a new and unforeseen risk of resistance." "The cities and large towns," he adds, "will require careful management;" but he hopes that, by experience and great latitude in carrying out the measures most suited to the feelings of the people, " the risk of error will be materially diminished."

This language undoubtedly confirms all the apprehensions of Lord Elphinstone and Sir C. Trevelyan. The budget is foreseen by all parties to be most unpopular with the natives generally: the best that was hoped was to carry it through without any overwhelming resistance. But even this depended on conditions which do not now exist. Sir Robert Hamilton, the one authority in its favour beyond the Council Chamber, expressly stipulates for entire unanimityand unmistakable determination on the part of Government. Without this, "assuredly there will not

attention to the necessity of a wiser and more generous policy towards our expatriated countrymen. Such a policy is as essential to the honour and safety of the empire, as a just consideration of the wants and feelings of the natives themselves. It is due to both, to establish some definite system, resting on the approved traditions of India, and guarded from the constant fluctuations of home politics. We are not content to trust the fortunes of India to a cabinet which is continually shifting, and seldom contains a single Minister of Indian experience. The royal army and navy, our own exchequer and trade, foreign and even colonial politics, are more or less familiar subjects with our leading statesmen. India is a puzzle and a bore to nearly all. Yet it is precisely in this department that the most peculiar questions and the most extensive interests lie at the mercy of the Minister. They have a right to demand some legislative guarantee in lieu of that imperfect, but practically effective representation which the Legislature has destroyed in removing the East India Company.

The Council of India, the only Indian element remaining in the Home administration, should be empowered to submit a scheme of government for the consideration of Parliament. Select committees in both Houses would bring to bear upon it all the experience and wisdom of the country; and when matured, it should be promulgated by legislative enactment. Many questions would require careful sifting before the scheme could be complete; but some leading provisions are obvious. If India is to retain any organ in the administration, the position of the Home Council must be settled and sustained. To us it seems not too much that it should be elevated into a Committee of the Privy Council, with a distinct province in the Government, controlled, but not superseded, by the Cabinet. Again, if "amalgamation is determined upon in the army, the interests both of the late Company's officers and of the country generally should be provided for. The patron

age of a due proportion of first commissions should remain with the Council, and all else be vested in the authorities in India. The Horse Guards must by all means be prevented from seizing the Indian commands and staff situations for their own favourites. Neither must it be left in their power to withdraw the European troops at pleasure. With all dutiful respect for H. R. H. the Duke of Cambridge, we cannot be satisfied to leave the safety of India to the discretion of the Commanderin-Chief and the two Secretaries of State. We know how much heavier the nearer alarms of this country would weigh in their counsels than the distant and ill-understood necessities of India. The very anxiety which the illustrious Duke displays not to cripple the imperial resources" by locking up a portion of the army in India, satisfies us that a legislative provision is indispensable. It ought to be enacted, at the very least, that no regiment should be withdrawn from any Presidency in India without the written consent of the local government.

Another question requiring to be arranged by Parliament, is the relation between the Calcutta Government and those of the other Presidencies. We can see no necessity for the stringent supremacy now exercised by the Governor-General and his Council over every detail of administration. There is no greater fallacy than to talk of India as a whole. There is no such country in existence ;-no region where the natives call their land" India," or themselves "Indians." It is a term of western geography, like "America," or "Europe," or Australia" and indicates no greater necessity or feasibility of a central administration. The Punjab, the North-Western Provinces, Bengal, Madras, Bombay, and Pegu, are regions as distinct as Brazil and the United States in America,-or_as Norway, Prussia, and Italy in Europe. The soil, the produce, the traditions of government, the commerce, social habits, religion, race, and very colour of the people, are

WHEN the Captain of the Great Britain ran that unfortunate_vessel on to the sands of Dundrum Bay, it was urged in his excuse, that so many marvellous tales are told about Ireland, that he was justified in concluding that no obstacle lay in his road from the Isle of Man to New York; that Dublin was as fabulous as Blefuscu; and that the Mourn mountains had no more real existence than the loadstone hill which proved fatal to the ship of Sindbad. The story we are about to tell, might almost justify such incredulity; yet it is only one of many equally strange and equally well authenticated.

In the year 1706, Arthur Lord Altham, a needy and dissolute Irish peer, married Mary Sheffield, an illegitimate daughter of the Duke of Buckingham. They lived together for three years; but in 1709 Lord Altham went to Ireland, leaving his wife in England, where she remained until 1713, when she joined her husband in Dublin. From that time until 1716, they resided together, principally at Dunmaine, in the neighbourhood of Ross, in the county of Wexford. In 1716 they separated, under circumstances which we shall presently have occasion to notice more minutely, and never met again. In 1727 Lord Altham died, and was succeeded in his title and estates by his brother Richard Annesley, who remained in undisturbed possession of both for a period of thirteen years. Lady Altham survived her husband for about two years, which were passed in sickness and poverty, but does not appear ever to have taken any step to prevent Richard Annesley's assumption of the character of heir to her husband, to which, of course, he would have had no title if she had a son living at the time of Lord Altham's death. In the year 1739, however, a young man of about four-and-twenty years of age made his appearance in the fleet which, under the command of Admiral Vernon, was lying off Porto-Bello. He called himself James Annesley, stated that he was the son of Lord Altham,

On his arrival in England he went to lodge at Staines, in the neighbourhood of Windsor, and here a circumstance occurred which had no doubt a considerable effect on the subsequent proceedings. One of his associates, a man of the name of Redding, was gamekeeper to Sir John Dolbin, the Lord of the Manor. One morning James Annesley was out with a gun shooting small birds, when Redding called him to assist in capturing a net with which a man of the name of Egglestone was fishing in the river; Annesley's gun unfortunately went off in the scuffle, and mortally wounded Egglestone. There could be little doubt that the discharge of the gun was purely accidental; but Lord Anglesea (for Richard, Lord Altham, had in the meantime succeeded to that title also) seized the opportunity to destroy, as he thought, the claimant of his title and estates. He instituted a prosecution against James Annesley for murder; he was prodigal of money and promises amongst the witnesses; and he declared that he would willingly give ten thousand pounds to get him hanged. The jury at the Old Bailey acquitted Annesley, and Lord Anglesea's machinations recoiled upon himself; for there can be no doubt that they greatly influenced both the court and jury against him on the subsequent trial.

On the 11th of November 1743 the trial for the recovery of the estates came on in the Court of Exchequer in Dublin. It lasted fifteen days, and above ninety witnesses