taxpayer for the expenses of the English Government, to ask nine or ten
millions more for the government of India would certainly cause great
dissatisfaction in this country. The picture is, to my mind, an alarming
one, notwithstanding the cheerful view taken of it by the Secretary for
India; and it has filled many besides myself with dismay.

Now, looking round for modes of escape from this position, I believe
they exist, if we had the courage to adopt them. An hon. Friend has
asked me, 'Is there nobody to tell the House of Commons the truth on
this matter?' I might ask why he has not done it himself. I suppose he
is afraid of being thought rash; but his advice is, that the Government
should re-establish the independence of the Punjab, recall the Ameers of
Scinde, restore the Government of the King of Oude, giving to it the
dependency of Nagpore. I confess, whether it be rash or not, that I
think it would be wise to restore the Government of the Punjab and to
give independence to that province which is called Scinde, because as no
revenue is received from that part of the country in excess of the
expense which its retention causes to this country, we should endeavour
to bring our dominions in India within a reasonable and manageable
compass. No policy can be more lunatic than the policy of annexation we
have pursued of late years in India, and the calamity we are now meeting
is the natural and inevitable consequence of the folly we have
committed. It is not easy for great generals and statesmen who have been
made earls and marquesses and had bronze statues put up in their honour
in our public squares--it is not easy for the statesmen who have done
all this to turn round and reverse it all; they have not the moral
courage to do it; it might be an act of peril; it might appear a descent
from the summit of empire and be wrongly construed throughout the world.
But as a question of finance and good government we should, a few years
hence, admit that it was a sound policy. But I will not pursue this