proposition to the House. I would show that industry is neglected by the
Government to a greater extent probably than is the case in any other
country in the world which has been for any length of time under what is
termed a civilized and Christian government. I should be able to show
from the notes and memoranda of eminent men in India, of the Governor of
Bengal, Mr. Halliday, for example, that there is not and never has been
in any country pretending to be civilized, a condition of things to be
compared with that which exists under the police administration of the
province of Bengal. With regard to the courts of justice I may say the
same thing. I could quote passages from books written in favour of the
Company with all the bias which the strongest friends of the Company can
have, in which the writers declare that, precisely in proportion as
English courts of justice have extended, have perjury and all the evils
which perjury introduces into the administration of justice prevailed
throughout the Presidencies of India. With regard to public works, if I
were speaking for the Natives of India, I would state this fact, that in
a single English county there are more roads--more travelable roads--
than are to be found in the whole of India; and I would say also that
the single city of Manchester, in the supply of its inhabitants with the
single article of water, has spent a larger sum of money than the East
India Company has spent in the fourteen years from 1834 to 1848 in
public works of every kind throughout the whole of its vast dominions. I
would say that the real activity of the Indian Government has been an
activity of conquest and annexation--of conquest and annexation which
after a time has led to a fearful catastrophe which has enforced on the
House an attention to the question of India, which but for that
catastrophe I fear the House would not have given it.

If there were another charge to be made against the past Government of
India, it would be with regard to the state of its finances. Where was