their movements were undoubtedly crippled by want of foresight in providing means of transport. The night attack on the lines of Seringapatam, however, shows that Lord Cornwallis was not destitute of the spirit which led Clive to cross the river at Plassey, and Wolfe to scale the heights of Abraham. One of the first qualities of generalship is to see where an advantage, commensurate with the risk, may be obtained by a bold departure from rule and a gallant defiance of the ordinary calculation of chances. To common apprehension, the odds are always against the performance of a dashing exploit; whilst the military genius discovers at a glance that they have been miscalculated or may be reversed by a new combination. Danton's famous maxim, De l'audace, de l'audace, toujours de l'audace!' is far more applicable in war than in politics. Lord Cornwallis, seeing that he had no alternative between a discreditable retreat and a successful coupde-main, chose the bolder and, we believe, the safer course, very much, it appears, to the wonder and consternation of his allies. "To attack,' says Mr. Mill, with a handful of infantry, and without cannon, the whole of Tippoo's army, in a fortified camp under the walls of his capital, appeared to them an extraordinary attempt; and their surprise was increased when told that Lord Cornwallis in person commanded the division which was to penetrate the centre of the enemy's camp, and had gone to fight, as they expressed it, like a private soldier.'

The defences of Seringapatam then consisted of three lines, comprising nine redoubts and the fort, besides a hedge of thorny plants almost impenetrable by man or beast; the whole defended by 300 pieces of artillery. The attacking force, about 9000 men, was divided into three columns. The right, under General Medows, was misled by the guides; and there was a critical interval during which the centre was left without support. The firing was heavy; and Lord Cornwallis, well knowing his man, exclaimed, If Medows is above ground, this will bring him 'a noble expression of sympathising reliance, which recalls the exclamation of Collingwood at being first in the heat of the fire at Trafalgar, What would Nelson give to be here?' whilst Nelson was simultaneously crying out, See how that noble fellow, Collingwood, carries his ship into action!'

Medows came up in time to do his part effectively, and the victory was complete. The British casualties in killed and wounded were 533, of which 342 fell to the share of the centre column. Tippoo's army was reduced to the extent of 23,000, but four-fifths of his loss was by desertion; and on appealing to his officers he was informed that the spirits of his remaining troops were too much broken to enable him to continue the con

test.

test. The want of means of transport, with the resulting scarcity of munitions of all sorts, rendered a termination of hostilities highly acceptable to the Governor-General, although it is not true that, compelled to make peace, he hastily conceded terms which laid the foundation of future disputes and difficulties. On the contrary, when Tippoo, who wished to retain the power of wreaking vengeance on the Rajah of Courg, threatened to break off the negotiations if a projected impediment was thrown in his way, Lord Cornwallis ordered the siege operations to be resumed, and the hostages were on their way back when the Sultan yielded, and the definitive treaty was signed. By it Tippoo was to surrender one-half of his dominions, pay down a large sum of money (3 crores, 30 lacs), and give two of his sons as hostages. Lord Cornwallis's despatch to the Board of Control, dated Camp before Seringapatam, March 4, 1791,' begins thus :

We have at length concluded our Indian war handsomely, and I think as advantageously as any reasonable person could expect. We have effectually crippled our enemy without making our friends too formidable. Indeed I am well convinced that the impression they have received of the power and superiority of our arms will greatly overbalance any confidence with which their territorial acquisitions can possibly inspire them.'

The Secret Committee acknowledged his brilliant successes,' and in the July following he was raised to the dignity of a Marquis, his consent being taken for granted after consulting his brother, the Bishop. Mr. Pitt, it would seem, was not of the same way of thinking as Lord Melbourne, whose reply to a noble friend desirous of a similar elevation in the peerage was a blunt expression of astonishment.

Lord Cornwallis had received the Garter soon after he left England in 1786, and wrote thus to his son:

'You will have heard that soon after I left England I was elected Knight of the Garter, and very likely laughed at me for wishing to wear a blue riband over my fat belly. I could have excused myself in the following lines :—

"Scarfs, garters, gold, amuse his riper stage,

And beads and prayer-books are the toys of age." But I can assure you, upon my honour, that I neither asked for it nor wished for it. The reasonable object of ambition to a man is to have his name transmitted to posterity for eminent services rendered to his country and to mankind. Nobody asks or cares whether Hampden, Marlborough, Pelham, or Wolfe were Knights of the Garter.'

His Lordship is singularly infelicitous in his mode of philosophising on honours, distinctions, well-paid places, and the rest of

what

what are popularly considered the good things of this world, the prizes of success, and sometimes (if not uniformly) the outward and visible signs of merit. If a title, a riband, or a star, be but the guinea stamp which may be carelessly or culpably impressed on brass, it may notwithstanding be useful in giving currency to gold. If nobody asks or cares whether Hampden, Marlborough, Pelham, or Wolfe-a strange assortment, by the way-were Knights of the Garter, this is simply because this particular Order is no longer associated in men's minds with merit-no longer contemplated as the reward of intellectual, political, or military services to the State. But everybody asks and cares whether our statesmen and heroes have received their due meed of honour; and the noblest of them (Nelson, for example) have been commonly the most sensitive on this point. Tried by the severest rules of reason, the value of decorations and distinctions depends on their accordance with the claims and character of the recipients; and most right-minded men will say of them what Lord Mansfield said of popularity,-'I wish popularity, but it is that popularity which follows, not that which is run after; it is that popularity which, sooner or later, never fails to do justice to the pursuit of noble ends by noble means.'

The treaty with Tippoo left Lord Cornwallis at liberty to resume and complete the financial and judicial reforms which form the most durable and striking memorials of his Eastern Administration. His arrangements for the collection of the land revenue of Bengal and some adjacent provinces, commonly called the permanent settlement, have remained a subject of constant interest and discussion to this hour. Three modes of collecting this revenue were open to the government: through the Zemindars, who might be made primarily liable and empowered to levy the required assessment on the occupiers; by the village system, under which a given district was required to supply a stated sum; or under the ryot system, which brought the actual occupiers into direct contact with the collectors of the State. Lord Cornwallis chose the first, regardless of the doubts that prevailed touching the proprietary title to the soil or the original status of the Zemindars, who have been alternately treated by high Indian authorities as a sort of greater feudatories, or as mere farmers of the revenue under the native sovereigns. Lord Cornwallis resolved on considering them as the owners of the soil; thereby, it was alleged, too summarily disposing of the vested rights of other claimants. He was also accused of treating with many as Zemindars who had no well-founded pretension to the rank. In fixing the amount to be levied, it was assumed by him that moderate payments, punctually collected, were most likely to Vol. 105.-No. 209.

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promote

promote the interests of all parties. The grand question, as to which he and his chief adviser, Mr. Shore (afterwards Lord Teignmouth), differed, was, whether the arrangement should be decennial or permanent. The Governor-General's reasons for making it permanent were drawn up in due form and forwarded, with Mr. Shore's for an opposite conclusion, for the consideration of the home authorities, who decided for permanence. Dundas's private letter, announcing their decision, is worth quoting for more reasons than one:

"Knowing that the Directors would not be induced to take it up so as to consider it with any degree of attention, and knowing that some of the most leading ones among them held an opinion different both from your Lordship and me on the question of perpetuity, and feeling that there was much respect due to the opinion and authority of Mr. Shore, I thought it indispensably necessary both that the measure must originate with the Board of Control, and likewise that I should indace Mr. Pitt to become my partner in the final consideration of so important and controverted a measure. He accordingly agreed to shut himself up with me for ten days at Wimbledon, and attend to that business only. Charles Grant staid with us a great part of the time. After a most ininute and attentive consideration of the whole subject, I had the satisfaction to find Mr. Pitt entirely of the same opinion with us.'

This is only one amongst many proofs in these volumes of Mr. Pitt's extraordinary capacity for business. Speaking of a debate in which the late Lord Grey fiercely and unwarrantably assailed Pitt, General Grant (April 16th, 1787) writes:

'He was attacked at the same time by Fox and Sheridan, and in short with all the abilities of Opposition; and Rigby, who was in the House and attended that day out of friendship to Lord Carteret, told me, “You know," says he, "that I am not partial to Pitt, and yet I must own that he is infinitely superior to anything I ever saw in that House, and I declare that Fox and Sheridan, and all of them put together, are nothing to him; he, without support or assistance, answers them all with ease to himself, and they are just chaff before the wind to him."

Lord Cornwallis's next care was the reformation of the judicial system and the police. We cannot enter into details; but the leading features of his improvements may be briefly indicated. He found the administration of justice, civil and criminal, almost exclusively in the hands of natives, and notoriously corrupt. He found, moreover, collectors of revenue sitting as judges in revenue cases, and many of the most repulsive and least defensible doctrines of Mahommedan jurisprudence mischievously in force. He therefore constructed a set of courts, rising in regular gradation above each other, in each of which, except the lowest (made subject to appeal), there was an infusion of the European element. Thus, a

European

European presided over the Zillah Court, or second degree, and three covenanted servants of the Company sat in each of the Provincial Courts, or third. Next came the Supreme Court, consisting of the Governor-General and Members of Council, from which an ultimate appeal lay to the King, when (since 1797) the property at stake was not less than 50,000 rupees.

Lord Cornwallis has been denounced as a theorist for seeking, without sufficient knowledge of native laws or habits, to introduce English institutions and notions into the financial arrangements and the administration of justice in the East. Mr. Mill arraigns him for departing from the Benthamite model in a country where complicated forms, or multiplied stages of appeal, were sure to be turned to the worst purposes by the all-pervading litigiousness. The same able though prejudiced writer has vehemently assailed the permanent settlement; nor do its advocates assert that it has been attended with all the beneficial results which might have ensued had it been more judiciously carried out. But the intellectual grasp, the moral firmness, and the statesmanlike views exhibited by a new system of law or revenue, must be estimated with reference to the place, the time, the emergency, the available instruments and materials, and the degree of progress to which financial or juridical science had attained. Long subsequently to 1793 the severity of our own criminal law remained a disgrace to civilization, and the prolix confusion of our Statute Book still calls vainly for an amending hand. Our political economists are not yet agreed as to the true principles of taxation; and the terrible events of the last two years, far from producing unanimity, have simply brought to light the most astounding and perplexing variety of opinion as to the policy to be adopted in Hindostan. What, then, can be more unfair than to judge the Indian legislator or reformer of 1793 by the brighter, though still clouded and imperfect, lights of 1858? It is surely enough for fame and national gratitude that he swept away at once the whole pre-existing structure of robbery and fraud; and if the edifice which he raised on its ruins has broken down in parts, the foundations have so far proved solid, that the wisest of his successors have not been afraid to build upon them, and the very fragments proclaim the boldness and comprehensiveness of the plan.

Lord Cornwallis ceased to be the Governor-General, and set sail for England, in October, 1793. On his recommendation, Sir John Shore was appointed his successor, and was near being the involuntary cause of his return to India in 1797. Sir John having given dissatisfaction by his mode of dealing with the Bengal mutineers, his Lordship was actually reappointed and sworn in, when