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INDIA UNDER BRITISH RULE

by

J. TALBOYS WHEELER


      *      *      *      *      *      *

    BY THE SAME AUTHOR.


     MADRAS IN THE OLDEN TIME, 1639-1748. 3 vols. sm. 8vo. Madras,
      1861-62.

     EARLY TRAVELS IN INDIA. First Series, comprising Purchas's
      "Pilgrimage" and the "Travels of Van Linschoten." 8vo. Calcutta,
      1864.

     EARLY TRAVELS IN INDIA. Second Series, comprising Sir Thomas Roe's
      "Embassy to the Great Mogul" and Fryer's "Travels in India." 8vo.
      London, 1873.

    HISTORY OF INDIA FROM THE EARLIEST AGES. 5 vols. 8vo.
     Vol. I. The Maha Bharata and the Vedic Period. Thick 8vo. Map. 1867.
         II. The Ramayana and the Brahmanic Period. Thick 8vo. Map. 1869.
        III. Hindu, Buddhist, and Brahmanic Revival. 8vo. Map. 1874.
         IV. and V. Mohammedan Rule. 2 vols. 8vo. 1876-82.

     SHORT HISTORY OF INDIA, and of the Frontier States of Afghanistan,
      Nipal, and Burma. Thick-crown 8vo, with Maps and Tables. Macmillan
      and Co. 12_s._ 1880.

     HISTORY OF THE IMPERIAL ASSEMBLAGE AT DELHI, held on the 1st of
      January, 1877, to celebrate the assumption by Her Majesty Queen
      Victoria of the Title of Empress of India; with Historical
      Sketches of India and her Princes. Royal 4to, with 13 Portraits,
      Map, and 17 Illustrations, chiefly by Photographs. 1877.

     EARLY RECORDS OF BRITISH INDIA; a History of the English
      Settlements in India. 8vo. Calcutta, 1878.

     JOURNAL OF A VOYAGE UP THE IRRAWADDY TO MANDALAY AND BHAMO. 8vo.
      Rangoon, 1871.

     TALES FROM INDIAN HISTORY. 12mo. 1881.

              *       *       *

     GEOGRAPHY OF HERODOTUS, Developed, Explained, and Illustrated from
      Modern Researches and Discoveries. Thick 8vo, with Maps and Plans.
      1854.

     LIFE AND TRAVELS OF HERODOTUS. 2 vols. post 8vo. 1855.

     ANALYSIS AND SUMMARY OF HERODOTUS. Post 8vo. Bohn's Philological
      Library. 1852.

     ANALYSIS AND SUMMARY OF THUCYDIDES. Post 8vo. Bohn's Philological
      Library. 1852.

      *      *      *      *      *      *


INDIA UNDER BRITISH RULE

From the Foundation of the East India Company

by

J. TALBOYS WHEELER

Late Assistant-Secretary to the Government of India, Foreign Department,
and Late Secretary to the Government of British Burma.
Author of "History of India from the Earliest Ages,"
Including the "Maha Bharata" and "Ramayana,"
"A Short History Of India,"
etc., etc.







London
Macmillan and Co.
1886

The Right of Translation and Reproduction is Reserved.

Richard Clay & Sons,
Bread Street Hill, London,
Bungay, Suffolk.




    TO

    SIR CHARLES TREVELYAN, BART.,

    WHO OPENED

    THE OLD MADRAS RECORDS TO THE AUTHOR

    IN 1860,

    This book is Dedicated.




PREFACE.


A hundred years ago, when the lively Miss Frances Burney was weeping
over the wrongs of Warren Hastings, and the learned and portly Gibbon
was still lamenting that he had not entered on an Indian career, there
were people in the British Isles who knew something of Indian history.
They had picked up information respecting Indian affairs from the
speeches of the grave Edmund Burke, the eloquent Charles James Fox, and
the impassioned Richard Brinsley Sheridan. The facts may have come
second hand, and been more or less distorted by the jealous and bitter
fancies of Sir Philip Francis, the reputed author of the _Letters of
Junius_; but facts or fables, they served to enlighten the British
public on the Indian questions of the day.

During the present century, the march of intellect has turned away from
India, except as regards an outlet for cotton goods, a field for
speculation in railways and teas, or a provision for younger sons in the
"Indian civil." Within the last few years, however, there has been a
change for the better. The British public has been alarmed at the fall
in silver. It has been cheered by the proposal to place British-born
subjects under the magisterial jurisdiction of Hindus and Mohammedans.
It has been aroused by the prospect of a war with Russia in Central
Asia; but it has been comforted by the restoration of the fortress of
Gwalior to Maharaja Sindia. Moreover, Burma is no longer confounded with
Bermuda, and no one groans over the annexation of the country, or the
destruction of brigandage by the new rulers. Still there is room for
more knowledge. The author, however, has before him a letter from an old
friend in high position in India, who tells him plainly that the British
government does not want history. Accordingly, the present work is not
called a _History of India_, but _India under British Rule_.

More than one British ruler in India has, however, sinned against
history, and might well like to shut it up with confidential minutes and
secret negotiations. Within the present century, India has been
desolated by wars as cruel as those of the Heptarchy, and as unmeaning
as those of the White and Red Roses. Within the present generation, it
has been distracted and tortured by a military revolt, created by a
scare about greased cartridges, but leading to crimes more horrible than
those of the French Revolution. Yet Anglo-Indian statesmen have been
known to ignore the past, and to propound schemes for India that would
be too advanced for any European nation excepting Great Britain. They
have blinded themselves against history, like ostriches burying their
faces in the sand. They have dealt with India, as the German philosopher
dealt with the "camel," not by the facts before them, but out of the
sublime depths of their moral consciousness, stirred up by a political
caucus, or a philanthropic gathering in Exeter Hall.

Controversy and fault-finding are to be deprecated. But reform is only
possible after a due consideration of what has been accomplished up to
date by British rule in India, and of the flaws and faults in the
existing constitution.

It will be seen from the first chapter, that the British traders of the
seventeenth century, who established factories, built fortresses, and
created manufacturing towns, also attempted to introduce representative
and municipal government into the East India Company's once famous city
of Madras. The second chapter reveals the fact that the acquisition of
Bengal in the eighteenth century was not the work of ambition, but an
act of self-preservation. The third chapter shows that the peace of
India could not have been maintained in any possible way except by the
establishment of British supremacy as the paramount power. The fourth
chapter proves that the first Afghan war, needless as it turned out to
be at the time, was the outcome of Russian ambition which dates back to
the times of Peter the Great and Nadir Shah.

The story of the sepoy mutinies of 1857 occupies a considerable space in
the present volume. It is not a mere narrative of military revolt, but a
revelation of Asiatic nature; a lesson which every Anglo-Indian
statesman must study, if he would avoid defeat or failure. The masses in
the British Isles may read Biblical accounts of rebellion and massacre,
or the story in Josephus of the atrocities of Herod the Great; but very
few seem to realise the fact that they are reading Asiatic history,
which has no reflex in Europe, nor in any country under European rule
except British India. The horrible intrigues and murders in the
household of Herod; his frantic passion for the fair Mariamne; the
malicious lies of Salome; the assassination of Mariamne by her jealous
and infuriated husband; the alternations in the mind of Herod as regards
Cleopatra, whether to accept her love or murder her;--find no parallels
in European history, excepting perhaps in Turkey, or in the Russian
court of the last century.

The last chapter in the present volume is devoted to the constitutional
changes in the government of India, and in the local governments, since
the mutinies. The author has not indulged in the hope of raising
Asiatics to the level of Europeans by the premature introduction of
representative government. He considers that such a scheme would for the
present be as much out of place in Asia as a republic of boys for the
control of schoolmasters. British India is treated as a political school
for Asiatics, in which Europeans are the teachers; and so long as that
theory of government is upheld, constitutional reforms in India are
practical and possible.

In conclusion, the author has to express his obligations to Professor
Terrien de Lacouperie of the London University College, and to his own
son, Owen E. Wheeler of the Leicestershire Regiment, for revising the
proofs of the present work, and for many valuable suggestions.

    FULHAM,
    _12th May, 1886_.




CONTENTS.




PART I.

_EAST INDIA COMPANY._


    CHAPTER I.

    FIRST PERIOD: FACTORIES, FORTRESSES, TOWNS.

    1600-1756.

    Sec. 1. India in 1600. Sec. 2. British at Surat and Masulipatam:
    Commercial and Social Life, 1612-1638. Sec. 3. Rise and Growth of
    Madras, 1639-1680: Portuguese and Dutch Ne