security to life, property, and character, and so much encouragement
to industry.

The consequence to the Government will be less serious than might at
first appear. Under a system of limited settlements of the land-
revenue, such as prevail over all our dominions, except in Bengal,
the Government is in reality the landlord; and our land-revenue is in
reality land-rent.* We alienate a portion of that rent for limited
periods in favour of those with whom we make such settlements, and
take all the rest ourselves. On an average, perhaps, our Government
takes one-sixth of the gross produce of the land; and the persons,
with whom the settlements are made, take another sixth. The net rent,
which the Government and they divide equally between them, may be
taken, on an average, at one-third of the gross produce of the land.
The cultivator would, I believe, always be glad to take and cultivate
land, on an average, on condition of giving one-third of the gross
produce, or the value of one-third, to be divided between the
Government and its lessee; and the lessee will always consider
himself fortunate if he gets one-half of this third, to cover the
risk and cost of management.

* I believe our Government committed a great _political_ and _social_
error, when it declared all the land to be the property of the
lessees: and all questions regarding it to be cognizable by Judicial
Courts. It would have been better for the people, as well as the
Government, had all such questions been left to the Fiscal and
Revenue Courts. There is the same regular series of these Courts,
from the Tuhseeldar to the Revenue Sudder Board, as of the Judicial
Courts, from the Moonsiff to the Judicial Sudder Board; and they are
all composed of the same class of persons, with the same character
and motives to honest exertion. Why force men to run the gauntlet
through both series? It tends to make the Government to be considered
as a rapacious tax-gatherer, instead of a liberal landlord, which it
really is; and to foster the growth of a host of native pettifogging
attorneys, to devour, like white ants, the substance of the
landholders of all classes and grades.

Where the soil of a particular village in a district deteriorates, an
immediate reduction in the assessment must be given, or the lands
will be deserted. If the Government does not consent to such a
reduction, the lessee must sustain the whole burthen, for he cannot
shift it off upon the cultivator