ding interests
of the kingdom by this restraint, its East India interest was
undoubtedly injured by it. The Company is also, and has been from a
very early period, obliged to furnish the Ordnance with a quantity of
saltpetre at a certain price, without any reference to the standard of
the markets either of purchase or of sale. With regard to their export,
they were put also under difficulties upon very mistaken notions; for
they were obliged to export annually a certain proportion of British
manufactures, even though they should find for them in India none or but
an unprofitable want. This compulsory export might operate, and in some
instances has operated, in a manner more grievous than a tax to the
amount of the loss in trade: for the payment of a tax is in general
divided in unequal portions between the vender and consumer, the largest
part falling upon the latter; in the case before us the tax may be as a
dead charge on the trading capital of the Company.

The spirit of all these regulations naturally tended to weaken, in the
very original constitution of the Company, the main-spring of the
commercial machine, _the principles of profit and loss_. And the
mischief arising from an inattention to those principles has constantly
increased with the increase of its power. For when the Company had
acquired the rights of sovereignty in India, it was not to be expected
that the attention to profit and loss would have increased. The idea of
remitting tribute in goods naturally produced an indifference to their
price and quality,--the goods themselves appearing little else than a
sort of package to the tribute. Merchandise taken as tribute, or bought
in lieu of it, can never long be of a kind or of a price fitted to a
market which stands solely on its commercial reputation. The
indifference of the mercantile sovereign to his trading advantages
naturally relaxed the diligence of his subordinate factor-magistrates
through all their gradations and in all their functions; it gave rise,
at least so far as the principal was concerned, to much neglect of price
and of goodness in their purchases. If ever they showed any
extraordinary degrees of accuracy and selection, it would naturally be
in favor of that interest to which they could not be indifferent. The
Company might suffer above, the natives might suffer below; the
intermediate party must profit to the prejudice of both.

Your Committee are of opinion that the Company is now ar