tained by our troops in that distant enterprise; if Martin has clearly established, that notwithstandRunjeet Sing had proved openly treacherous, and ing all that was prophesied of, the trade to India has assailed our rear and cut off our supplies when the been, including exports and imports, less for the last bulk of our force was far advanced in the Affghanis- twenty years than for the twenty years preceding, tan defiles; if the Bolan pass had been defended with clearly demonstrates some vital defect in our colona courage equal to its physical strength; if the ial policy. Nor is it difficult to see where that error powder bags which blew open the gates of Ghuznee is to be found. We have loaded the produce of Inhad missed fire, or the courage of those who bore dia-sugar, indigo, &c.-with duties of nearly a them had quailed under the extraordinary perils of hundred per cent., while we have deluged them with their mission; the fate of the expedition would in all our own manufactures at an import duty of two or probability have been changed, and a disaster as three per cent. In our anxiety to find a vent for our great as the cutting off of Crassus and his legions in own manufactures on the continent of Hindostan, we Mesopotamia, would have resounded like a clap of seem to have entirely forgotten that there was anthunder through the whole of Asia. Few if any of other requisite indispensably necessary towards the the brave men who had penetrated into Affghanistan success of our projects even for our own interests,― would ever have returned; the Burmese, the Napau- to give them the means of paying for them. Our lese would immediately have appeared in arms; the conduct towards our colonies, equally with that to Mahratta and Pindarree horse would have re-assem- foreign states, has exhibited reciprocity all on one side bled round their predatory standards; and, while the-with this material difference, that we have, in our British empire in Hindostan rocked to its foundation, blind anxiety to conciliate foreign states, allowed an Affghanistan army, directed by Russian officers, the whole benefits of the reciprocity treaties to rest and swelled by the predatory tribes of Central Asia, with them; while, in our selfish legislation toward would have poured down, thirsting for plunder our colonial subjects, we have taken the whole te and panting for blood, on the devoted plains of ourselves. Hindostan.

So vast is the importance of our Indian possesSubsequent events have already revealed, in the sions, to the British empire, and so boundless the clearest manner, the imminent danger in which the market for her manufactures which might be opened English empire in the East was placed at the period if a truly wise and liberal policy were pursued towards our Indian possessions, that there is nothing of the Affghanistan expedition. So low had the reputation of the British name sunk in the East, that more to be regretted than that there has not hitherto even the Chinese, the most unwarlike and least pre-of our Indian possessions. Auber has, indeed, with issued from the press a popular and readable history cipitate of the Asiatic empires, had ventured to offer a signal injury to the British interests, and insult great industry, narrated the leading facts, and supto the British name; and so miserably deficient were ported them by a variety of interesting official docu-“ ments. But it is in vain to conceal, that his book Government in any previous preparation for the danger, that it was only twelve months after the insult possesses no attractions to the general reader; and was offered, that ships of war could be fitted out in accordingly, although it will always be a standard the British harbours to attempt to seek for redress. book of reference to persons studying Indian affairs, it has not and will not produce any impression upon It is now ascertained that a vast conspiracy had been public thought. It was, therefore, with peculiar long on foot in the Indian peninsula to overturn our pleasure that we recently opened the Chapters on Inpower; in the strongholds of some of the lesser rajahs in the southern part of the peninsula, enormous dian History, just published by Mr. Thornton, almilitary stores have been found accumulated; and ready so favourably known to the eastern world by not a doubt can remain, that, if any serious disaster his work on India, and its State and Prospects. From had happened to our army in Central Asia, not only the cursory examination we have been able to give would the Burmese and Nepaulese have instantly to this very interesting work, we have only reason commenced hostilities, but a formidable insurrection to regret that the author has not been more comprewould have broken out among the semi-independent British India since the administration of Marquis hensive in his plan, and that, instead of chapters on rajahs, in the very vitals of our power. And yet it

ances.

was while resting on the smouldering fires of such a Wellesley, in one volume, he has not given to the volcano, that Lord William Bentinck and the Liberal world a full history of the period in three. The work Administration of India thought fit to reduce our mi- is distinguished by judgment, candour, and research, litary force to one-half, and shake the fidelity of the and is, beyond all doubt, the most valuable that has native troops by the reduction of their pay and allow-yet appeared on the recent history of India. We would beg leave only to suggest to the able author, that his next edition should extend to two volumes, But this proved hostility of so large a portion of and should embrace the whole events of the period the native powers, suggests matter for further and of which he treats; in particular, that Lord Hastmost serious consideration. It is clear, that although ing's war in 1817 should be more fully enlarged the British Government has, to an immense degree, upon; and that greater exertions should be made, benefitted India, yet it has done so chiefly by the by the introduction of picturesque incidents and vivid preservation of peace, and the suppression of robbery,

throughout its vast dominions; and it is painfully evi- *See Colonial Magazine, No. I., article-"Fo dent, that hardly any steps have yet been taken to reign Trade to India,a newly established miscelreconcile the natives to our dominion, by the ex-lany, full of valuable information, and which, if contended market which we have opened to their indus-ducted on right principles, will prove of the very try. The startling fact which Mr. Montgomery highest importance.

descriptions, to interest the mass of the nation in a possessions, against which, if duly supported by subject daily rising in importance, and on which manly vigour at home, and wise administration in they must soon be called upon to exercise the func- our Indian provinces, all the efforts of Northern amtions of direct legislation. bition will beat in vain.

To have engaged in and successfully accomplished But there is one consideration deserving of espesuch an undertaking; to have overcome so many cial notice which necessarily follows from this sucand such formidable intervening obstacles, and cessful irruption. The problem of marching overplanted the British guns in triumph on the walls of land to India is now solved; the Russian guns have Herat, is one of the most glorious exploits which come down from Petersburg to Herat, and the Brithave ever graced the long annals of British military ish have come up from Delhi to the same place. prowess. That our soldiers were undaunted in bat- English cannon are now planted in the embrasures, tle and irresistible in the breach has been often against which, twelve months ago, the Russian shot proved, in the fields alike of Asiatic and European were directed; and if twenty thousand British could fame. But here they have exhibited qualities of a march from Delhi to Candahar and Cabool, forty totally different kind, and in which hitherto they thousand Russians may march from Astrakan to the were not supposed to have been equal to the troops Ganges and Calcutta. Our success has opened the of other states. They have successfully accom- path in the East to Russian ambition;-the stages plished marches, unparalleled in modern times for of our ascending army point out the stations for their their length and hardship; surmounted mountain descending host; and the ease with which our triranges, compared to which the passage of the St. umph has been effected, will dispel any doubts Bernard by Napoleon must sink into insignificance; which they may have entertained as to the practicaand solved the great problem, so much debated, bility of ultimately accomplishing the long-cherished and hitherto unascertained in military science, as object of their ambition, and conquering in Calcutta to the practicability of an European force, with the the empire of the East. This is the inevitable result implements and incumbrances of modern warfare, of our success; but it is one which should excite no surmounting the desert and mountain tracts which desponding feeling in any British bosom; and we separate Persia from Hindostan. Involved as we allude to it, not with the selfish, unpatriotic design are in the pressing interests of domestic politics, of chilling the national ardour at our success, but in and in the never-ending agitation of domestic con- order, if possible, to arouse the British people to a cerns, the attention of the British public has been sense of the new and more extended duties to which little attracted by this stupendous event; but it is they are called, and the wider sphere of danger and one evidently calculated to fix the attention of the hostility in which they are involved. great military nations on the continent, and which It is no longer possible to disguise that the sphere will stand forth in imperishable lustre in the an- of hostility and diplomatic exertion has been imnals of history. mensely extended by our success in Affghanistan. There is one result which may and should follow Hitherto the politics of India have formed, as it were, from our undertakings in Affghanistan, which, if a world to themselves; a dark range of intervening properly improved, may render it the means of mountains of arid deserts were supposed to separate strengthening, in the most essential manner, our pos- Hindostan from Central Asia; and however much sessions in the East. The Indus and the Himalaya we might be disquieted at home by the progress of are the natural frontier of our dominions; they are Russian or French ambition, no serious fears were what the Danube and the Rhine were to the Romans, entertained that either would be able to accomplish and the former of these streams to Napoleon's em- the Quixotic exploit of passing the western range of pire. The Indus is navigable for fifteen hundred the Himalaya mountains. Now, however, this veil miles, and for nine hundred by steamers of war and has been rent asunder-this mountain screen has mercantile vessels of heavy burden. It descends been penetrated. The Russian power in Persia, and nearly in a straight line from the impassable barrier the British in India, now stand face to face; the adof the Himalaya to the Indian ocean; its stream is so vanced posts of both have touched Herat; the high rapid, and its surface so broad, that no hostile force road from St. Petersburg to Calcutta has been laid can possibly cross it in the face of a powerful defen- open by British hands. The advanced position we sive marine. Never was an empire which had such have gained must now be maintained; if we retire, a frontier for its protection; never was such a base even from tributary or allied states, the charm of our afforded for military operations as on both its banks. invincibility is gone; the day when the god TerProvisions for any number of soldiers; warlike stores minus recoils before a foreign enemy, is the comto any amount: cannon sufficient for a hundred mencement of a rapid decline. We do not bring thousand men, can with ease ascend its waves. forward this consideration in order to blame the exVain is the rapidity of its current; the power of pedition; but in order to show into what a contest, steam has given to civilized man the means of over-and with what a power, it has necessarily brought coming it; and before many years are expired, us. Affghanistan is the out-post of Russia; Dost British vessels, from every harbour in the United Mohammed, now exiled from his throne, was a vasKingdom, may ascend that mighty stream, and open sal of the Czar; and we must now contend for the fresh and hitherto unheard-of markets for British empire of the East, not with the rajahs of India, but industry in the boundless regions of Central Asia. the Muscovite battalions.

Now, then, is the time to secure the advantages, and The reality of these anticipations as to the ingain the mastery of this mercantile artery and frontier creased amount of the danger of a collision with stream; and, by means of fortified stations on its Russia, which has arisen from the great approximabanks, and a powerful fleet of armed steamers in its tion of our outposts to theirs, which the Affghanisbosom, to gain that impregnable barrier to our Indian tan expedition has occasioned, is apparent. Already

Russia has taken the alarm, and the expedition naval station at Antwerp, without raising the blockade against Khiva shows that she has not less the incli- of one of his harbours, from Gibraltar to the North nation, than she unquestionably has the power, of Cape. Herein, then, lies the monstrous absurdity, amply providing for herself against what she deems the unparalleled danger of our present national polithe impending danger. No one can for a moment cy, that we are vigorous even to temerity in the East, suppose that that expedition is really intended to and parsimonious even to pusillanimity in the West; chastise the rebellious Khan. Thirty thousand men, and that while we give Russia a fair pretext for hosand a large train of artillery, are not sent against an tility, and perhaps some ground for complaint in the obscure chieftain in Tartary, whom a few regiments centre of Asia, we make no preparation whatever to of Cossacks would soon reduce to obedience. A resist her hostility on the shores of England. glance at the map will at once show what was the The contrast between the marvellous vigour of our real object in view. Khiva is situated on the Oxus, Indian Government and the niggardly spirit with and the Oxus flows to the north-west from the moun- which all our establishments are starved down at tains which take their rise from the northern bound- home, would be inconceivable if we did not recollect ary of Cabool. its stream is navigable to the foot by what opposite motives our Government is reguof the Affghanistan mountains, and from the point lated in Hindostan and in the British islands. Taxawhere water communication ceases, it is a passage tion in India falls upon the inhabitants, who are unof only five or six days to the valley of Cabool. If, represented; taxation at home falls upon the tentherefore, the Russians once establish themselves at pounders, who have a numerical majority in Parlia Cabool, they will have no difficulty in reaching the ment. We never doubted the inclination of a demopossessions of Shah Shoojali; and their establish- cracy to dip their hands in other people's pockets; ment will go far to outweigh the influence establish- what we doubted was their inclination, save in the ed by the British, by the Affghanistan expedition, last extremity, to put them in their own. among the Affghanistan tribes. Already, if recent Disregard of the future, devotion to present obaccounts can be relied on, this effect has become ap-jects, has, in all ages, been the characteristic of the parent. Dost Mahommed, expelled from his king- masses of mankind. We need not wonder that the dom, has found support among the Tartar tribes; British populace are distinguished by the well-known backed by their support, he has already re-appeared limited vision of their class, when all the eloquence over the hills, and regained part of his dominions, of Demosthenes failed in inducing the most enlightand the British troops, on their return to Affghanis- ened republic of antiquity to take any measures to tan, have already received orders to halt. Let us ward off the danger arising from the ambition of hope that it is not in our case, as it was in that of Philip of Macedon; and all the wisdom of Washthe French at Moscow, that when they thought the ington was unable to communicate to the greatest campaign over it was only going to commence. republic of modern times, strength or foresight suffiRegarding, then, our success in Affghanistan as cient to prevent its capital from being taken, and its having accelerated by several years the approach of arsenals pillaged by a British division not three this great contest, it becomes the British nation well thousand strong. Unless, however, the Conservato consider what preparations they have made at tive press can succeed in rousing the British public home to maintain it. Have we equipped and man- to a sense of their danger on this subject, and the ned a fleet capable of withstanding the formidable Conservative leaders in Parliament take up the matarmament which Nicholas has always ready for im- ter earnestly and vigorously, it may safely be promediate operations in the Baltic ? Have we five-nounced that the days of the British empire are numand-twenty ships of the line and thirty frigates bered.

ready to meet the thirty ships of the line and eigh- No empire can possibly exist for any length of teen frigates which Nicholas has always equipped time which provokes hostility in its distant possesfor sea at Cronstadt? Have we thirty thousand sions, while it neglects preparation in the heart of its men in London ready to meet the thirty thousand ve- power; which buckles on its gloves and puts on the terans whom the Czar has constantly prepared to helmet, but leaves the breastplate and the cuirass step on board his fleet on the shores of the Baltic? behind. If a Russian fleet of thirty ships of the line Alas! we have none of these things. We could not, appears off the Nore, it will not be by deriding their to save London from destruction or the British em- prowess, or calling them a "pasteboard fleet," that pire from conquest, fit out three ships of the line the danger will be averted from the arsenals and the to protect the mouth of the Thames, or assemble treasures of England. The Russian sailors do not ten thousand men to save Woolwich or Portsmouth possess any thing like the nautical skill or naval from conflagration. What between radical econo- habits of the British; but they are admirably trained my in our army estimates, Whig parsimony in our to ball practice, they possess the native courage of naval preparations, and Chartist violence in our man- their race, and they will stand to their guns with any ufacturing cities, we have neither a naval nor a mil- sailors in Europe. Remember the words of Nelson, itary force to protect ourselves from destruction. All" Lay yourself alongside of a Frenchman, but outthat Sir Charles Adam, one of the Lords of the Ad- manoeuvre a Russian." miralty, could say on this subject last session of The manifest and not yet terminated dangers with Parliament was, that we had three ships of the line and which the Affghanistan expedition was attended, three guard-ships to protect the shores of England. should operate as a warning, and they will be cheaply Never was such a proof afforded that we had sunk purchased if they prove a timely one, to the British down from the days of giants into those of pigmies, people, of the enormous dangers, not merely to the than the use of such an argument by a lord of the national honour and independence, but to the vital British Admiralty. Why, thirty years ago, we sent pecuniary interests of every individual in the state, thirty-nine ships of the line to attack the enemy's of continuing any longer the pernicious system of

present economy, and total disregard of future dan-affected by present calamity, would infallibly make ger, which for twenty years has characterised every the most incredible exertions; and a navy, greater department of our Government. Why is it that Eng-than any which ever yet issued from the British harland has now been compelled in the East, for the first bours, might sally forth from our sea-girt isle, to time, to incur the enormous perils of the Affghanistan carry, like the French Revolutionary armies, devastaexpedition to hazard, as it were, the very existence tion and ruin into all the naval establishments of of our Eastern empire upon a single throw; and ad- Europe. No such career of naval conquest, however, venture a large proportion of the British army, and is either needed for the glory, or suited for the interthe magic charm of British invincibility, upon a peri-ests of England; and it is as much from a desire to lous advance, far beyond the utmost frontiers of Hin- avert that ultimate forcible and most painful converdostan, into the heart of Asia? Simply because sion of all the national energies to warlike objects, as previous preparation had been abandoned, ultimate to prevent the immediate calamities which it would danger disregarded; because retrenchment was the occasion, that we earnestly press upon the country order of the day, and Government yielded to the the immediate adoption, at any cost, of that great inever popular cry of present economy; because the no-crease to our naval and military establishments which ble naval and military establishment of former times can alone avert one or both of these calamities. was reduced one-half, or allowed to expire, in the childish belief that it never again would be required. Rely upon it, a similar conduct will one day produce a similar necessity to the British empire. It will be found, and that too ere many years have passed over, that the Duke of Wellington was right when he said, that a great empire cannot with safety wage a little SIR ROBERT GRANT'S SACRED POEMS. war; and that nothing but present danger and future disaster, will result from a system which blindly the late Sir Robert Grant," published by his brother, WE copy the follwing from "Sacred Poems by shuts its eyes to the future, and never looks beyond Lord Glenelg. The pieces are but twelve in number, the conciliating the masses by a show of economy at and would not fill above three or four closely-printed the moment. An Affganistan expedition-a Mos

From the Christian Observer.

cow campaign will be necessary to ward off impend-pages of a magazine; but they are made to occupy ing danger, or restore the, sunk credit of the British nearly forty pages of elegant type and paper, appaMany name: happy if the contest can thus be averted from of them have already appeared in print, either in perently for presentation. Lord Glenelg says " our own shores, and by incurring distant dangers we riodical publication, or in collections of sacred poecan escape domestic subjugation. But let not foreign nations imagine, from all that try but a few are now published for the first time." has been said or may be said by the Conservatives than our own in which any of them originally ap We are not aware of any other periodical publication on this vital subject, that Great Britain has now lost peared. The first in the collection-the admirable her means of defence, or that, if a serious insult or hymn "When gathering clouds"-was sent by the injury is offered to her, she may not soon be brought author for insertion in our volume for 1806, under the into a condition to take a fearful vengeance upon her signature of E.-Y. D. R.; and he sent an improv enemies. The same page of history which tells us ed edition for our volume for 1812, under the same that while democratic states never can be brought to signature. The beautiful lines on the Litany, foresee remote dangers, or incur present burdens to Saviour, when in dust to Thee," and we believe guard against it, when the danger is present, and some others were inserted without signature. We strikes the senses of the multitude, they are capable have noticed the signature, because there is in our of the most stupendous exertions. That England, volume for 1806 another poem with the above signain the event of war breaking out in her present su-ture, entitled "To a friend gathering wild flowers," pine, unprepared state, would sustain in the outset which we pointed out to Lord Glenelg when he was very great disasters, is clear; but it is not by any collecting his brother's pieces; but none of the family ordinary calamities that a power of such slow growth had ever seen the lines, and his Lordship has omitted and present magnitude of England is to be subdued. them, either as thinking them apocryphal, or not parShe now possesses 2,800,000 tonnage, and numbers ticularly worth preserving. They are not equal to 1,600,000 seamen in her commercial navy, and a fleet our departed correspondent's other pieces; though of seven hundred steamboats, more than all Europe the signature, which is specific, seems to determine possesses, daily prowl along her shores. Here are them to his pen, and they were inserted the very all the elements of a powerful marine; at no period month after " When'gathering clouds." Lord Glenelg did Great Britain possess such a foundation for naval gives this last composition nearly as it appeared in strength within her bosom. What is wanting, is not our volume for 1812; but some compilation of hymns, the element of an irresistible naval force, but the sa- we believe, have the reading of 1806. We are not gacity of the people to foresee the approaching neces-surs that the following reading in the first copy was sity for its establishment, and the virtue in the Gov- not the best: ernment to propose the burdens indispensable for its restoration. In the experienced difficulty of either communicating this foresight to the oue, or imparting this virtue to the other, may be traced the well-known and often-predicted effects of democratic ascendency. But that same ascendency, if the spirit of the people is roused by experienced disgrace, or their interests

1806.

When writhing on the bed of pain,
I supplicate for rest in vain;

Still, still my soul shall think of Thee,
Thy bloody sweat and agony.