Siyar al-mutaʾakhkhirin 26.1
A Translation of the Seir Mutaqherin (Haji Mustafa) 26.1
- Language
- English
26.1.1
The Author accounts for the peculiar character of the Indians, from the peculiarities of the soil — Indian Princes love their subjects, as fond parents do their children — On the contrary, the English hate the natives of India, and disdain their company — Twelve causes assigned for the diminution of revenue and population all over Bengal — The first, that the English are aliens — The second is their ignorance of the customs and usages of the country — Account of those usages — A Daroga of Audaulet-office — A Cazi — this last office greatly abused now — A Sadr-el-Sodur — Governor Hastings, informed in time, rescues an infinity of families from the oppressions of the actual Sadr — Fervent prayer of the Author's — The Daroga of the Audaulet, another Civil Judge, whose office is shockingly abused at this day — The Emperors and Rulers of Hindostan think it their duty to sit as Supreme Judges — Warning given to the Princes of Hindostan by the Author — Unsociableness and inaccessibleness of the English, another great defect of their Government — The Mohtesib, or Clerk of the Market — The Vacaa-naviss, and Sevana-naviss — The Emperor, by the means of the post, minutely informed every day of what happens in the remotest parts of the Empire — Two singular notes in the hand of the Emperor Aoreng-zib's — The Fodjdars, Military Commandants in some fortresses and some difficult countries — An infinity of persons in each province dependent immediately on the Emperor, and not on the respective Viceroys — Extents of duties expected from Fodjdars — Happy conditions of Indians under their native Princes, and latterly under Aaly-verdy-qhan — Third reason or cause, the Zemindars too loose, and too unrestrained, under the English Government — The Fodjdar's office, as it is excercised now, is become one of the main grievances of the natives — Fourth cause, this country having no apparent master, lies under all the disadvantages of a house untenanted — Men of confessed superior abilities eternally thwarted by majorities sent from home — Fifth cause, the subordinate rulers do not stay long enough in their employs — Benignity and tenderness of the Indian Emperors to the conquered — The natural insociableness of the English, as well as the inaccessibleness of their rulers, produces the first cause of the declension of these countries — The second is, the difference of language, manners, and way of life — The third is, the endless variations and mutations in posts of trust and importance — Slowness of proceedings in the Supreme Council, is the fourth — Differences in giving audience between the benignity and condescension of the ancient native rulers, and the superciliousness, and roughness of the present ones, is the fifth — The sixth is, the rapacity of the English, who engross all the trade of the country ;
26.1.2
very different in that from their native Princes, who left all those livelihoods to the subjects — Fifty thousand Cavalry, and ninety thousand Infantry kept up in only these three provinces — The seventh cause is, in the exorbitant powers left to Zemindars, a race deemed incorrigible in all ages — Eighth reason, the slowness of proceedings in the Council of Calcutta, and in the subordinate Councils — The ninth is, that wrong custom of giving employments and offices by seniority of rank — Tenth, partiality of the English to their own countrymen — Eleventh, establishment of the Supreme Court of Judicature of Calcutta — Twelfth, the English decide in their closets, what ought not to be decided only in public. Nothing is clearer in itself, or better understood by men of intelligence and penetration, than that the gradation of climates is such, that every tract of land has properties of its own, which have been denied to others. In other words, that in consequence of some hidden causes, in a certain tract of land, the diversity of the soil produces immancably a diversity in the genius of the inhabitants, and that this diversity is so self-evident, that the man of perspicuity needs no discourse or argument to be convinced of it ;
26.1.3
and indeed, were all soils and lands of one and the same nature, that astonishing difference in the colour of the inhabitants, and in the fruits, metals, waters, plants, and animals, so conspicuous everywhere, would not be constant and permanent in every tract of land. Amongst so many climes and so many lands, India looks the strangest country on the face of the earth. Whether we cast our eyes on the actions and practices of the inhabitants, or consider the institutions and maxims by which they are restrained and ruled, nothing in the world bears so evident marks of strangeness, and nothing under Heaven is so completely dissimilar from what we see in other countries. This is so far true, that unless the Sovereign turn his inclinations towards a management adapted to the climate and country, no steady Government can be expected ; nor is it possible that the ease and prosperity of the inhabitants, or the peace and tranquillity of the country should take place. Now as this climate, in consequence of its being under the influence of Saturn, is dominated by that planet, hence most of its inhabitants are feeble in action, and slow in comprehension ; and withal, prove so very feeble in the frame of their bodies, that they have been constantly subdued by foreign conquerors, and vanquished by foreign armies. But, however, so tenacious were at all times the vanquished of their own tenets and customs, that the victors soon found themselves under a necessity of assimilating with them ;
26.1.4
and so soon as these mighty conquerors had acquired a firm footing in these countries, and the violence and extortions inseparable from a state of warfare, slaughter, and confusion, came to be over, their very first thought was always to quiet the minds of the inhabitants, and to afford them relief, by always becoming their protectors in whatever concerned their lives, fortunes, honors, and families. They used to call up all the abilities of the land to their sides, would give them weight and consequence, and prepose Vezirs and Omrahs of the country to the management of their own affairs. In consequence of such a conduct, each individual, high or low, finding an easy access to the Princes, and to their Ministers, used to meet with opportunities of shewing what business he was particularly fit for; so that those Princes, who were naturally endowed with penetration, and had their minds exercised in the art of conjecture, soon found out the capacity and fitness of every one, and soon preposed him to a business adequate to his talents and abilities; whilst themselves, standing above them all as so many overseers, attended to the regulation of affairs, to the tranquillity and ease of the country and its inhabitants, and to the promoting of men of penetration and knowledge; which last never failed, after a proper trial of their abilities and virtuous dispositions, to be advanced to offices of trust and dignity.
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Hence those Princes lived amongst their people, and amongst their nobles, as kind and condescending parents amongst their children; nor did they suffer the dust of sorrow to darken the heart of any of the creatures of God, by a show of tenderness to one part of the people, and of rudeness to the other. For they looked upon them all, whether conquerors or conquered, with an equal eye; so that for several ages together, down to the times of Shah-djehan, every thing in Hindostan was quietness, love, and harmony. It is only since the times of Aoreng-zib-Aalem-ghir, his son, a Prince extremely warlike and ambitious, that evils have crept upon the land. But yet these were light matters; for such were the abilities, prowess, and strictness of government under that reign, that the established rules and institutions did not suffer any considerable injury from the wickedness of the turbulent Grandees; nor did the people of God meet with much oppression in the civil wars, during which it never ceased to be protected and cherished. The main evil resulting from his time was this, that to make a diversion in the minds of the people, to the ill renown of ingratitude and hardness of heart, which he had acquired by killing his brothers, and keeping his father in prison, he had assembled the Ecclesiastics about his person, and had given them such unbounded sway, that the populace complimented him with the titles of the Faithful Emperor, ever victorious, and the constant Cherisher of Religion.
26.1.6
But those hypocrites no sooner saw themselves at the head of affairs, than their avarice and covetousness gave rise to such a train of evils, as shed even now their baleful influence on these countries, continuing to pour ruin and devastation on the posterity of the Faithful: a revolution which has been succinctly mentioned at the end of our first volume, where our narrative gives the history of the latter Emperors of Hindostan. Matters grew worse in the reign of Feroh-syur, who was a nothing without brains. In his time Ratan-chund, Divan to Seyd-abdollah-qhan, then omnipotent under the name of Vezir, got so far possession of his master's mind, that he governed the whole Empire, and drove from the helm, or disgusted entirely those very Grandees and Ministers that had supported its honor and glory, in the time of Aoreng-zib. Then commenced the custom of leasing out all the branches of the Finance-office, and all the districts and lands of the Imperial demesnes. Then bribing men into compliance became of fashion, and of current use; and sluggish people, addicted to their ease, thinking it a good fortune to get at once so much assured money, made no difficulty to sacrifice the sweat of the people of God, and the toil of the helpless farmer, to the rapacity of lease-takers, tax-gatherers, and contractors. It is from those times that must be dated the sinking of rents, the decrease of husbandry, the distress of the people, and their detestation of their Rulers.
26.1.7
These evils went on increasing from day to day, till at last the office of Cazy or Judge, and that of Sadr or of Great Almoner, with many other Magistratures, came to be put up publicly to sale; so that the people skilled in law, and in matters of distributive justice, entirely disappeared from the land; nor was anything else thought of, but how to bring money to hand by any means whatever. This, and this alone, became the utmost ambition of all ranks, and especially of the hypocrites amongst the men that meddled with law. It was in such an enfeebled state of the Empire, that there arose a new sort of men, worse than the former, who, so far from setting up for patterns of piety and virtue, or pretending to shew the right way to others, squandered away the lives and properties of the poor with so much barefacedness, that other men, on beholding their conduct, became bolder and bolder, and practised the worst and ugliest actions, without fear or remorse; so far are they from thinking it a shame or an infamy to imitate and follow such examples. From those men sprung an infinity of evil-doers, who plague the Indian world, and grind the face of the wretched inhabitants. Those men having in process of time assembled in bodies, there arose an age of senseless, slothful Princes, and of Grandees, ignorant and meddling.
26.1.8
Then it was that the Sun of Justice and Equity, that had already been verging from the meridian, inclined downwards, degree by degree, and at last entirely set in the Occident of ignorance, imprudence, violence, and civil wars. It is in consequence of these excesses, that evils are arisen to such a height, as render a remedy impossible. It is in consequence of such wretched administrations that every part of Hindia has gone to ruin, and every one of its discouraged inhabitants have broken their hearts. Life itself is become disgustful to most. So that, on comparing the present times with the past, one is apt to think that the world is overspread with blindness, and that the earth is totally overwhelmed with an everlasting darkness.