The sun of 81,5801. being the amount of savings under the 1st, 2, and 3d heads of the foregoing abstract, would therefore accrue to the public in proportion as the several offices enumerated under those heads might fall in. And this sum, together with whatever saving might accrue from regulations under the 4th head, would be to be placed against the expence of any fund which parliament shall have instituted in pursuance of the resolution of the house for euabling his majesty duly to recompense the faith ful dischage of high and effective civil offices." 20th June, 1810. VII. Extracts from Papers laid be fore the House of Commons, relative to the East India Company. The East India Company's receipts for sales of goods from March 1st, IS03, to March 1st, 1806, fell short of the receipts in the three years immediately preceding 3,268,6711. This was owing 1798-9 stood at· · £4,667,295 The unsold goods in their ware houses in London on the first of March, 1808, and expected in the course of the season, at prime cost, amounted to, 7,148,4401. valued at the selling price at 13,086,3051. The India debt, according to the best estimate that can be formed of its amount on the first of May, 1808, stood at 31,895,000. There had been, on the whole, no diminution of civil and military expenditures to compensate for the heavier charge of interest; but on the contrary, while the revenues had from tions, been greatly enhanced, the exdifferent acquisitions and annexa. penditure kept pace with the increase and had even outrun it; so that although when in 1793-4* the_re venues were only eight millions per annum, there was a surplus of 1,600,000l. now that the revenues 1798-9 3802-3 .... 8,652,032 8,417,812 759,326 13,464,537 11,043,108|1,577,922 843,507 15,217,516| 15,561,950 2,070,792 1807-8 ... 14,614,261 13,456,198 2,197,160 1805-6 .... 1798..10,866,588 525,106 1799..12,811,863 1803-19,528,737 2,414,606 1806--28,538,804 1,019,097 1808.-31,895,000 are are ĥfteen millions per annum, there is a deficit of 1,019,097, What is most obvious and striking in this statement, is the increase not of the charges only but also of the debt, as the revenues increased, and not merely in proportion to the increase of the revenues; for whilst from the year 1793-4 to the year 1805-6, the amount of the revenues has not been quite doubled, that of the charges has been in creased as five to two, and that of the debt nearly quadrupled, besides a very large sum of debt transferved in the course of that period to England.: profits of the company at home and abroad. The increased charges of freight and demorage alone, occasioned by this war, have amounted, since its commencement, to more than seven millions sterling. Whenever Great Britain is involved in European war, the effects are always felt in India in increased military expences, even when no European enemy appears in the field there; but that war has been 'carried into India; and, at the desire of his majesty's government, the company have had to sustain the expence of various foreign expeditions against the French, Dutch, and Spanish possessions in India, and to Egypt, all chiefly on the national account, in which, as is well known, the company expend After all allowances and adjust ments, which, according to the best knowledge of the court, compre hend every thing the account ought to contain, the balance is in favoured very large sums, borrowed at of England, or of the Company at honre, 5,691,6891. Before concluding, the executive body of the company think it may be proper for them to declare, that they are not conscious of having, by improvidence or mismanage ment, contributed to bring the company's affairs into the embarrassments in which they are now involved. They may be placed in a very material degree to the vast increase of the Indian debt-the consequence of various measures adopted abroad under the administration of controul exercised by his majesty's government since the year 1784. Those embarrassments proceed also in part from causes which it has not been in the power of this country to control. An unexampled European war, which has already continued fourteen years, has in every way aggravated the the expences, and diminished the high Indian interest, to the prejudice of their general credit and affairs, in ways which cannot be made matter of account. This warmoreover has occasioned a gradual rise in the cost of home manufactures and metals, which the company, consulting the national interest, have continued to export for many years to the extent of 2,200,000!. annually, notwithstanding the known disadvantage under which they prosecuted that trade; for the increased cost could not be compensated by a corresponding increase in the selling prices abroad, nor by a decrease in the prices of goods purchased for Europe, and has therefore been attended with positive and considerable loss to the company. The progressive diminutions of profit on their Indian importations here, have been already shewn. All these evils are now followed by a stagnation in the home sales of the company. In this they suffer with the nation, and with Europe - at large, but the consequences, as already described, fall with peculiar severity upon them in the other circumstances of their affairs; for the Indian finances, which are become of immense importance in the system of the company, instead of affording relief, are in a state that imperiously calls for instant and effectual regulation. It is by no means to be concluded, however, that affairs would now have been better under any other supposable mode of Indian administration; it is perfectly within the power of this country to afford the aids which are now required for the relief of the company's finances, both at home and abroad, for consolidating the credit of the company, and strengthening the hands of the authorities at home, so necessary to the well-being of the company's affairs. Amount of the Indian Debt at several £ 7,971,668 12,811,863 May, 1793 May, 1808, 18,350,873 ditto 28,538,804 ditto 30,244,341 ditto ditto 32,007,819 ditto 30,876,788 May, 1809, ditto N. B. Current rupees at 2s. Pagodas 8s. Bombay rupees 23. Sd. each. Ships that proceeded to India in each Season since 1776; with the number Lost, Burnt, or Captured in each Seuson: freight on pri -1,020,158 Season. Received on account of Company's claims on the public, on report of the committee.... 1,500,000 1780 Current R$ at 2s. 6d. 14,25,29,306 £16,012,016 * Deduct bills of exchange drawn since close of quick stock By balance of quick stock against the Company at Bom- 3,51,280 1,209,174 -14,802,872 Bombay R$ at 2s. 6d. 1,86,31,382 £2,328,922 Deduet bills of exchange drawn on England since close of quick stock |