figure, in white marble, not however of a very good description, measuring not less than nine feet eleven inches high. The statue

seems to be of one entire block.

I have been thus minute in describing the present temple, not only because it is a complete specimen of the best Burman modern architecture, but still more on account of the history of the building itself, which is extremely curious, and places the character of the Government in a very odious light. In a small vaulted building, within the area surrounding it, there is a handsome marble slab, with an inscription on both sides in the Pali character. From this

it appears, that the temple is named Aong-mre-lo-ka; which, as far as I can understand, means the "ground or spot of victory ;”that it was built by the late King, in the year 1144 of Burman time, or 1782 of ours, being the second year of his reign ;—that be endowed it with four hundred and thirty-seven slaves; and, that he fed and clothed five thousand priests on the occasion of its consecration. His Majesty, in the inscription, vaunts of his own wisdom and power; describes himself as master of one-fourth of the universe, meaning the whole terrestrial globe; and states that one hundred kings paid him homage. The authentic history of the foundation of the temple is less to his Majesty's credit, and, in truth, paints him as an odious and unfeeling tyrant. He was the fourth son of Alompra, the founder of the present dynasty. His first and second brother, and his nephew, the son of the last, had respectively succeeded Alompra. Maong-maong, the son of the elder brother, had been excluded from the throne by his uncle, who first occupied it himself, and then left the succession to his own son, Senku-sa. Men-ta-ra-gyi, the founder of the temple, conspired against the son of his younger brother, raised the son of the elder brother to the throne, and in a few days seized the throne for himself, and caused his nephew, the legitimate successor of Alompra, to be drowned in the Irrawaddi. It was to consecrate such deeds as these that he built the costly temple which I have just described, and upon the very spot where his own house, as a prince, had stood, and from which he had commenced his successful rebellion. The persons made slaves were the unoffending inhabitants of the district allotted for subsistence, while a prince, to the nephew whom he had murdered. To make this picture of tyranny complete, it is necessary to understand what is the lot of those condemned to be slaves to a temple. They are reduced, hereditarily and for ever, to the same degraded rank in society as the Chandalas, or burners of the dead. They cannot intermarry with the rest of the people, nor indeed in almost any manner associate with them, and few persons will even condescend to sit down and eat with them. This is a fair sample of the united effects of despotism and superstition among the Burmans.'-pp. 227-230.

With this specimen of Burmese manners we conclude our notice of Mr. Crawfurd's valuable and interesting volume.

ASIATIC JOURNAL.-EXAMINATION OF AN ARTICLE ON THE EAST INDIA AND CHINA TRADE.

THE facts and arguments elicited in the debate, on the 14th of May, by Mr. Whitmore's motion for a committee to inquire into the state of the trade between Great Britain, the East Indies, and China, have produced an effect upon public opinion, as alarming to the supporters of Monopoly as it is gratifying and encouraging to the friends of commercial freedom. This preliminary agitation in parliament, of a question which exceeds all others in extent, variety, complexity, and importance, has excited a spirit, almost universal, of curiosity and inquiry. Among all classes of men, in all ranks of life in which knowledge and education are to be found, the injury inflicted on this country by the Monopoly, of the East India Company, has become the subject of daily complaint and lamentation. At length it seems to be understood and acknowledged that there is no species of industrious occupation, the prosperity of which is not in some degree retarded by the impolitic restrictions on British intercourse with Asia. The necessity of counteracting the avowed hostility of the American System, announced in the Tariffs of 1824, and 28, and the impossibility of retaliation while the full development of Indian resources is impeded, have sunk deep into the minds of all who are interested in that important branch of national industry, the cotton manufacture, which has attained, during the last twenty years, such prodigious extension; the people of Manchester and of Glasgow, the ship owners of Liverpool, Bristol, and Belfast, the manufacturers of Leeds and Birmingham, and Sheffield, have all supported the prayer of the petitions, presented by Mr. Whitmore, by unqualified spontaneous attestations of the injustice done to them by the continuance of the present system.

It was to be expected that a great corporation of chartered Monopolists, who, though not really rich, have abundance of anticipated means at their disposal, would not want advocates and apologists in so dangerous a crisis. The Playfairs and the Robertsons-the first with some candour and no knowledge, the second with some knowledge and little candour-started into life, armed, as they conceived, at all points, to prove, that things as they exist are right, that the Monopoly is good for England and good for India, and that the Company deserve the gratitude and admiration of mankind! Of Mr. Robertson, after the notice taken of him in July, it is hardly necessary to speak; we have paid as much attention in our present number to the antiquities of Mr. Playfair, as his wonderful inadvertencies deserve, and we are now about to make a few remarks on the composing opiate prepared by The Asiatic Journal,' to allay the disquiet and apprehensions which all

this turmoil and agitation has occasioned to the inmates and visitors of the house in Leadenhall-Street. It is indeed high time that our contemporary should bestir himself to retrieve the desperate condition of his masters' affairs

Hostis habet muros ruit alta à culmine Troja.

The pledge of early and extensive inquiry into the affairs of the Company-and the condition of India, given by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, has struck terror into the hearts of numberless wellmeaning respectable people, who foolishly imagine their 1000l. or 2000l. India stock give them an interest in the continuance of Eastern oppression. These good folks look upon Mr. Crawfurd and Mr. Whitmore, and Mr. Rickards and Mr. Huskisson, as so many disaffected unprincipled incendiaries, who would pilfer their dividends if they could, and unless there appear in the list of contents some attempt to fabricate apologies for these silly prejudices, the tables of numerous libraries from Wapping to Park Lane would soon cease to be decorated with the recreating verdure of The Asiatic Journal.'

We sincerely commiserate the condition of those who, delighting in the calm tranquil enjoyments of literary and scientific pursuits, are thus dragged nolentes volentes into the bustle and confusion of political strife; we are aware how painful it is for men, whom long familiarity in a bad cause has enabled to discern its iniquity, to rack their invention for arguments which they know to be fallacious; to stoop to the meanness of imposing on the credulity of indolence by a pompous parade of figures, irrelevant or inconclusive; to apply epithets of taunt and reproach to the most respectable and honourable names; to discredit the petitions of the Liverpool and Bristol merchants, by illiberal recollections of the views taken by their ancestors of the slave trade, and confounding the manufacturers of Manchester with the destroyers of their looms! These are the last resources, the violent convulsions of effete and worn-out partizans, who having undertaken a task above their strength, are pledged to prove what the experience of each successive month suffices to confute. They may be good evidences of zeal, but they are fatal to all character for discretion. The thing was better done in the days of Mr. Grant. His urbanity did not detract from the cogency of his arguments, and we are at a loss to understand why hard names should be applied to the advocates of principles repeatedly urged by the king's ministers on the attention of the Directors, the recognition of which has been declared essential to the interests of British commerce, by committees of both Houses of Parliament.

It is not our intention to follow the writer of the article on the East India and China trade, through the superfluous accessaries by which he has contrived to distract attention from the real points at issue between the free traders and the Company. Those points were in succession, and at length, treated in our pages long before

the discussion in the House of Commons; they have since been ably condensed and embodied in speeches, at various public meetings throughout the country; and to Mr. Whitmore and Mr. Huskisson, we are indebted for their lucid exposition in that place, where alone, general attention can be drawn to matters of public concern. Why wait to detect imaginary errors in the statement of Mr. Whitmore, when the works of Bishop Heber, of Messrs. Rickards and Crawfurd, invited and challenged refutation? Let the conductors of 'The Asiatic Journal' disprove, if they can, the rapid increase of our exports and imports since the permission of the private trade; let them show that the inhabitants of China, and the islands of the Eastern Archipelago, entertain those prejudices against articles of foreign manufacture, which once were fabled of the Hindoos; let them refute the alleged injury to our shipping interests, by American Monopoly of the carrying trade between Asia and Europe, and prove that this misfortune is not attributable to the restraints upon the China trade, and the traffic in tea; when they have done this service to their patrons, we may be disposed to give them credit for any ingenuity displayed in discovering the incidental inaccuracies of speeches and reports.

The charges advanced against Mr. Whitmore, by the writer of the article on the East India and China trade, are reducible to the following propositions. Firstly, that he mis-stated the condition of the India and China trades antecedent to the last renewal of the Charter. Secondly, that he borrowed from the Glasgow petition, or the Memorial of the Liverpool Association, an untrue comparison of the prices of tea in England, with those in the markets of foreign Europe and America; and Thirdly, that he treated the question as one entirely commercial, not looking to the East India Company as a peculiar engine for the government of a mighty territory. To avoid all suspicion of misrepresentation, we insert the statement of Mr. Whitmore, and the arguments of The Asiatic Journal,' as we find them.

'It is not extraordinary (said Mr. Whitmore) that gentlemen connected with the East India Company, should endeavour to give currency to these notions; nor is it perhaps surprising, that they should even contrive to bring their minds to this conclusion: it was quite natural that they should conceive it must be a losing trade, inasmuch as from 1793 to 1813, the Company had lost to the extent of about 4,000,000l. by it; in short, from first to last, at that time, and from persons interested in the continuance of the Charter, it was argued that the trade to India was an injury instead of a benefit. Looking at the previous falling off in the trade, from impediments thrown in the way of it, perhaps they were in some degree justified in taking this unfavourable, though false, view of the subject. I trust that the House will allow me to refer to the state

of that trade a short time antecedent to the renewal of the Company's Charter; first noticing the gradual falling off in the trade, and then contrasting it with the rapid extension of it, from the time it was made free. From 1790 to 1796, it was 2,520,000l.; from 1796 to 1801, it was 2,342,000l.; from 1802 to 1807, it had decreased to 2,153,000l.; and from 1808 to 1812, it was only 1,748,000l.? The charter having been renewed in 1813, the produce of the trade from 1814 to 1819, was 2,118,000l.; from 1820 to 1826, it ascended to 4,877,000/; and in 1827, it rose to 5,891,000l. The House will not fail to remark during the first period, that is, up to the year 1813, the gradual diminution of the trade, and during the last, from 1814 to 1817, its constant and rapid augmentation; so that the predictions in which some indulged, as to the impossibility of extension,* were founded upon misapprehension and miscalculation.' So far Mr. Whitmore; now for 'The Asiatic Journal.'

'But admitting, it may be said that much of the increase in the trade to India since the last renewal of the Charter is fictitious, it has certainly increased to some extent. No doubt; and it had been increasing for many years before, in spite of the assertions made to the contrary. It is one of the artifices and uncandid modes of argument adopted by the adversaries of the East India Company, to cull items and institute comparisons between periods which do not show the real state of the facts. It is part of Mr. Whitmore's case, that whilst the trade was confined to the Company, it was stationary or deteriorating. What are the facts? Mr. Milburn, a writer upon whom Mr. Whitmore confidently relies, gives the following statement of the Company's exports (exclusive of bullion) and imports for 102 years, from 1708-9 to 1809-10, founded, as all his statements are, upon official documents, uniform in their rates of valuation.

27

3,754,955

17

..

1766-71792-3 16,454,016 609,408 101,383,792 1793-4-1809-10..31,060,752 1,827,103 102,737,954 6,043,409 'Mr. Milburn adds, that in the last ten years, the Company's exports amounted to 21,413,8071., or, upon an average, 2,141,3801. per annum, whereof, he says, "more than one-half consisted of the staple manufacture of the country, woollens." Thus, in the interval between the first and second periods, the exports had increased 175 per cent.; between the second and third periods, they made a further advance upon the former increase of 95 per cent.; and in

* Vide Oriental Herald,' vol. 21, p. 573.