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had in her different factories in Asia Minor; from the researches made by La Bourdonnais and Dupleix, into every branch of the trade and politics of India; from the works of Commerçon, Lechenaade de la Tour, and Gentil, on the science and natural history of India and the Indian seas; from the knowledge acquired by the French Institute, while in Egypt, relative to that country and its connection with Asia; and finally, from her having established at Paris a society, whose sole object is to carry on researches relative to the literature and science of Asia, must be considered as one of the most able and efficient coadjutors, which the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland can have, in prosecuting the researches for which it was instituted.

'For these reasons, the Committee have already opened a communication with some of the governments, and with many of the most distinguished characters on the continent of Europe; and have received from all of them the most encouraging assurances of cooperation and literary assistance. Monsieur Falck,* Baron Bülow, Count Ludolf, Count Moltke, and Baron Cetto, the Ministers at the British Court, from the Netherlands, Prussia, Naples, Denmark, and Bavaria, will procure for the Society an accurate account of all the collections of Oriental manuscripts in Prussia, Naples, Rome, Denmark, Bavaria, the Netherlands, the archives of the late Dutch East India Company, the Island of Java, and all the Dutch possessions in Asia. Count Funchal, the Minister of Portugal at Rome, will draw up for the Society a précis of all the information which the Portuguese possess relative to Asia; and Lord Stuart de Rothsay, the English Ambassador at Rome, will, as soon as his Portuguese manuscripts are arranged, allow the Committee to look over such of them as relate to the different Portuguese settlements in the East Indies.

With respect to France, the Committee beg leave to report, that they have on every occasion received the most ready, and most material assistance from Prince Polignac, the French Ambassador at this court; and that they feel it their duty, in referring the Society to the letter, (which will be found in the Appendix, No. 6),

• Monsieur Falck is descended from a family, whose services in India have been productive of the greatest benefit to the Dutch East India possessions, and is a cousin of the late Dutch governor of the Island of Ceylon, William Emanuel Falck, whose name is still revered on that island, and is invariably associated in the minds of the natives of the country, with the idea of the most impartial justice and the purest integrity. Sir Alexander Johnston, out of respect to the memory of this great man, has presented to the Royal Asiatic Society a very interesting drawing, in which Governor Falck is represented as signing, in the presence of his council and the Candian ambassadors, the treaty of 1766, by which the King of Candia ceded to the Dutch East India Company the whole circumference of the island of Ceylon, the acquisition of which had been the principal object of their policy from the time they first got possession of that island.

from Mons. Abel Remusat to Sir Alexander Johnston, most particularly to call the attention of the Society to the very cordial and friendly manner in which the Duke of Orleans, as President of the Asiatic Society at Paris, and all the Members of that Society, received the communication which Sir Alexander Johnston made to them upon the subject of Mr. Daniell's proposal to publish, under the patronage of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, his very valuable collection of drawings of different parts of India.

'The Committee also beg leave to report that they have, in carrying on their foreign communications with different persons and governments on the continent of Europe, derived great assistance from many foreigners who are members of the Committee, and that they have therefore, with their permission, appointed three of them to be their foreign Secretaries: Dr. Rosen, the pupil of the celebrated Professor Bopp at Berlin, and professor of Oriental languages at the London University, to be their Sanscrit and German Secretary; Dr. Dorn, a distinguished Persian and Arabic scholar, to be their Persian and Arabic Secretary; and Monsieur Cæsar Moreau, the French Vice Consul in England, and the author of inany valuable works on the Statistics and Commerce of Great Britain and France, to be their French Secretary.

'The Committee have taken measures for procuring detailed accounts of the different articles of which the collection in the Museum of the Society is composed; and they have reason to hope that several persons, who are well acquainted with the nature of those articles, will soon lay before the Society such descriptions of them, as may enable the public to derive much information from the Museum, relative to those parts of Oriental history to which the Society have directed their inquiries.'

SONG.

(From the Juvenile Keepsake, 1829.)

I WILL Come to thee when night-winds creep
O'er the crimson rose's odorous sleep;
When the song of the gurgling nightingale
Sounds like a harp, in the greenwood vale;
When moonlight sleeps on the deep-blue sea-
Maid of my love! I will come to thee!

When the tulip-flower has closed its leaf,
Like a bosom that hides from the world its grief;
When the lily is drooping its beautiful head,
Like a love-sick girl, o'er the violet's bed;
When the night-dew hangs on the passion-tree-

Maid of my love! I will come to thee!

MOUNT CARMEL.

(From Hervey's Poetical Sketch Book.)
THE harp is hushed in Kedron's vale,
The river dwindled to a rill,
That haunts it-like an ancient tale,
In dying whispers, still!

The wind among the sedges, keeps

Some echoes of its broken lyre,
And wakes, at times, with sudden sweeps,
Thoughts of its former fire,-
Where Carmel's flowery summits rise,
To point the moral to the skies!
My breast has learnt in other lands,-

That moral, through its own deep glooms, Lone-as yon lonely city stands

Among her thonsand tombs !

Amid its mouldering wrecks and weeds,
While memory-like that river,—sings,
Or-like the night-breeze in the reeds,—
Plays with its broken strings,
My spirit sits, with folded wing,

A sad-but not unhappy-thing!
What if my love's like yonder waves,

That seek a dead and tideless sea,-Have perished in the place of graves, That darkly waits for me!

What if no outlet of the earth

Those dull and dreary waters own, And time can give no second birth To dreams and wishes gone! What though my fount of early joy,

Like Kedron's springs be almost dry! High o'er them, with its thousand flowers, Its precious crown of scent and bloom, Hope, like another Carmel, towers

In sunshine and in gloom!

Flinging upon the wasted breast

Sweet born in climes more pure and high,

And pointing, with its lofty crest,

Beyond the starry sky,―

Where a new Jordan's waves shall gain

A statelier Jerusalem.

MEETING OF THE MERCHANT COMPANY OF EDINBURGH.

From 'The Edinburgh Evening Courant,' July 9.

TRADE TO INDIA AND CHINA.

Mr. J. F. MACFARLAN said, as the business for which the Meeting had been specially called was now disposed of, he would take the liberty of directing the attention of the Company to a subject of very great and general interest, and which at this moment excited much attention throughout the whole country. He alluded to the trade to India and China. He did not mean that the Company should take any immediate step, but merely declare an opinion, and remit the subject to the more deliberate consideration of the Master and Assistants-to be brought forward by them at such time, and in such manner, as they should see most advisable. It is upwards of 200 years since the East India Company was established, with a capital of about 400,000l. It was established at a time when capital was not so abundant, nor the enterprise of our merchants so great as at the present day; but it appeared to him that the Company was established for general good, more than as a monopoly for the profit of individuals. He drew that inference from Government requiring the Company to bring home such a supply of tea (the principal article of the monopoly) as should be required for consumption; and, if the supply was not equal to the demand, so as to enhance the price, it retained the power to grant licences to import the article from the continent. This proved that the intention of Government in granting the monopoly, was good; but unfortunately, this valuable privilege was repealed, among a heap of trash, by the Customs' Consolidation Act, 6th Geo. IV. Many years ago, when smuggling in tea was carried on to a great extent, Government, as a remedy, was induced to lower the duty; and, in order to make up the deficiency in the revenue thus occasioned, he believed the windowtax-the most odious of all impositions, which makes us pay for the light of the sun shining into our houses-was laid on; and, on that ground at least, the public did not owe the Company a debt of gratitude. In 1792, attempts were made to open the trade to the East, which were so far successful; but the privilege being limited to trading in vessels of the Company, and subject to their controul, proved of little utility. In 1814, however, a greater boon was obtained, in the trade being opened to the private merchant on a more extended scale; but still it was so guarded with restrictions as to the size of the vessels to be employed, the ports to which they were limited, and the regulations on dealing with the Natives, particularly by being entirely prohibited a free intercourse with the interior, These and other restrictions rendered the privilege of comparatively

little advantage. None were permitted to trade without license from the Company, and of these they were so jealous, that, so late as 1826, an order was issued, signed by Mr. Lushington, the chief secretary of the Indian Government, to stop all Europeans, whether British born subjects or otherwise, who might be found at a distance of more than ten miles from the presidency, on commercial business, unprovided with a passport; and even those who had been in India with a license, on returning to England, were obliged to bring with . them a certificate from the Company's servants abroad of their good conduct, otherwise they would not obtain another license to return thither. The renewal of the Company's charter will be in 1834, but the discussion will take place next session of Parliament, because three years' notice must be given of an intention to alter it. The advantages derived from opening the trade had already been felt in the prices of almost every article brought from the East being reduced almost one half; but the export trade was of still greater importance, as would appear from the fact, that in the year 1814, only about eight hundred thousand yards of plain and printed calicoes were exported, while in 1827, the number of yards had increased to upwards of 34,000,000, and there was every prospect that this trade would increase, because the supply was not equal to the consumption; and surely this was a circumstance of vast importance to our manufacturers in their present depressed state. The next point, and upon which he would say but a very few words, was the trade with China, from which the private trader is at present entirely excluded. This was a branch of the subject of much importance to the shipping interest, at a time when freights were difficult to be had. Before the English merchant could send his goods to China, he was obliged to ship them in American vessels, because no British ship, except those belonging to the Company, were permitted to clear for the Celestial Empire. It was curious to observe the difference of price in teas on the Continent and in England-occasioned entirely by the want of free intercourse with China-a difference, though not so great as existed some years ago, as stated in No. 78 of the Edinburgh Review, was yet sufficiently extraordinary. He begged to refer to the latest returns of prices, as certified to by Mr. Canning, our Consul-General to the Hans Towns, and Mr. Ferrier, our Consul at Rotterdam. At Hamburgh the wholesale price of Bohea is 5d. to 7d.; Congo, 8d. to 10d.; Souchong, 5d. to 1s. 5d.; and so on. At Lubec, Congo is retailed at 1s. 2d. to 1s. 10d. per lb. At Bremen, Bohea is retailed at Is. 11⁄2d. and Congo at 1s. 7d. to 1s. 8d. per lb. At the last June sale, the Company's lowest price for Bohea was, he believed, 1s. 54d., while Congo was from 2s. 1d. to 2s. 7d.; but this price told double-for whatever the Company's sale price was, the duty was equal in amount. He did not grudge Government their duty, but the difference in the cost to the merchant was so great, as to call for an opening of the tea trade. He did not mean to say that the Company pocketed the difference of price

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