hend any
serious change in the constitution of the Court of Directors in the
new charter. No ministers would hazard such a change in the present
state of Europe. The Court is India's only safeguard. No foreign
possession was ever so governed for itself as India has been, and
this all foreigners with whom I have conversed, admit. The Governor-
General of the Netherlands India was with me lately on his way home.
He is a first-rate statesman, and he declared to me that he was
impressed and delighted to see a country so governed, and apparently
so sensible of the benefits conferred upon it by our paternal rule.
He will tell you the same thing if you ever meet him. His name is
Rochasson. The people appreciate the value of the Court of Directors,
and no act, as far as it is known to them, has tended more to
strengthen their confidence in it than that which has brought
retribution on the great sinner in Scinde, Allee Murad. No punishment
was ever more just or merited. Scinde, however, is too remote for the
people in general to feel much interest in its affairs or families.
Our weak points in the last Burmese war were:--1. The want of
transport for troops and stores; 2. The want of carriage by land, for
arms and stores; 3. Sickness. All these things have been remedied,
and the war, when begun in earnest, can last but a short time. We
know more of the country and shall avoid the sources of endemial
disease; our steam provides for the rapid transport of troops and
stores; and draft-cattle will be supplied from our own districts on
the coast. Where our Government has no representative as Resident or
Consul, all Europeans should be told that they remain entirely on
their own responsibility. Unless this is done, the Governments must
be eternally in collision. If war be carried on in earnest, it must
be one of annexation: we must make use of persons whom we cannot
abandon to the mercy of the Burmese Government. We have nothing to
fear from the people: they have no religious feeling against us,
being all Buddhists; and they have seen too much of the benefits
conferred by us on the territories taken during the last war to have
any dead of our dominion. Lord Dalhousie has, I believe, been most
anxious to avoid a war--it has been forced upon him.

Believe me,
Yours very faithfully,
(Signed) W. H. SLEEMAN.

To Sir James W. Hogg,
Deputy Chairman,
India House.