e
natives to be yet so reduced as to disable them from partaking in the
trade, if they were otherwise able to put themselves on an equal footing
with Europeans.

The difficulties at the outset will, however, be considerable. For the
long continuance of abuse has in some measure conformed the whole trade
of the country to its false principle. To make a sudden change,
therefore, might destroy the few advantages which attend any trade,
without securing those which must flow from one established upon sound
mercantile principles, whenever such a trade can be established. The
fact is, that the forcible direction which the trade of India has had
towards Europe, to the neglect, or rather to the total abandoning, of
the Asiatic, has of itself tended to carry even the internal business
from the native merchant. The revival of trade in the native hands is of
absolute necessity; but your Committee is of opinion that it will
rather be the effect of a regular progressive course of endeavors for
that purpose than of any one regulation, however wisely conceived.

After this examination into the condition of the trade and traders in
the principal articles provided for the investment to Europe, your
Committee proceeded to take into consideration those articles the
produce of which, after sale in Bengal, is to form a part of the fund
for the purchase of other articles of investment, or to make a part of
it in kind. These are, 1st, Opium,--2ndly, Saltpetre,--and, 3rdly, Salt.
These are all monopolized.

OPIUM.

The first of the internal authorized monopolies is that of opium. This
drug, extracted from a species of the poppy, is of extensive consumption
in most of the Eastern markets. The best is produced in the province of
Bahar: in Bengal it is of an inferior sort, though of late it has been
improved. This monopoly is to be traced to the very origin of our
influence in Bengal. It is stated to have begun at Patna so early as the
year 1761, but it received no considerable degree of strength or
consistence until the year 1765, when the acquisition of the Duanne
opened a wide field for all projects of this nature. It was then adopted
and owned as a resource for persons in office,--was managed chiefly by
the civil servants of the Patna factory, and for their own benefit. The
policy was justified on the usual principles on which monopolies are
supported, and on some peculiar to the commodity, to the nature of the
trade, and to the state