ral, that fields green with rice had been
forcibly ploughed up to make way for that plant,--and that this was done
in the presence of several English gentlemen, who beheld the spectacle
with a just and natural indignation. The board, struck with this
representation, ordered the Council of Patna to make an inquiry into the
fact; but your Committee can find no return whatsoever to this order.
The complaints were not solely on the part of the cultivators against
the contractor. The contractor for opium made loud complaints against
the inferior collectors of the landed revenue, stating their undue and
vexatious exactions from the cultivators of opium,--their throwing these
unfortunate people into prison upon frivolous pretences, by which the
tenants were ruined, and the contractor's advances lost. He stated,
that, if the contractor should interfere in favor of the cultivator,
then a deficiency would be caused to appear in the landed revenues, and
that deficiency would be charged on his interposition; he desired,
therefore, that the cultivators of opium should be taken out of the
general system of the landed revenue, and put under "his _protection_."
Here the effect naturally to be expected from the clashing of
inconsistent revenues appeared in its full light, as well as the state
of the unfortunate peasants of Bengal between such rival protectors,
where the ploughman, flying from the tax-gatherer, is obliged to take
refuge under the wings of the monopolist. No dispute arises amongst the
English subjects which does not divulge the misery of the natives; when
the former are in harmony, all is well with the latter.

This monopoly continuing and gathering strength through a succession of
contractors, and being probably a most lucrative dealing, it grew to be
every day a greater object of competition. The Council of Patna
endeavored to recover the contract, or at least the agency, by the most
inviting terms; and in this eager state of mutual complaint and
competition between private men and public bodies things continued until
the arrival in Bengal of Mr. Stephen Sulivan, son of Mr. Sulivan,
Chairman of the East India Company, which soon put an end to all strife
and emulation.

To form a clear judgment on the decisive step taken at this period, it
is proper to keep in view the opinion of the Court of Directors
concerning monopolies, against which they had uniformly declared in the
most precise terms. They never submitted to the