Page:The Marquess Cornwallis and the Consolidation of British Rule.djvu/102

95 the Indian Government was framed by such high authorities as Macaulay and Cameron, or Maine and Stephen in our own days. But we should remember that the Indian Government a century ago had to deal with a community ruled by despots and unacquainted with any fixed or settled Code of administration. The training of the officials who were to administer the new laws was imperfect. Many of the Collectors and Magistrates began to learn their business when they began to work, and had to arrive at system and method through the detection of errors and mistakes.

The Regulations in consequence were not merely the expression of what in future was to be the revenue or the criminal law of the land. The preambles, and occasionally some of the sections, contained reasons and explanations for the new procedure. Some are more in the nature of a manifesto from the Ruling Power than a law. The Governor-General reviewed the past, pointed out the errors discovered in practice and arising out of imperfect knowledge of the wants of the people, and then proceeded to apply a legislative remedy.

The Perpetual Settlement itself took the form of a Proclamation which became Regulation I in the Code. The Hindus, 'who form the body of the people,' are expressly informed that while agriculture then as now is the principal element in the wealth of the country, it is the object of the British Government to extend commerce, to improve judicial procedure,