22 Dr. Govan on the Natural History and Physical 



for the sale of slaves, form probably sufficient answers to this 

 question. 



From many of the causes to which these evils owed their 

 orio-in the country is now happily freed. Conquered by the 

 British from its Goorkali invaders, in a contest which couldnot 

 with honour beavoided,it has been restored to its former chiefs. 

 Property has been secured, nor will the former temporary 

 expedients of a petty and short-sighted authority, in collect- 

 ing the revenues, which are obviously injurious to the future 

 prosperity of a state, be permitted under their presiding eye. 

 That eye, however, cannot safely be withdrawn. It seems 

 very doubtful whether, during the exile into which many of 

 the restored feudal chiefs were driven by the Goorkali, and 

 in the state of indigence and dependence to which they and 

 their families were reduced, that liberality and those high 

 qualities by which arbitrary power is rendered tolerable or 

 even useful to a community in certain states of society, have 

 been much cultivated in their characters. The very security, 

 too, of the restored chiefs, under the British government, de- 

 prives the subjects, in some degree, of one of the most power- 

 ful means they formerly possessed of insuring a mild and 

 paternal exercise of the feudal authority. 



An attempt on the part of any of the paramount authorities 

 to levy a larger sum for the protection afforded to a smaller 

 state, than the protected found it for their interest to pay, 

 was resented by a defection, not easily prevented in a country 

 possessed of such strong natural defences to the banner of a 

 rival state. The subjects of a petty chief found shelter and 

 protection, under similar circumstances, in the territory of a 

 neighbour more able or move willing to be generous and con- 

 ciliating in his dealings with those under his protection. 



The power of emigration still remains as a remedy, but in 

 no part of the world is this willingly exercised. And here it 

 is still less readily resorted to, from the bad effects of the cli- 

 mate, either of the plains or of the lower hills, upon the con- 

 stitutions of the inhabitants of the more elevated regions; the 

 more durable and expensive structure of the houses, ren- 

 ders them valuable property, and less willingly abandoned 

 by their possessors, than the almost moveable huts of the 

 plains of Hindostan, formed of mud, straw, and bamboos, 



