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taken place in Bengal, that, contrasting* it with 

 other parts of India, is truly remarkable. I fully 

 admit the increase of wealth ; but to what, I would 

 ask, is it due ? It is due, not to the activity, energy, 

 and enterprise of an intelligent landed proprietary 

 but to the extraordinary fertility of the Gangetic 

 Delta, it s greater freedom from famines, and to those 

 gains arising from an increase in the area of culti- 

 vation, to which the landlords of Bengal had no 

 right or title, and which, however upright the inten- 

 tions of the framers of the law of 1793, can be 

 viewed in no other light than the illegitimate and 

 unjust alienation of the property of the whole com- 

 munity for the benefit of a favoured class. In the 

 year 1793, 30,000,000 acres of land were under 

 cultivation in Bengal, and in the year following, 

 the land revenue was 3,235,259. In the year 

 ending the 30th of April 1857, or ten days before 

 the outbreak of the rebellion, 70,000,000 acres were 

 under cultivation in Bengal, and the land revenue 

 was 3,295,378. Had the excess of 40,000,000 of 

 cultivated acres been assessed at the nominal rate 

 of one rupee an acre, it would have yielded, with 

 little expense, with less trouble, and with no dissatis- 

 faction to the people, a clear revenue of 4,000,000 

 per annum. Seventy years have elapsed since the 

 year 1793, and taking but one half of this period, 

 the accumulation of the illegitimate annual gains of 

 the landholders of Bengal, if hoarded, would repre- 

 sent 140,000,000 sterling, a sum far in excess of the 



