FLAX TRADE. 



309 



my mode of preparing, spinning, and manufacturing the fibres 

 of India, confident that it will benefit the present and coming 

 generations. We are bound to the natives of our Indian 

 territories by the same obligations of duty which bind us to all 

 Her Majesty's other subjects: and those obligations are to 

 impart the instruction which is so necessary to civilization. 

 So long as I am blessed by Providence with health and 

 strength to make my views known through the press, I will, 

 like Buffon, not think twelve or fourteen hours so spent at my 

 writing-desk otherwise than a state of pleasure. 



Some people doubt the possibility of having pleasure in 

 doing what we conscientiously believe will benefit our fellow 

 men, even in the midst of adversity; but history tells us that 

 some of our most learned writers have found both comfort and 

 benefit in affliction when so occupied. It is another proof, 

 that, there is scarcely any situation, however unfortunate, 

 which does not admit of alleviation ; it is so ordered by a 

 kind Providence, and is not lost upon the true Christian. 

 When troubles overtake him, he has sufficient strength of 

 mind to contemplate that, when inquietude and adversity 

 are only calculated to render the web of fate more difficult 

 to be unravelled, his knowledge of the inscrutable decrees 

 of the Divinity, suggests the necessity of patiently yielding 

 to his power. It hence appears there is a possibility of 

 being tranquil in our most afflictive trials in life. In proof 

 of this, I give the following list of learned authors who suffered 

 imprisonment, and who found that the consolation and pleasure 

 their enemies wished to deprive them of was always at hand, 

 when the writing-desk was resorted to. 



One of our biographers says, "Imprisonment has not 

 always disturbed the man of letters in the progress of his 

 studies, but has often unquestionably greatly promoted 

 them." 



Sir Walter Ealeigh wrote his " History of the World " in 



