54 



INDIGO. 



Bengal'' jcct, that the quality of the indigo sent to this 

 28 Aug. 1800. market was a point of decisive importance ; neither 

 do they appear to have enough considered the 

 shock with which too precipitate an increase 

 in the quantity here, especially of the lower 

 sorts, might recoil upon the exporters from India. 

 As general propositions, what they urge may in- 

 deed be granted, that superiority of quality may 

 enable the owner of it to stand, whilst speculators 

 in inferior qualities are ruined, and that those 

 who make better and cheaper indigo than the 

 Americans, Spaniards, and other rivals, will have 

 the supply of the market. 



23. These, as abstract propositions, may on 

 the whole hold true ; but they may not hold true 

 in all cases, nor of every individual, when, by a 

 much greater importation than the whole demand 

 requires, there is a general depression of price- 

 The question then will not turn upon quality 

 merely, but upon strength of capital ; and perhaps 

 all the individuals concerned may fall in the con- 

 flict, a crisis which it cannot be the wish of any 

 administrative body to produce. 



24. Neither are we convinced that we are called 

 upon, by justice or by policy, to lay it down as a 

 principle, that countries dependent on us, or in our 

 alliance, should receive the same commercial pri- 

 vileges and encouragements as our own dominions. 

 We think that the utmost we can be required to 

 c^oncede on this head, in the way of a general prin- 

 ciple, 



