DISTANT POSSESSIONS. 



291 



intentions of doing everything for the best, in- 

 numerable artifices and anomalous provisions en- 

 cumber the executive administration ; and render 

 the system utterly unintelligible to the natives. 

 Were the same system in the hands of the crown, 

 without being, as at present, administered by a 

 number of individuals of all parties, and, compa- 

 ratively speaking, indifferent to political power 

 and patronage ; there can be little doubt that its 

 practical operation would soon prove destructive 

 of the happiness of the Indian population, even 

 were the intentions of the political authorities at 

 home ever so virtuous. If this be true, with our 

 representative government, and with the nume- 

 rous constitutional checks which arrest the undue 

 exercise of authority at every turn, how much 

 more must it have been in the case of South Ame- 

 rica ? With us, public opinion, as is universally 

 allowed, is the best safeguard of the happiness of 

 India, and of the permanence of our authority. 

 But in South America, where principles of go- 

 vernment diametrically opposite prevailed, the in- 

 stant public opinion was allowed to exert its in- 



