1834.] 



On Slavery in Southern India. 



254 



their proceedings of the 25th November 1819, with the informa- 

 tion which had been received from the provinces, that Board, at my 

 suo^gestion, proposed that, by an enactment of the Madras Govern- 

 ment, it should be declared, first, that the purchase of free persons 

 as slaves should be illegal, and of course subject to penalties ; se- 

 condly, that the children of all slaves, born after a certain date, 

 should be free, contemplating of course a registry of slaves, and of 

 their children born previously to such date ; thirdly, that voluntary 

 contracts to labour for a term of years, or for life, should bind the 

 individual alone, and not his wife, nor children after the years of 

 discretion ; fourthly, that, slaves should be competent to possess, 

 and dispose of their property, independently of their master ; fifth- 

 ly, that the'^ purchase of children to be brought up as prostitutes, 

 should be subjected to special penalties; sixthly, that the local civil 

 oflftcers should by a summary proceeding, have power to cause mas- 

 ters to provide wholesome food and decent clothing for their slaves^ 

 and to prevent their neglecting them in sickness, age or infir- 

 mity ; seventhly, that the power of corporal punishment should be 

 transferred from the masters of slaves to the local civil officers ; 

 eighthly, that slaves bought by their masters should, by repayment 

 of the purchase money, recover their liberty ; ninthly, that all slaves 

 attached to lands or estates escheating to Government should be 

 declared free ; and tenthly, that slaves, on being ill-treated by their 

 masters, should be allowed to claim the privilege of being sold to 

 another; and that the breach of any of these rules by the master, 

 should, at the option of the slave, entitle him to liberty. It was 

 also recommended, that the share of the harvest granted to the 

 agrestic slaves in the Tamil country, should be augmented at the 

 expense, not of their masters, but of the Government itself. 



Having soon afterwards left Madras for duties in the provinces, the 

 fate of these suggestions remained unknov/n to ms, until my atten- 

 tion was recalled to the subject by the receipt of your letter, enclos- 

 ing the queries under reply ; when, on reference to the papers on 

 Indian slavery, printed by order of the House of Comm®ns, I per- 

 ceived that, by the Madras Government, they were merely "order- 

 ed to be recorded." 



A vis merlicB, hostile to all change, seems inherent on the local 

 Governments of India, imbibed perhaps from the people subject to 

 their rule, whose characteristic peculiarity is a tenacity of long-esta- 

 blished customs. Even when improvements are suggested by the 

 constituted authorities, the voice of then- servants has little weioht 

 in favour of new measures. Responsibility is avoided by foUowino 



