SOUTHERN AFRICA. 301 
all Indian goods, teas and spices excepted, were suffered to 
be again exported on a drawback of the same amount as the 
duty. How far such a regulation might interfere with the in- 
terests of our East India Company, if at a peace the Dutch 
should keep the Cape, I am not sufficiently acquainted with 
the subject to determine ; but such a plan would seem to open 
a wide door for smuggling Indian commodities into Europe, 
under English capitals, .to an amount that must be alarming, 
to the Directors themselvesi 
The operation of this measure will be checked, to a cer- 
tain degree, by the present war, which, I am sanguine enough 
to hope, will ultimately be the means of once more annexing 
the southern extremity of Africa to the dominions of Great 
Britain. In such an event, the determination of securing it, 
at a peace, will be a more important object than the consi- 
deration how its government is to be administered ; whether 
as a dependency of the Crown, or as a territorial possession of 
the East India Company. The interests, indeed, of the two, 
are so intimately connected, that any question of privilege, 
in a matter of such national importance, is a mere secondary 
consideration, and ought, therefore, to bend to circumstances. 
The interests of the Company, during our late tenure, were, 
as I have shewn, secured and promoted in every respect. 
They had their agent established at the Cape, and not the 
smallest article of Eastern produce, not even the most trifling 
present, was allowed on any consideration to be landed, 
without a positive declaration, in writing, from their said 
agent, that the landing of such article did not interfere with, 
nor was in any shape injurious to, the concerns of his em- 
