of it as in the interior of Bengal.[1] The substitution of a single humane and enlightened landlord would be a blessing to a whole neighbourhood. The elevation of the character of the whole class would be a national benefit of the first magnitude. A great deal has been said about the advantage of having English landholders, but till lately nothing has been done to render the native landholders, who must always be the majority, more fit for the performance of their duties. In Bengal, owing to the indolent and intemperate habits, and consequent early deaths of many of the great zemindars, minorities are frequent, and a large proportion of the landed property of the country falls under the management of the government in the course of a few years. In the western provinces, where landed property exists in a more wholesome form, a new settlement for thirty years has given peace of mind, leisure, and comparative opulence to the agricultural classes. If these circumstances are
- ↑ As by the permanent settlement we have put the agricultural classes into the hands of the Bengal zemindars, we are bound, as far as we are able, to qualify the latter to exercise their power aright. The new men who have purchased their estates under our system are, as a class, friendly to improvement; but when they take up their abode in parts of the country where there are no means of obtaining a tolerable education, they become after a generation or two as ignorant and bigoted as the rest.
