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    742 THE LEA PER. [No. 436, July ^1 ^ 185...

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    AHMY CONTRACTS. The Committee of the Hou...

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    NOVELETTES OF LAW AKD THEIR MORAL, The m...

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    Some Of The Causes Of The Rebellion. The...

    Provinces , the principal theatre of the rebellion . We found the institution ; we resolved it into its elements ; in our judgment some were useless ( the Thalookdai-ee rights , for instance ) ,- others were essential , and we dealt with these elements according to our own ideas of what was just and expedient . In doing this , however defensible the course which we took was , according to our own moral principles and economical science , we changed everything ; we superseded custom ; iu short , we made a revolution . This is an epitome of the history of the first years of our rule , in every successive extension of that rule . It was not . everywhere the same kind of change . We established one system in Lower Bengal—the Zemindaree system ; another in Madras—the Ryotwaree system ; another in the North-Western Provinces—a new-fangled combination of the Talookdaree and village system ; and so on . The reviewer explains iu a very intelligible manner our different revenue systems . Here , then , we have one set of causes of the rebellion . True it was a military rebellion , and it would appear to be difficult to connect it with causes so purely civil as those mentioned . But the Sepoy army is not , like ourown , raised in great part from the refuse of the popuhition , but it is raised from ( to use a short analogy ) the yeomanry of . the country "who still kept up their connexion with the cultivators and landed chiefs whom they left only for a time ; and Oude was the great recruiting ground . In short , then , it was the introduction of our revenue settlement , and the apprehension of its further extension in Oude , which inflamed the Sepoy army , and was the chief cause of the rebellion .

    Our readers will at once perceive that this is no mere abstract discussion . It shows wherein our chief error has-been : a want of proper respect for ¦ what was established and legal ; the precipitate introduction of new systems ; and the obvious lesson of instruction , to be derived from- the rebellion is , that we must , in our future policy , aoid in our new governmental scheme , make no Violent changes in the Iaw 3 , customs , and habits of the people . We shall return to this subject on an early occasion .

    742 The Lea Per. [No. 436, July ^1 ^ 185...

    742 THE LEA PER . [ No . 436 , July ^ 1 ^ 1858 .

    Ahmy Contracts. The Committee Of The Hou...

    AHMY CONTRACTS . The Committee of the House of Commons "to inquire into the principle adopted for making contracts for public departments , and the effect which the present system has upon the expenditure of public money , " was originally , we believe , appointed m 1856 , and continued in 1857 , at the instance of Mr . J . Lewis Ricardo , member for Stoke-upou-Trent , who had taken precautions to satisfy himself that charges of bribery and gross malversation could be substantiated before he would consent to lend parliamentary assistance . An ample volume , consisting of evidence find appendical matter , taken and collected during the session of 1858 , is now before us , and although it is a matter ~ of regret that upon the assurance of Sir Benjamin Hawes that everything should be made pleasant they have omitted to present a report , the piiblic is nevertheless indebted to several of the members for the acumen and diligence they have exercised in unravelling a tissue of improprieties—to use the mildest term—detrimental to the fair trader , the taxpayer , and the neglected army itself . Mr . Ricardo has been too great an invalid to assist the committee ; but the more prominent members

    during the present sessioa have been Colonel Boldero , Lord Claude Hamilton , Sir Charles Napier , all energetic against red tape , routine , and secrecy . Mr . T . G . Baring , an old Whig official ; Viscount Duncan , an old Lord of the Treasury ; and Sir John Ramsden , an Under-Secretary of the Ordnance—a department much involved in the results of the inquiry , and alread y in no fair odour—all no doubt inclined to stifle inquiry and hush up evil doings . It appears that the quality of clothing and accoutrements issued to her Majesty ' s army prior to 1854

    s , although iu many respects too low to be economical , was nevertheless fair at the price . The ' clothing colonel" system had been pursued from time immemorial . The allowance for each outfit wus fixed by the Government , and th « colonels were at liberty to purchaso of whom they pleased . The contractor was bound by sealed patterns , and was only paid upon the certificate of tho purchasing colonel and a " clothing board" of regimental officers to assist him , after the articles had boon subjected not merely to inspection but to tho test of u lengthened period of wear and tear . There wns , it l * true , an avowed and discreditable -fiction connected

    with this system . A sum in excess of the known actual cost of his regiment ' s outfit was regularly p laced by the departments at the credit of the clothing colonel , who was allowed to retain it in addition to his regimental pay . Farther he could not go , unless by forfeiting his character as an officer and a gentleman , throwing overboard entirely that esprit de corps which has led officers on some occasions to expend , upon the comfort and decoration of troops entrusted to them , not only their entire quota of the estimates proper , plus the off-reckonings , which

    while the system obtained they might fairly look upon as lawful gain , but also considerable sums from their private r-esources . The colonel , again , as the actual dealer in the articles , was more accessible to the complaints of men . and of good officers , and a regiment whose pay had been stopped for articles of clothing had some chance of redress in the event of those articles proving defective , through the mere sense of shame which might be brought home to its commander by the reports of its officers , and through its discreditable appearance upon inspection .

    On the 6 th of June , 1854 , public attention having been very repeatedly turned to the miserable quality and hygienic unfit-ness of our military uniforms , and having oeen led . on to the-abuse of clothing colonelcies by way of a false scent , a royal warrant suppressed the practice , put an end to the profit of those officers , gave them compensation , and continued the x-est of the system . But when Lord Panmure , in February , 1 S 55 , succeeded Mr . Herbert , under whom the last-mentioned alteration had taken place , it was arranged , in order that right men should be in right places—for that was the slang of the day—that Mr . Thomas Howell , an

    army packer rend merchant of Mark-lane , who was the more eligible , perhaps , from being in partnership with a near relative of the then Treasury whipperin , and Mr . George Dalhousie Bamsay , a cadet of the Fox Maule family , should reign , Instead of the colonels of the army , * over the whole military clothing contract system . In the same year the Weedon establishment was mounted on a vast footing as a contract store depot ; Mr . James Sutton Elliott ( since _ levanted to the United States under the travelling name of Brook ) was appointed to be principal militarv storekeeper . Active preparations

    were then set on foot , if we can trust at all to the inferential fabric we have in our own minds constructed upon the mass of evidence before us , for a misappropriation of the most magnificent calibre . A nice man was Mr . Elliott , and a persuasive . He was called as a witness before this committee , and how soft and balmy was his sweet reply to an iuterjectional query of Mr . Roebuck ' s , " whether , under certain circumstances , he would admit dishonesty or incompetency at Weedon ?" . " I would not say dishonesty , " he answered ; " there might be incompetency , or there might be error . Human

    nature is not perfect . ' But the bland Mr . Elliott , who thus threw oil upon the troubled waters of Mr . Roebuck , is by this time out of all harm ' s way , beyond the scope of the extradition treaty , enriched at the public expense—there is too good foundation in the Blue Book for the inference—by highly favoured contractors , and bearing with hhn ^ it is to be feared—for his accounts are of course in inextricable confusion . — the key of the many official and non-official persons who must have been privy to tho organisation of which he was the head and front .

    We have no space at our immediate disposal to enable us to savour this announcement of progress with some of the piquancies we could gather from the pages of the Blue Book . Many of them were given to the public in anticipation of the report by a contemporary ; and the story of the rejected and resold boots , as related in the House of Commons , and there questioned by the administrative Tories , hns made the grand tour of tho press . Suffice it , however , for the present to say , that on tho 28 th of June , Colonel Boldero moved in formal terms , we presume as mouthpiece of the reticent

    committee , that an humble address bo presented to her Majesty , praying that she would issue a commission of inquiry into tho Weedon establishment . The gallant gentleman observed , ( hat the accounts ot the dcp 6 t were more than Unrty-clcrk power in arrcar ; the grossest irregularities had prevailed there ; the facts which hud transpired had been elicited from unwilling witnesses ; grave suspicion was entertained of malpractices with reference to clothing and accoutrement contracts ; and that tho inquiry should by rights be extended to other p laces . General Peel , ¦ who had committed iriirtBcll in the earlier part ol

    the evening to an official warning that " the less tl 7 Horse Guards were interfered with by PariiawJS " the better they would perform their duties " wlffl promising the royal commission , assured the House that evidence would be forthcoming at the prooer time to rebut much of that already given That commission is now sitting , aikl we watch its nrn gress with anxiety . In reply to the gallant Score * tary-at-War , we are glad to be able to state thn ' t if the forms of the tribunal are not so arranged as to exclude them , there is an array of rods in pickle for officialism more than equivalent to the defence it has spared no pains to organise .

    Unluckily , some of the " unwilling witnesses " before the committee will not be again forthcoming We have already hinted at the " abest" of tl ? e Weedon " Lieutenant-Colonel , " Mr . Elliott . "We fully anticipate more than one " asgrotat " ' One subordinate who could have given useful evidence has melted away to oae part of the world , one to another . A person connected with another store depot has painfully disposed of himself . Serjeant Brodie , who , after being court-martialed and" persecuted for his interference in the affair of the Baumgarten duel at Canterbury , was nrovided far .

    under pressure of public opinion , by a kind of transportation to the Weedon inferno , is now . a shaky witness . Some curious revelations are in our possession . We believe the gcutlcman sent down to make up—not to cook , oil no—the accounts has returned , and has declared the thing impossible . The public will very likely not know how much it has been robbed of . The struggle of the Bureaux concerned , if not to gam °° least to save some character and prestige , is natural enough ; but her Majesty ' s Government would be ill advised indeed to throw . their weight into the scale against Parliament and tlie public .

    Novelettes Of Law Akd Their Moral, The M...

    NOVELETTES OF LAW AKD THEIR MORAL , The many stories that have Come out through our law-courts this week give so many proofs how thoroughly true is the boast of the Englishman , that the meanest iu the land can attain to justice . There are many anomalies in our social state , as there arc in our opinions , and therefore in our laws ; but , taking those broad principles in which all of . us are agreed , referring those wider laws which are meant for the average run of men , it is literally true that there is no land compared to that of England for the facility with which the meanest can invoke the law , and the perfect certainty that in the end justice will be rendered . It is true that , in civil cases , justice is sometimes expensive , and so far unjust ; but that is an anomaly less of law than of taxation . We shall , perhaps , some day find out the economy of rendering law absolutely free and uncharged ; the difficulty , meanwhile , being how to discover the proper check upon a wanton and useless appeal to the interference of the law . The tales with which oyv law reports constantly supply us are interesting , not only as proof of the general equity which we have described , but also as evidence that the law itself is not complete . The basis of these , anomalies , we have said , lies in the anomalies of our own opinions , the mixture of pnnvir » ti ' nn iinnn jisnrrtninrd facts

    with experimental problems and dogmata , subjected neither to experiment nor reason . We have not yet deter mined amongst ourselves what are exactly the hases of morals ; the consequence is that our law is shifting , and in the meanwhile society , not quite certain what to do , wanders into the troubles which bring its inner life to be anatomised before judge and jury , before the most merciless and not always the most delicate of anatomiststhe counsel , who differ from their medical brethren in applying the reckless knife to the living creature . From this point of view the stories of our law

    courts are interesting as studies of society , and nrc practically useful for tho student of social p hilosophy and of legislature . Take the case of Mrs . Turner , which was gone into before one of tho Commissioners in Lunacy and a jury the other day at York Castle . The lady is tho wife of one of tho official assignees of the Liverpool Bankruptcy Court . Almost from Ilio outset of her marriage she has been violently j ealous of licr husband , and hns constantly persecuted him with accusations of infidelity . To such a degree was her mind affected upon this subject ., tliat , fit home , at hotels , in fact wherever she happened i ° bo with her husband , she accused him oi iinpro-

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), July 31, 1858, page 14, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_31071858/page/14/