There have been a more than usual number of publications on Indian subjects during the present season. Sir John Malcolm's book and Captain Grant Duff's we mentioned in our last; and we shall give some account of both in a future number. The Letter of a Civil Servant' is reviewed in our present. A valuable little pamphlet, entitled A Review of the Code of Bengal Regulations,' will be noticed in our next; as well as Mr. Auber's Analysis of the Constitution of the East India Company,' of which a short, and we believe, an impartial notice, has been transcribed from the Globe' in another page. We are glad to see these increasing indications of the growing importance of East Indian topics and we trust that every succeeding year will more and more arouse the attention of the country at large to a subject in which the nation will find, ere long, that they have a much deeper interest than they hitherto have been accustomed to consider.

P. S. Since these pages were written for the press, an announcement has been made of the arrival of an overland despatch from India, bringing letters from Bengal to the 8th of March. It is added, that the only news they bring is of a commercial nature; but it is rarely the case that overland despatches are sent by private individuals. It is more frequently the act of the Government, when it desires to transmit intelligence of political importance with speed; and mercantile houses then avail themselves of the opportunity of sending short mercantile letters, (each cover being restricted to an exceedingly small size and weight,) for which they pay a large postage. Although it may be perfectly true, therefore, that only commercial intelligence has transpired, there can be little doubt but that political intelligence has also reached the Court of Directors, which, if favourable, will be certain of being communicated to the world without a moment's delay. It is said, that two houses of business in Calcutta have failed; but no more is publicly communicated of this, than that they are not leading establishments in that city.

We have since learnt that the overland despatch is from Bombay, from which place it brings letters to the 8th of March. It was sent off by the Mission from that Presidency to the Court of Persia, at the head of which is Major Macdonald Kinnier, of the Madras army, author of the Geographical Memoir of the Persian Empire,' whose appointment to that post we mentioned some time since. These letters communicate the death of one of the most worthy as well as most intelligent of the Parsee merchants of Bombay, Hormajee Bomanjee; whose family have been as distinguished for their talents and integrity, as for their great wealth and personal influence in that settlement, where the loss of one its principal members will be deeply felt and regretted.

LAW REPORT.-COURT OF KING'S BENCH.

BUCKINGHAM V. W. J. BANKES.

Mr. HILL moved, on the part of the plaintiff, for a postponement of the trial in this cause until the next sittings, on the ground that the original letter of the defendant, in which is contained the alleged libel on the plaintiff for which this action was brought, had been sent out to India, in the month of August last, with a commission issued from the Court of King's Bench, for the purpose of examining Mr. H. W. Hobhouse, then supposed to be in Calcutta, as to the fact of the publication of the alleged libel, which commission had not yet been returned: and also, on the ground that Dr. Benjamin Babington, a most material witness for the plaintiff, who was now on the Continent, and had been originally expected to return within the present month of June, was not, as the plaintiff had learnt within the last few days only, now expected to arrive until the end of the next month.

Mr. GURNEY, on the part of the defendant, argued in objection to the postponement applied for, that the defendant had for a long time retained in this country two foreign witnesses, one from Egypt and the other from Italy, at a great expense, which witnesses were to prove the truth of the justification pleaded; and his client, Mr. Bankes, having no control over these witnesses, he was not certain that they could be prevailed on to remain in England until the sittings in October.

Mr. HILL stated, in reply, that the expenses of the witnesses in question had been already paid, up to a certain period, by his client; and a further engagement entered into on his part, in compliance with an order of Court, to defray all the expenses from that period till the return of the Commission from India: so that such expense could not be urged as an objection; but further, that the retention of these witnesses in England at all would be unnecessary, if the defendant, Mr. Bankes, would only admit an attested copy of the letter containing the alleged libel, in lieu of the original, which had not yet been returned from India. If he would do this, his client was willing to go immediately to trial on the merits of the case; for the witness, Mr. Hobhouse, for whose evidence the Commission had been sent out to India, having left that country before the Commission reached it, had recently arrived in England, and was prepared to give his evidence on the question of publication. The LORD CHIEF JUSTICE could not ask the defendant to admit such copy in lieu of the original.

Mr. HILL observed, that Mr. Bankes might the more readily allow the attested copy to be given in in evidence, inasmuch as he had admitted the original to be in his own handwriting; so that the only question_that_remained was as to the fact of its publication, which his client, Mr. Buckingham, was now for the first time in a condition to prove, by the arrival of Mr. Hobhouse in England.

Mr. GURNEY stated, that the postponement would be attended with further expenses, and that the witnesses of his client would most probably leave England; so that the plaintiff would be required to pay all their expenses up to the present period, by paying the money down; and if they insisted on going away, they must be examined on interrogatories.

Mr. HILL replied, that his objection to paying the money down for the expenses up to the present time, arose from a conviction, that when the foreign witnesses were called on to give their evidence, it would be found they had none which could bear out the allegation made; and that therefore such payments would perhaps induce them at once to depart.

Mr. GURNEY said he entertained a very different opinion.

The LORD CHIEF JUSTICE observed, that as he would not touch the merits of the case, so neither would he alter any thing by-gone. The order of Court for the plaintiff's undertaking to pay the expenses of the past, should remain untouched, but for the future expenses of the foreign witnesses, from the period of the present application for postponement up to the day of trial, the plaintiff should pay the money down.

Mr. HILL said, that he would infinitely prefer the payment of the sum required for retaining the witnesses in England, and having their viva voce evidence in open court, to permitting them to depart, on being examined on interrogatories. That rather than consent to this, he would, provided Mr. Bankes would admit the attested copy of the letter in his own handwriting, be prepared to go to trial at once, notwithstanding the absence of Dr. Babington, the most important witness on his client's behalf.

The LORD CHIEF JUSTICE said, that this being an application to his discretion, in which the plaintiff moved to postpone the trial on the ground of a certain commission issued from the Court not having yet been returned from India, he thought it right, in the exercise of that discretion, to state that the only conditions on which he could accede to this application would be, that the plaintiff should pay immediately to defendant the sum necessary to defray the further expenses of defendant's witnesses till the next sittings. And that if the defendant could not prevail on the witnesses in question to remain in England till the trial came on, he should be at liberty to examine them on interrogatories, refunding, in that case, the expenses paid on account of their detention.

Mr. HILL, on the part of the plaintiff, asked leave to reserve the consideration of these conditions until to-morrow; to which the Lord Chief Justice readily assented.

These conditions were finally acceded to.-Globe, June 1826.

CONSTITUTION OF THE EAST INDIA COMPANY.

'AN Analysis of the Constitution of the East India Company, and of the Laws passed by Parliament for the Government of their Affairs,' by Peter Auber, Esq., Assistant-Secretary to the Court of Directors, has just been published. A work of this kind has long been wanted, to afford a clear and authentic view of the machinery of a Government which, though not in name independent, exercises a more powerful influence, and upon a greater population, than a dozen or two independent potentates taken together. This task Mr. Auber, as well from his official situation as his knowledge, has been enabled to perform in a most satisfactory manner; and he has produced a book, which is not only most useful to all persons connected with India, but indispensable to any Englishman who wishes to obtain a complete view of the constitution of the British empire. The work contains a clear view of the conditions on which the privileges and possessions of the Company are held, and generally of the laws enacted for its guidance by the supreme legislative power, (which before could only be collected by a laborious search into the statutes,) and also all the material regulations which the Company, in the exercise of its own authority, has established for the management of its affairs, which were still more difficult of access to an ordinary inquirer. The information is collected under heads in an alphabetical order, for facility of reference, prefaced by an historical account of a sketch of the rise and progress of the British power in India. Mr. Auber's station may be supposed to give him a leaning in favour of the acts of the Company; but his business has happily been to collect facts, rather than to express opinions, and he has rarely deviated from it. There is one fault which Mr. Auber's book possesses in

common with most other English works of compilation and abridgment. Books of this kind not only should contain all they profess to have, but they should contain nothing more; the introduction of irrelevant or unnecessary matter swells their bulk, even where it is not intended as a cover for their defects. We object, therefore, to the introduction of the account of English coinage, and of the origin of banking, apropos of the articles in which very valuable information is given respecting the mints and banks of India. We should suggest also, that instead of the history of the rise and progress of the British power in India, a mere chronological statement of the acquisitions of the Company should be given, with an account of the population and revenues of the several districts; for the Analysis' cannot supersede histories of British India, though it may explain and elucidate them.

The history of the proceedings in Parliament, and particularly on the India bills of Pitt and Fox, we should, however, be loth to dispense with, not merely on account of its intrinsic value, but because it explains the views and objects of the existing legislative enactments. To make up for any curtailments, Mr. Auber, we think, should supply, in his next edition, an enumeration also of the dependent powers, and of the conditions by which they are subjected more or less completely to the Company's authority, as the management of these states forms an important part of the Government of India, and one which is little understood.

As Mr. Auber's book must be a standard book of reference, and must be reprinted, we hope these suggestions may tend to render it more valuable than it is at present.-Globe.

SELECTIONS FROM INDIAN PAPERS.

It was one of the prominent features of our original plan to include in every Number of our work, a variety of Selections from the Indian Journals that reached us from each of the Presidencies, as the English reader but rarely has access to these journals themselves, and it is, therefore, only by transplanting their contents into other pages that they can at all become known in this country. This intention has been occasionally carried into practice, and occasionally interrupted by a pressure of other claims on our space. Whenever it has been practicable, however, we have never failed to resume it, from a conviction of its utility. It should be borne in mind, that we have two large classes of readers, the wishes and interests of which are so different, that it is a matter of extreme difficulty to steer steadily between them without offending either one or both. The original articles and selections which are most eagerly read in England, are those which excite the least interest in India, being principally drawn from that source; and those which we have reason to believe are read with the greatest avidity in India, are comparatively disregarded here. The union is a matter of difficulty, but we shall endeavour, as far as may be practicable, to meet the views of both classes. A portion of the extracts will be found incorporated with our comments on the latest intelligence from the East. The following, being of greater length and on specific subjects, we have thought it best to place them under

their respective heads, as they appear in the papers named; and from the whole, a fair and impartial judgment may be formed of the prevailing topics of discussion in those distant quarters.

SPECULATIONS ON THE FALL OF BHURTPOOR.*

The successful assault of Bhurtpoor, and the unconditional surrender of the citadel, have put an end to all the stories of interior defences, unknown resources, and wet ditches that would float a seventy-four, which have been so currently circulated for the last fortnight, and the enterprise has terminated in a manner equally creditable to the commander-in-chief and his army, and proving that, distinguished officer to be much more careful of the lives of his soldiers than of his own. If the enemy showed not much skill or vigour in stopping the approaches of our force, they seem to have resisted at the last awful moment, with a degree of courage which might have rendered victory doubtful to less numerous or less determined assailants. The public ought, therefore, to appreciate rightly the conduct of Lord Combermere, in sacrificing the eclat that would have been derived from a successful coup de main to the laudable desire of sparing the valuable lives intrusted to his command; a humane consideration too often lost sight of by commanders, and the neglect of which is perhaps the greatest blot in the fame of Napoleon. The result of this siege leaves little room for regret that it was not undertaken by Sir David Ochterlony. We have seen that this fortress, which acquired so unfortunate a celebrity from our former failures, has been able to stand three weeks against all the efforts of the most formidable army which perhaps ever took the field in the interior of this country,-an army in which the European troops alone outnumber Sir David's whole force. And though everything might have been hoped from the skill and experience of that veteran officer, the advantage which he expected to obtain from the comparatively unprepared state of the enemy, would surely have been more than counterbalanced by his inferiority in numbers, especially in cavalry and artillery. Attacks by main force could only have supplied the place of the latter arm, similar to those which led to the defeat of Lord Lake's attempt, and which must always be highly dangerous when undertaken against a brave and cautious enemy. The season of the year too, at which the attack would have commenced, must have been highly unfavourable to the health of European troops, and rendered the success of a protracted siege highly problematical. When we consider the probable consequences of a failure, and compare them with the imposing situation in which the present complete success has placed our arms in Upper India, we may certainly be satisfied that the attempt was delayed till a force could be collected which, as far as human means are concerned, rendered a failure impos sible. The ratification of the Ava treaty may be very shortly expected, and we shall then have to congratulate our readers on the event of a complete peace in India, honourable to our arms, and, as we have every reason to expect, highly favourable to our permanent prosperity.—Hurkaru.

Now that Bhurt poor is fallen, and that we have nothing new from Ava to communicate, we are deprived for the present of the means of giving interest to the Editorial column.

The former event is one which furnishes ground for congratulation, not merely because it has asserted successfully the cause of an injured orphan, the son of our ally, against the formidable schemes and violence of an usurper; but because it is a triumphant proof to the factious chiefs upon our frontiersto the open concealed enemies of our supremacy, that nothing can resist British power and bravery, when their energies are anxiously made to bear upon any point, however strong or impregnable it may be in the opinion of Native partisans.