"
This letter contains a perfect plan of policy, both of compulsion and
encouragement, which must in a very considerable degree operate
destructively to the manufactures of Bengal. Its effect must be (so far
as it could operate without being eluded) to change the whole face of
that industrious country, in order to render it a field for the produce
of crude materials subservient to the manufactures of Great Britain. The
manufacturing hands were to be seduced from their looms by high wages,
in order to prepare a raw produce for our market; they were to be locked
up in the factories; and the commodity acquired by these operations was,
in this immature state, carried out of the country, whilst its looms
would be left without any material but the debased refuse of a market
enhanced in its price and scanted in its supply. By the increase of the
price of this and other materials, manufactures formerly the most
flourishing gradually disappeared under the protection of Great Britain,
and were seen to rise again and flourish on the opposite coast of India,
under the dominion of the Mahrattas.
Pages:
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145