But, though the intrinsic value of these works may be small, they will still yield much that is worth observation to any one who will attentively examine them. They will serve to dispel the mists of ignorance by which the knowledge of India is too much obscured, and show that the history of the Muhammadan period remains yet to be written. They will make our native subjects more sensible of the immense advantages accruing to them under the mildness and and equity of our rule. If instruction were sought for from them, we should be spared the rash declarations respecting Muhammadan India, which are frequently made by persons not otherwise ignorant. Characters now renowned only for the splendour of their achieve­ments, and a succession of victories, would, when we withdraw the veil of flattery, and divest them of rhetorical flourishes, be set forth in a truer light, and probably be held up to the execration of man­kind. We should no longer hear bombastic Bábús, enjoying under our Government the highest degree of personal liberty, and many more political privileges than were ever conceded to a conquered nation, rant about patriotism, and the degradation of their present position. If they would dive into any of the volumes mentioned herein, it would take these young Brutuses and Phocions a very short time to learn, that in the days of that dark period for whose return they sigh, even the bare utterance of their ridiculous fantasies would have been attended, not with silence and contempt, but with the severer discipline of molten lead or empalement. We should be compelled to listen no more to the clamours against resumption of rent-free tenures, when almost every page will show that there was no tenure, whatever its designation, which was not open to resumption in the theory of the law, and which was not repeatedly resumed in practice. Should any ambitious functionary entertain the desire of emulating the “exceedingly magnifical” structures of his Moghal predecessors,* it will check his aspirations to learn, that beyond palaces and porticos, temples, and tombs, there is little worthy of emulation. He will find that, if we omit only three names in the long line of Dehli Emperors, the comfort and happi­ness of the people were never contemplated by them; and with the exception of a few saráís* and bridges,—and these only on roads tra­versed by the imperial camps—he will see nothing in which purely selfish considerations did not prevail. The extreme beauty and ele­gance of many of their structures it is not attempted to deny; but personal vanity was the main cause of their erection, and with the small exception noted above, there is not one which subserves any purpose of general utility. His romantic sentiments may have been excited by the glowing imagery of Lalla Rookh, and he may have indulged himself with visions of Jahángír's broad highway from one distant capital to the other, shaded throughout the whole length by stately avenues of trees, and accommodated at short distance with saráís and tanks; but the scale of that Emperor's munificence will probably be reduced in his eyes, when he sees it written, that the same work had already been in great measure accomplished by Sher Sháh, and that the same merit is also ascribed to a still earlier predecessor; nor will it be an unreasonable reflection, when he finds, except a ruined milestone here and there, no vestige extant of this magnificent highway, and this “delectable alley of trees,” that, after all, that can have been no very stupendous work, which the resources of three successive Emperors have failed to render a more enduring monument.* When he reads of the canals of Fíroz Sháh and 'Alí Mardán Khán intersecting the country, he will find on further examination, that even if the former was ever open, it was used only for the palace and hunting park of that monarch; but when he ascertains that no mention is made of it by any of the historians of Tímúr, who are very minute in their topographical de­tails, and that Bábar exclaims in his Memoirs, that in none of the Hindústání Provinces are there any canals (and both these con­querors must have passed over these canals, had they been flow­ing in their time), he may, perhaps, be disposed to doubt if anything was proceeded with beyond the mere excavation. With respect to 'Alí Mardán Khán, his merits will be less extolled, when it is learnt that his canals were made, not with any view to benefit the public, but for an ostentatious display of his profusion, in order that the hoards of his ill-gotten wealth might not be appropriated by the monarch to whom he betrayed his trust. When he reads that in some of the reigns of these kings, security of person and property was so great, that any traveller might go where he listed, and that a bag of gold might be exposed on the highways, and no one dare touch it,* he will learn to exercise a wise scepticism, on ascertaining that in one of the most vigorous reigns, in which internal tran­quillity was more than ever secured, a caravan was obliged to remain six weeks at Muttra, before the parties who accompanied it thought themselves strong enough to proceed to Dehli;* that the walls of Agra were too weak too save the city from frequent attacks of marauders; that Kanauj was a favourite beat for tiger-shooting, and wild elephants plentiful at Karra and Kalpí;* that the depopulation of towns and cities, which many declamatory writers have ascribed to our measures of policy, had already commenced before we entered on possession; and that we found, to use the words of the Prophet, “the country desolate, the cities burnt, when the sons of strangers came to build up the walls, and their kings to minister.”

If we pay attention to more general considerations, and wish to compare the relative merits of European and Asiatic Monarchies, we shall find that a perusal of these books will convey many an useful lesson, calculated to foster in us a love and admiration of our country and its venerable institutions.

When we see the withering effects of the tyranny and capricious­ness of a despot, we shall learn to estimate more fully the value of a balanced constitution. When we see the miseries which are en­tailed on present and future generations by disputed claims to the crown, we shall more than ever value the principle of a regulated succession, subject to no challenge or controversy. In no country have these miseries been greater than in India. In no country has the recurrence been more frequent, and the claimants more numer­ous. From the death of Akbar to the British conquest of Dehli—a period of two hundred years—there has been only one undisputed succession to the throne of the Moghal Empire, and even that ex­ceptional instance arose from its not being worth a contest; at that calamitous time, when the memory of the ravages committed by Nádir Sháh was fresh in the minds of men, and the active hostility of the Abdálí seemed to threaten a new visitation. Even now, as experience has shown, we should not be without claimants to the pageant throne, were it not disposed of at the sovereign will and pleasure of the British Government, expressed before the question can give rise to dispute, or encourage those hopes and expectations, which on each occasion sacrificed the lives of so many members of the Royal Family at the shrine of a vain and reckless ambition.

It is this want of a fixed rule of succession to the throne, which has contributed to maintain the kingdom in a constant ferment, and retard the progress of improvement. It was not that the reigning monarch's choice of his successor was not pro­mulgated; but in a pure despotism, though the will of a living autocrat carries with it the force of law, the injunctions of a dead one avail little against the “lang claymore” or the “persuasive gloss” of a gallant or an intriguing competitor. The very law of primogeniture, which seems to carry with it the strongest sanctions is only more calculated to excite and foment these disturbances, where regal descent is not avowedly based on that rule, and especially in a country where polygamy prevails; for the eldest prince is he who has been longest absent from the Court, whose sympathies have been earliest withdrawn from the influence of his own home, whose position in charge of an independent government inspires most alarm and mistrust in the reigning monarch, and whose interests are the first to be sacrificed, to please some young and favorite queen, ambitious of seeing the crown on the head of her own child. In such a state of society, the princes themselves are naturally brought up, always as rivals, sometimes as adventurers and robbers; the chiefs espouse the cause of one or the other pre­tender, not for the maintenance of any principle or right, but with the prospect of early advantage or to gratify a personal predilection; and probably end in themselves aspiring to be usurpers on their own account; the people, thoroughly indifferent to the success of either candidate, await with anxiety the issue, which shall enable them to pursue for a short time the path of industry and peace, till it shall again be interrupted by new contests; in short, all classes, interests, and institutions are more or less affected by the general want of stability, which is the necessary result of such unceasing turmoil and agitation.

These considerations, and many more which will offer themselves to any diligent and careful peruser of the volumes here noticed, will serve to dissipate the gorgeous illusions which are commonly enter­tained regarding the dynasties which have passed, and show him that, notwithstanding a civil policy and an ungenial climate, which forbid our making this country a permanent home, and deriving personal gratification or profit from its advancement, notwithstand­ing the many defects necessarily inherent in a system of foreign administration, in which language, colour, religion, customs, and laws preclude all natural sympathy between sovereign and subject, we have already, within the half-century of our dominion, done more for the substantial benefit of the people, than our predecessors, in the country of their own adoption, were able to accomplish in more than ten times that period;* and, drawing auguries from the past, he will derive hope for the future, that, inspired by the success which has hitherto attended our endeavours, we shall follow them up by continuous efforts to fulfil our high destiny as the rulers of India.