Sect. 4. Turkish BOOK I. but its comparative moderation and strength have Chap. iv. remained useless to its unhappy subjects, from a degree of supineness and indifference as to the malversations of its distant officers, which may be traced, partly perhaps to the bigotry which has made the commander of the faithful careless about the treatment his Christian subjects received from Mahometan officers: and partly to an obstinate ignorance of the ordinary arts of civilized governments, which the vanity of the Ottomans has cherished as if it were a merit, and which their bigotry has also helped to recommend to their good opinion. Near the capital, and in the countries where the Turks themselves are numerous, there are some bounds to the oppression of the Pachas and Agas. The Turks, secure of justice if they can contrive to be heard by the superior authorities, have found the means of protecting their persons and properties, by belonging to societies, which are bound as bodies, to seek justice for the wrongs of individual members. But in the distant provinces no sect is safe. The cry of the oppressed is easily stifled, and if faintly heard, seems habitually disregarded. The Sultan indeed abstains, with singular forbearance, from any attempts to raise the revenue paid to himself; but provided it is regularly transmitted by the Pachas of the provinces, he cares little by what means, or with what additional extortions, it is wrung from the people. The consequences are such as might be expected. The jealousy of the government allows the Pachas to remain in office but a short time, the knowledge of this inflames Book I. Sect. 4. their cupidity, and the wretched cultivators are allowed to exist in peace upon the soil, only while they submit to exactions which have no other limit than the physical impossibility of getting more from Turkish them. Volney has accurately described the effect of this state of things in Syria and Egypt. "The absolute "title of the Sultan to the soil appears to aggra"vate the oppression of his officers. The son is 66 66 66 66 never certain of succeeding to the father, and the "peasantry often fly in desperation from a soil which "has ceased to yield them the certainty of even a bare subsistence. Exactions, undiminished in amount, are demanded, and as far as possible extorted, from those who remain; depopulation goes on, the waste extends itself, and desolation "becomes permanent." It is thus that a scanty and most miserable remnant of the people are found occupying tracts, which were the glory of ancient civilization; and of which the climate and the soil are such, that men would multiply and would enrich, almost without effort, themselves and their masters; did the general government think fit to protect its subjects with half the energy it sometimes exerts, to force the spoilers to disgorge a miserable pittance of plunder into the imperial treasury. Ryots: Book I. Chap. iv. Sect. 5. Chinese SECTION V. Of Ryot Rents in China. We know enough of China to be aware, that the sovereign is there, as elsewhere in Asia, the sole proprietor of the soil: but we hardly know enough to judge accurately of the peculiar modifications which this system of imperial ownership has received in that country. The manner in which the Chinese government assumes possession of the land, and imposes a rent upon it in the case of new conquests, is curiously illustrated by a letter of a victorious Chinese commander to the Emperor, published by Mr. Patton'. Although one-tenth of the produce is the nominal rent in China, it is not unlikely that a very different portion is actually collected. It would be very interesting to have more multiplied and detailed observations on the practical effects of the system among the Chinese, than the jealousy of the government is likely soon to give opportunity for obtaining. The progress and effects of ryot rents in China, must almost necessarily have been very different from those exhibited by India, Persia, or Turkey. In these last countries, the vices of the government, and the oppression and degradation resulting from them, have left us little means of judging what might be the results of the system itself, if conducted for any considerable period by an administration more mild and forbearing, and capable of 1 Patton, 232, 233. BOOK I. Book giving security to the persons and property of the cultivators. In China this experiment seems to have been fairly tried. The arts of government are, to Chinese a certain extent, understood by the laboriously edu- Rvots. cated civilians, by whose hands the affairs of the Empire are carried on; the country has, till very lately, been remarkably free from intestine convulsion or serious foreign wars, and the administration has been well organized, pacific and efficient. The whole conduct indeed of the Empire, presents a striking contrast to that of the neighbouring Asiatic monarchies, the people of which, accustomed to see violence and bloodshed the common instruments of government, express great wonder at the spectacle of the Chinese statesmen upholding the authority of the state rather by the pen than the sword'. One effect we know to have followed from the public tranquillity: the spread of agriculture, and an increase of people much beyond that of the neighbouring countries. While not one half of India has ever been reclaimed, and less still of Persia, China is as fully cultivated, and more fully peopled than most European monarchies. Whether any class of subordinate proprietors exists between the crown and the persons paying produce rents like to the Zemindars, of India; 1 Frazer, Appendix, p. 114. See Frazer's account of the Chinese administration in the provinces nearest Khorasan, and of the effect which the spectacle of that administration produced on the minds of merchants and travellers from other Asiatic states. Chap. iv. Sect. 5. BOOK I. whether the persons actually liable for the produce rents, are the cultivating peasants themselves, or a class above them, we have no sufficient data to determine. In some cases, at least, the actual cultivators are persons hiring the ground from those liable for the crown, and paying them half the produce. Chinese There are abundant indications that the Chinese population has, in some parts of the Empire, increased beyond the number for which the territory can produce a plentiful subsistence, and that they are in a state of the most wretched penury. The very facilities for increase which good government gives to a ryot population, will usually be followed by such a consequence, if in the progress of their multiplication a certain advance has not taken place in the habits and civilization of the mass of the people. The absence of that improvement may flow from various causes, which in unfolding the subject of population, it will be part of our business to distinguish. We know enough of China to be sure, that obstacles to the amelioration of the habits and character of the mass of the people, exist in abundance there, and therefore the rapid spread of population, up to a certain point, would certainly be the first effect of a mild administration. According to Klaproth, the number of ryots (paysans contribuables) at the time of the Mantchou conquest in 1644, was registered as twenty-six millions, while all other classes were estimated at eleven millions. And since that time he calculates that the whole population has quadrupled. |
