ther such third person be an authorized arbitrator or not? The law and usage of India, and I believe of every country, authorize voluntary submission to the decree of an upright and disinterested arbiter; and I cannot see on what principle it can be disallowed. All that is required of the law in cases of arbitration, is to authorize judges to execute the written decrees of arbitrators, unless fraud can be established against them.

Nor do I imagine that any advantage could arise from giving heads of villages, such as choudries, munduls, mokuddums, judicial authority. To have a court of law in every village would be of itself a nuisance. It would, besides, generally occur, that these persons would have, directly or indirectly, an interest in the issue, or at least a bias. The influence of the zumeendar among a village community, and the part he has to act in most of the disputes which occur, render highly doubtful the propriety of investing persons with judicial authority so much under his power; so that, although, like other respectable individuals, they might be highly useful as arbitrators, I should think encouragement, as such, preferable to conferring upon them any direct judicial authority whatsoever.

Thus, on a review of what is here suggested, the judicial divisions in Bengal would be,

7 circuits or provinces,

42 zillahs and cities;

and the establishment for the administration of justice would be as follows:

ESTABLISHMENT of JUDGES and others having Judicial Authority, proposed for the Bengal Presidency; shewing the Extent of Jurisdiction and of Final Decision of the several Courts in Money Demands and Personal Actions.

CHAP. VI.

On the Police.

I Now come to the last proposed branch of the subject, the Police.

To protect those who obey, and to bring to justice those who break the laws, I consider to be the immediate object of a police establishment. The former part of the definition, indeed, may be said to be included in the latter; for as there is no crime for which the punishment, when inflicted, is not a greater evil to the offender than the advantage he can derive from the commission thereof, so, if all criminals where sure of being brought to punishment, all would refrain from crime. Thus perfect security of person and property would follow; and this is the ultimate object of police, as well, indeed, as of all criminal laws.

Police has been divided into two branches: preventive, or that which is intended to prevent crime; and detective, or that which is designed to discover and bring to punishment the criminal.

The first branch is necessarily the most important. But to coerce an immense idle, generally speaking, and immoral population, as that of India is, and to restrain such from committing offences, must be allowed to be a task of no ordinary difficulty. If we look at such an undertaking, and the population in the aggregate, we must at

once

once declare it impossible; yet if we ask ourselves, could we restrain the inhabitants of a small village from crime, or detect the offenders, we should answer in the affirmative, and think the task by no means arduous. We see, then, that to attain the object is possible, perhaps practicable; and the first step towards it is indicated, viz. by division. It is in this, as in every undertaking, physical or moral, there must be a regular well-defined mode of conveying the impetus from the mover to the body moved or influenced. The intermediate instruments, or agents, must be distinct, that they may not clash, and that each may perform just what is expected of it.

After this subdivision, the processes of classification, and combination are to be adopted. So many of the smallest divisions must be combined into a larger one, and so many of these into a still larger one, and so many of these again into one larger still, under their several designations, till the whole are united into grand districts, each under a chief superintendent, who shall be in direct communication with the supreme government. The movement of one thousand men, or of one hundred thousand, in military array, is a practical demonstration of the wonderful effects of such division, and classific combination, and assures us that methodical arrangement of a similar nature, alone, is wanting to give us most extensive command in this department also.

For example, take, as a grand district, a district of circuit before specified in speaking of the administration of justice. Such a district is composed of towns and of villages, Suppose the lowest police division to be formed on an average of two hundred houses; and that this wereestablished throughout the district, as well in cities and

towns

towns as in the country. Thus, the Lower Provinces, as before, are stated to contain villages 156,000 and the Upper Provinces may be rated at ...... 78,000

Making together............ 234,000

If we assume the average of houses in each village, both in the Lower Provinces and the Upper Provinces to be forty-five, the number would be............... 10,530,000 These formed into police divisions of two hundred houses, give divisions

52,650 Formed into seven circuit districts, give for each district, police divisions

7,521

And for each of the six zillah magistracies in the district police divisions of two hundred houses, each division

1,253

250,600

Or number of houses..... which, at the average of forty-five per village, would give... Villages 2,563

These placed under charge of the zillah magistrate, with his assistants, European and native, under him, would form the basis of the police arrangements,

It is impossible for any government to keep up an establishment in regular pay, sufficient for the purposes of an efficient police, independent of the people. Could it be done, it would be highly objectionable. All that is, or ought to be requisite, is an establishment sufficient to conduct the details of the duty, and to afford the people a rallying point, when their more active exertions are required to preserve the peace or to apprehend offenders. This is sufficient: for, as the peaceable and well-disposed in every community, must far out-number those who are disturbers of the peace, the latter must always be over

powered,