numbers cannot all be provided for by these channels; and it is the country at large which is taxed to supply the means of sustenance to the younger scions of nobility—­taxed directly in the shape of place and sinecure, indirectly in various ways; but in no way so heavily as by the monopoly of the East India Company, which has so long been permitted to oppress the nation, that these detrimentals (as they have named themselves), may be provided for.  It is a well-known fact, that there is hardly a peer in the Upper House, or many representatives of the people in the lower, who are not, or who anticipate to be, under some obligation to this Company, by their relations or connections being provided for in those distant climes; and it is this bribery (for bribery it is, in whatever guise it may appear) that upholds one of the most glaring, the most oppressive of all monopolies, in the face of common sense, common justice, and common decency.  Other taxes are principally felt by the higher and middling classes; but this most odious, this most galling tax, is felt even in the cottage of the labourer, who cannot return to refresh himself after his day of toil with his favourite beverage, without paying twice its value out of his hard-earned pittance, to swell the dividend of the Company, and support these pruriencies of noble blood.

And yet, deprecating the evils arising from the system of entail, I must acknowledge that there are no other means by which (in a monarchical government) the desirable end of upholding rank is to be obtained.  I remember once, when conversing with an American, I inquired after one or two of his countrymen, who, but a few years before, were of great wealth and influence.  To one of my remarks he answered, “In our country, all the wealth and power at the time attached to it does not prevent a name from sinking into insignificance, or from being forgotten soon after its possessor is dead, for we do not entail property.  The distribution scatters the amassed heap, by which the world around him had been attracted; and although the distribution tends to the general fertilisation of the country, yet with the disappearance, the influence of the possessor, and even his name, are soon forgotten.”

These remarks, as will appear in the sequel, are apposite to the parties whom I am about to introduce to the readers.  As, however, they are people of some consequence, it may appear to be a want of due respect on my part, if I were to introduce them at the fag-end of a chapter.

Chapter XXVI

          “’Twas his the vast and trackless deep to rove. 
   Alternate change of climates has he known,
   And felt the fierce extremes of either zone,
   Where polar skies congeal th’ eternal snow,
   Or equinoctial suns for ever glow;
   Smote by the freezing or the scorching blast,
   A ship-boy on the high and giddy mast.” 
   FALCONER.