There is a perpetual variation between the spirit and the letter of every treaty; and while the internal independence of each State is the groundwork, it is frittered away and nullified by successive stipulations, and these positive and negative qualities continue mutually repelling each other, until it is apparent that independence cannot exist under such conditions. Where discipline is lax, as with these feudal associations, and where each subordinate vassal is master of his own retainers, the article of military contingents alone would prove a source of contention. By leading to interference with each individual chieftain, it would render such aid worse than useless. But this is a minor consideration to the tributary pecuniary stipulation which, unsettled and undetermined, leaves a door open to a [123] system of espionage into their revenue accounts—a system not only disgusting, but contrary to treaty, which leaves ‘internal administration’ sacred. These openings to dispute, and the general laxity of their governments coming in contact with our regular system, present dangerous handles for ambition: and who so blind as not to know that ambition to be distinguished must influence every viceregent in the East? While deeds in arms and acquisition of territory outweigh the meek éclat of civil virtue, the periodical visitations to these kingdoms will ever be like the comet’s, Foreboding change to princes. Our position in the East has been, and continues to be, one in which conquest forces herself upon us. We have yet the power, however late, to halt, and not anticipate her further orders to march. A contest for a mud-bank has carried our arms to the Aurea Chersonesus, the limit of Ptolemy’s geography. With the Indus on the left, the Brahmaputra to the right, the Himalayan barrier towering like a giant to guard the Tatarian ascent, the ocean and our ships at our back, such is our colossal attitude! But if misdirected ambition halts not at the Brahmaputra, but plunges in to gather laurels from the teak forest of Arakan, what surety have we for these Hindu States placed by treaty within the grasp of our control? But the hope is cherished, that the same generosity which formed those ties that snatched the Rajputs from degradation and impending destruction, will maintain the pledge given in the fever of success, “that their independence should be sacred”; that it will palliate faults we may not overlook, and perpetuate this oasis of ancient rule, in the desert of destructive revolution, of races whose virtues are their own, and whose vices are the grafts of tyranny, conquest, and religious intolerance.[2.8.1]