He complained that year, as I was told,
that he had not been able to save more than one hundred thousand
rupees that season out of his salary and commission upon the opium,
purchased by the Government from the cultivators.[13] The members of
the civil service, in the other branches of public service, were all
anxious to have it believed by their countrymen that they were well
acquainted with their duties, and able and willing to perform them;
but the Honourable Company's commercial agents were, on the contrary,
generally anxious to make their countrymen believe that they neither
knew nor cared anything about their duties, because they were ashamed
of them. They were sinecure posts for the drones of the service, or
for those who had great interest and no capacity.[14] Had any young
man made it appear that he really thought W------n knew or cared
anything about his duties, he would certainly never have been invited
to his house again; and if any one knew, certainly no one seemed to
know that he had any other duty than that of entertaining his guests.
No one ever spoke the native language so badly, because no man had
ever so little intercourse with the natives; and it was, I have been
told, to his ignorance of the native languages that his bosom friend,
Mr.
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