ABSTRACT
The newly-elected Parliament, that came together, on November 24, 1812, for a short set of pre-Christmas sittings, faced both good news and bad. It was already plain that Napoleon had run into the greatest difficulties and dangers in Russia, and, when Ministers moved a grant of £200,000. In aid of the Russian sufferers from the French invasion, there was virtually unanimous approval, Government’s grant, indeed, being supplemented, all over the country, by voluntary local collections and Funds. When Parliament came together again on February 12, 1813, Ministers still had a good many anxious moments to endure. In arranging the new India Bill, to determine Indian conditions for the next twenty years, they undoubtedly showed prudence in steering a careful course between “Company monopoly” and “free trade”. In commercial matters and, in religion, between the dangerous Christianising policy of Wilberforce and the religious indifferentism favoured by most Anglo-Indians.
