Volume IX Part 3 (1/2)

XV.--REVENUES.

PART I.

That the property of the lands of Bengal is, according to the laws and customs of that country, an inheritable property, and that it is, with few exceptions; vested in certain natives, called _zemindars_, or landholders, under whom other natives, called _talookdars_ and _ryots_, hold certain subordinate rights of property or occupancy in the said lands. That the said natives are Hindoos, and that their _rights and privileges are grounded upon the possession of regular grants, a long series of family succession, and fair purchase_. That it appears that Bengal has been under the dominion of the Mogul, and subject to a Mahomedan government, for above two hundred years. That, while the Mogul government was in its vigor, the property of zemindars was _held sacred_, and that, either by voluntary grant from the said Mogul or by composition with him, the native Hindoos were left in the free, quiet, and undisturbed possession of their lands, on the single condition of paying a fixed, certain, and unalterable revenue, or quit-rent, to the Mogul government. That this revenue, or quit-rent, was called the _aussil jumma_, or _original ground-rent_, of the provinces, and was not increased from the time when it was first settled in 1573 to 1740, when the regular and effective Mogul government ended. That, from that time to 1765, invasions, usurpations, and various revolutions took place in the government of Bengal, in consequence of which the country was considerably reduced and impoverished, when the East India Company received from the present Mogul emperor, Shah Allum, a grant of the _dewanny_, or collection of the revenues. That about the year 1770 the provinces of Bengal and Bahar were visited with a dreadful famine and mortality, by which at least one third of the inhabitants perished. That Warren Hastings, Esquire, has declared, ”that he had always heard the loss of inhabitants reckoned at a third, and in many places near one half of the whole, and that he knew not by what means such a loss could be recruited in four or five years, and believed it impossible.” That, nevertheless, the revenue was _violently kept up to its former standard_,--that is, in the two years immediately preceding the appointment of the said Warren Hastings to the government of Fort William,--in consequence of which _the remaining two thirds of the inhabitants were obliged to pay for the lands now left without cultivation_; and that from the year 1770 to the year 1775 _the country had languished, and the evil continued enhancing every day_. That the said Warren Hastings, in a letter to the Secret Committee of the Court of Directors, dated 1st September, 1772, declared, ”that the lands had suffered unheard-of depopulation by the famine and mortality of 1769; that the collections, _violently kept up to their former standard_, had added to the distress of the country, and threatened a general decay of the revenue, unless immediate remedies were applied to prevent it.” That the said Warren Hastings has declared, ”that, by intrusting the collections to the hereditary zemindars, the people would be treated with _more tenderness_, the rents more improved, and cultivation more likely to be encouraged; that _they_ have a perpetual interest in the country; that _their_ inheritance cannot be removed; that _they_ are the proprietors; that the lands are _their_ estates, and _their_ inheritance; that, from a long continuance of the lands in their families, it is to be concluded they have riveted an authority in the district, acquired an ascendency over the minds of the ryots, and _ingratiated their affections_; that, from continuing the lands under the management of those who have a natural and perpetual interest in their prosperity, solid advantages might be expected to accrue; that the zemindar would be less liable to failure or deficiencies than the farmer, from the perpetual interest which the former hath in the country, and because his inheritance cannot be removed, and it would be improbable that he should risk the loss of it by eloping from his district, which is too frequently practised by a farmer when he is hard-pressed for the payment of his balances, and as frequently predetermined when he receives his farm.” That, notwithstanding all the preceding declarations made by the said Warren Hastings of the loss of one third of the inhabitants and general decline of the country, he did, immediately after his appointment to the government, in the year 1772, make an arbitrary settlement of the revenues for five years at a higher rate than had ever been received before, and with a progressive and acc.u.mulating increase on each of the four last years of the said settlement.

That, notwithstanding the right of property and inheritance, repeatedly acknowledged by the said Warren Hastings to be in the zemindars and other native landholders, and notwithstanding he had declared ”that the security of private property is the greatest encouragement to industry, on which the wealth of every state depends,” the said Warren Hastings, nevertheless, in direct violation of those acknowledged rights and principles, did universally let the lands of Bengal _in farm_ for five years,--thereby destroying all the rights of private property of the zemindars,--thereby delivering the management of their estates to farmers, and transferring by a most arbitrary and unjust act of power the whole landed property of Bengal from the owners to strangers. That, to accomplish this iniquitous purpose, he, the said Warren Hastings, did put the lands of Bengal up to a pretended public auction, _and invited all persons to make proposals for farming the same_, thereby encouraging strangers to bid against the proprietors,--in consequence of which, not only the said proprietors were ousted of the possession and management of their estates, but a great part of the lands fell into the hands of the banians, or princ.i.p.al black servants of British subjects connected with and protected by the government; and that the said Warren Hastings himself has since declared, that _by this way the lands too generally fell into the hands of desperate or knavish adventurers_.[6] That, before the measure hereinbefore described was carried into execution, the said Warren Hastings did establish certain fundamental regulations in Council, to be observed in executing the same.[7] That among these regulations it was specially and strictly ordered, that no farm should exceed the annual amount of _one_ lac of rupees, and ”that no peshcar, banian, or other servant, of whatever denomination, of the collector, or relation or dependant of any such servant, should be allowed to farm lands, nor directly or indirectly to hold a concern in any farm, nor to be security for any farmer.” That, in direct violation of these his own regulations, and in breach of the public trust reposed in him, and sufficiently declared by the manifest duty of his station, if it had not been expressed and enforced by any positive inst.i.tution, he, the said Warren Hastings, did permit and suffer his own banian or princ.i.p.al black steward, named Cantoo Baboo, to hold farms in different purgunnahs, or districts, or to be security for farms, to the amount of thirteen lac of rupees (130,000_l._ or upwards) per annum; and that, after enjoying the whole of those farms for two years, he was permitted by the said Warren Hastings to relinquish two of them. That on the subject of the farms held by Cantoo Baboo the said Warren Hastings has made the following declaration. ”Many of his farms were taken without my knowledge, and almost all against my advice. I had no right to use compulsion or authority; nor could I with justice exclude him, because he was my servant, from a liberty allowed to all other persons in the country. The farms which he quitted he quitted by my advice, because I thought that he might engage himself beyond his abilities, and be involved in disputes, which I did not choose to have come before me as judge of them.”[8] That the said declaration contains sundry false and contradictory a.s.sertions: that, if _almost all_ the said farms were taken against his advice, it cannot be true that _many_ of them were taken without his knowledge; that, whether Cantoo Baboo had been his servant or not, the said Warren Hastings was bound by his own regulations to prevent his holding any farms to a greater amount than one lac of rupees per annum, and that the said Cantoo Baboo, being the servant of the Governor-General, was excluded by the said regulations from holding any farms whatever; that, if (as the Directors observe) it was thought dangerous to permit the banian of a collector to be concerned in farms, the same or stronger objections would always lie against the Governor's banian being so concerned; that the said Warren Hastings had a right, and was bound by his duty, to prevent his servant from holding the same; that, in advising the said Cantoo Baboo to relinquish some of the said farms, for which he was actually engaged, he has acknowledged an influence over his servant, and has used that influence for a purpose inconsistent with his duty to the India Company, namely, to deprive them of the security of the said Cantoo Baboo's engagement for farms which on trial he had found not beneficial, or not likely to continue beneficial, to himself; and that, if it was improper that he, the said Warren Hastings, should be the judge of any disputes in which his servant might be involved on account of his farms, that reason ought to have obliged him to prevent his servant from being engaged in any farms whatever, or to have advised his said servant to relinquish the remainder of his farms, as well as those which the said Warren Hastings affirms he quitted by his advice. That on the subject of the said charge the Court of Directors of the East India Company have come to the following resolution: ”_Resolved_, That it appears that the conduct of the late President and Council of Fort William in Bengal, in suffering Cantoo Baboo, the present Governor-General's banian, to hold farms in different purgunnahs to a large amount, or to be security for such farms, contrary to the tenor and spirit of the 17th regulation of the Committee of Revenue at Fort William, of the 14th May, 1772, and afterwards relinquis.h.i.+ng that security without satisfaction made to the Company, was highly improper, and has been attended with considerable loss to the Company”; and that in the whole of this transaction the said Warren Hastings has been guilty of gross collusion with his servant, and manifest breach of trust to his employers.

That, whereas it was acknowledged by the said Warren Hastings, that the country, in the years 1770 and 1771, had suffered great depopulation and decay, and that the collections of those years, having been violently kept up to their former standard, had added to the distress of the country, the settlement of the revenues made by him for five years, commencing the 1st May, 1772, instead of offering any abatement or relief to the inhabitants who had survived the famine, held out to the East India Company a promise of great _increase_ of revenue, to be exacted from the country by the means hereinbefore described. That this settlement was not realized, but fell considerably short, even in the first of the five years, when the demand was the lightest; and that on the whole of the five years the real collections fell short of the settlement to the enormous amount of two millions and a half sterling, and upwards. That such a settlement, if it had been or could have been rigorously exacted from a country already so distressed, and from a population so impaired, that, in the belief of the said Warren Hastings, it was impossible such loss could be recruited in four or five years, would have been in fact, what it appeared to be in form, an act of the most cruel and tyrannical oppression; but that the real use made of that unjust demand upon the natives of Bengal was, to oblige them to compound privately with the persons who formed the settlement, and who threatened to enforce it. That the enormous balances and remissions on that settlement arose from a general collusion between the farmers and collectors, and from a general peculation and embezzlement of the revenues, by which the East India Company was grossly imposed on, in the first instance, by a promised _increase_ of revenue, and defrauded, in the second, not only by the failure of that _increase_, but by the revenues falling short of what they were in the two years preceding the said settlement to a great amount. That the said Warren Hastings, being then at the head of the government of Bengal, was a party to all the said imposition, fraud, peculation, and embezzlement, and is princ.i.p.ally and specially answerable for the same; and that, whereas sundry proofs of the said peculation and embezzlement were brought before the Court of Directors, the said Directors (in a letter dated the 4th of March, 1778, and signed by William Devaynes and Nathaniel Smith, Esquires, now Chairman and Deputy-Chairman of the said Court, and members of this House) did declare, that, ”although it was rather their wish to prevent future evils than to enter into a severe retrospection of past abuses, yet, as in some of the cases then before them they conceived there had been _flagrant corruption_, and in others great oppressions committed on the native inhabitants, they thought it unjust to suffer the delinquents to pa.s.s wholly unpunished, and therefore they directed the Governor-General and Council forthwith to commence a prosecution against the persons who composed the Committee of Circuit, and their representatives, and against all other proper parties”; but that the prosecutions so ordered by the Court of Directors in the year 1778 have never been brought to trial; and that the said Warren Hastings did, on the 23d of December, 1783, propose and carry it in Council, _that orders should be given for withdrawing_ the said prosecutions,--declaring, that he was clearly of opinion that there was no ground to maintain them, and _that they would only be productive of expense to the Company and unmerited vexation to the parties_.

REVENUES.

PART II.

That the said Warren Hastings has on sundry occasions declared his deliberate opinion generally against all innovations, and particularly in the collection and management of the revenues of Bengal: that ”he was well aware of the expense and inconvenience _which ever attends innovations of all kinds_, on, their first inst.i.tution;[9]--that innovations are _always_ attended with difficulties and inconveniences, and innovations in the revenue with a suspension of the collections;[10]--that the continual variations in the mode of collecting the revenue, and the continual usurpation on the rights of the people, have fixed in the minds of the ryots a rooted distrust of the ordinances of government.”[11] That the Court of Directors have repeatedly declared their apprehensions ”that a sudden transition from one mode to another, in the investigation and collection of their revenue, might have alarmed the inhabitants, lessened their confidence in the Company's proceedings, and been attended with other evils.”[12]

That the said Warren Hastings, immediately after his appointment to the government of Fort William, in April, 1772, did abolish the office of _Naib Dewan_, or native collector of the revenues, then existing; that he did at the same time appoint a committee of the board to go on a circuit through the provinces, and to form a settlement of the revenues for five years; that he did then appoint sundry of the Company's servants to have the management of the collections, viz., one in each district, under the t.i.tle of _Collector_; that he did then abolish the General Board of Revenue or Council at Moorshedabad, for the following reasons: ”That, while the controlling and executive part of the revenue and the correspondence with the collectors was carried on by a council at Moorshedabad, the members of the administration at Calcutta had no opportunity of acquiring that thorough and comprehensive knowledge which could only result from _practical experience_; that the orders of the Court of Directors, which established a new system, which enjoined many new regulations and inquiries, could not properly be delegated to a subordinate council, and it became absolutely necessary that the business of the revenue should be conducted _under the immediate observation and direction of the board_.”[13]--That in November, 1773, the said Warren Hastings abolished the office of Collector, and transferred the collection and management of the revenues to several councils of revenue, commonly called _Provincial Councils_. That on the 24th of October, 1774, the said Warren Hastings _earnestly offered his advice_ (to the Governor-General and Council, then newly appointed by act of Parliament) _for the continuation of the said system of Provincial Councils in all its parts_. That the said Warren Hastings did, on the 22d of April, 1775, transmit to the Directors a formal plan for the future settlement of the revenues, and did therein declare, that, ”with respect to the mode of managing the collection of the revenue and the administration of justice, none occurred to him so good as the system which was already established of Provincial Councils.”

That on the 18th of January, 1776, the said Warren Hastings did transmit to the Court of Directors a plan for the better administration of justice, that in this plan the establishment of the said Provincial Councils was specially provided for and confirmed, and that Warren Hastings did recommend it to the Directors _to obtain the sanction of Parliament for a confirmation of the said plan_. That on the 30th of April, 1776, the said Warren Hastings did transmit to the Court of Directors the draft or scheme of an act of Parliament for the better administration of justice in the provinces, in which the said establishment of Provincial Councils is again specially included, and special jurisdiction a.s.signed to the said Councils. That the Court of Directors, in a letter dated 5th of February, 1777, did give the following instruction to the Governor-General and Council, a majority of whom, viz., Sir John Clavering, Colonel Monson, and Mr. Francis, had disapproved of the plan of Provincial Councils: ”If you are fully convinced that the establishment of Provincial Councils has not answered nor is not capable of answering the purposes intended by such inst.i.tutions, we hereby direct you to form a new plan for the collection of the revenues, and to transmit the same to _us for our consideration_.”--That the said Warren Hastings, in contradiction to his own sentiments repeatedly declared, and to his own advice repeatedly and deliberately given, and in defiance of the orders of the Directors, to whom he transmitted no previous communication whatever of his intention to abolish the said Provincial Councils, did, in the beginning of the year 1781, again change the whole system of the collections of the public revenue of Bengal, as also the administration of civil and criminal justice throughout the provinces. That the said Warren Hastings, in a letter dated 5th of May, 1781, advising the Court of Directors of the said changes, has falsely affirmed, ”that the plan of superintending and collecting the public revenue of the provinces through the agency of Provincial Councils had been inst.i.tuted for the temporary and declared purpose of introducing another more permanent mode _by an easy and gradual change_”; that, on the contrary, the said Warren Hastings, from the year 1773 to the year 1781, has constantly and uniformly insisted on the wisdom of that inst.i.tution, and on the necessity of never departing from it; that he has in that time repeatedly advised that the said inst.i.tution should be confirmed _in perpetuity_ by an act of Parliament; that the said total dissolution of the Provincial Councils was not introduced by any easy and gradual change, nor by any gradations whatever, but was sudden and unprepared, and instantly accomplished by a single act of power; and that the said Warren Hastings, in the place of the said Councils, has subst.i.tuted a Committee of Revenue, consisting of four covenanted servants, on principles opposite to those which he had himself professed, and with exclusive powers, tending to deprive the members of the Supreme Council of a due knowledge of and inspection into the management of the territorial revenues, specially and unalienably vested by the legislature in the Governor-General and Council, and to vest the same solely and entirely in the said Warren Hastings. That the reasons a.s.signed by the said Warren Hastings for const.i.tuting the said Committee of Revenue are incompatible with those which he professed when he abolished the subordinate Council of Revenue at Moorshedabad: that he has invested the said Committee _in the fullest manner with all the powers and authority of the Governor-General and Council_; that he has thereby contracted the whole power and office of the Provincial Councils into a small compa.s.s, and vested the same in four persons appointed by himself; that he has thereby taken the general transaction and cognizance of revenue business out of the Supreme Council; that the said Committee are empowered to conduct the current business of the revenue department without reference to the Supreme Council, and only _report to the board such extraordinary occurrences, claims, and proposals as may require the special orders of the board_; that even the instruction to report to the board in extraordinary cases is nugatory and fallacious, being accompanied with limitations which make it impossible for the said board to decide on any questions whatsoever: since it is expressly provided by the said Warren Hastings, _that, if the members of the Committee differ in opinion, it is not expected that every dissentient opinion should be recorded_; consequently the Supreme Council, on any reference to their board, can see nothing but the resolutions or reasons of the majority of the Committee, without the arguments on which the dissentient opinions might be founded: and since it is also expressly provided by the said Warren Hastings, that _the determination of the majority of the Committee should not therefore be stayed, unless it should be so agreed by the majority_,--that is, that, notwithstanding the reference to the Supreme Council, the measure shall be executed without waiting for their decision.

That the said Warren Hastings has delivered his opinion, with many arguments to support the same, in favor of long leases of the lands, in preference to _annual_ settlements: that he has particularly declared, ”that the farmer who holds his farm for one year only, having no interest in the next, takes what he can with the hand of rigor, which, even in the execution of legal claims, is often equivalent to violence; he is under the necessity of being rigid, and _even cruel_,--for what is left in arrear after the expiration of his power is at best a doubtful debt, if ever recoverable; he will be tempted to exceed the bounds of right, and to augment his income by irregular exactions, and by racking the tenants, for which pretences will not be wanting, where the farms pa.s.s _annually_ from one hand to another; that the discouragements which the tenants feel from being transferred every year to new landlords are a great objection to such short leases; that they contribute to injure the cultivation and dispeople the lands; that, on the contrary, from long farms the farmer acquires a permanent interest in his lands; he will, for his own sake, lay out money in a.s.sisting his tenants in improving lands already cultivated, and in clearing and cultivating waste lands.”[14] That, nevertheless, the said Warren Hastings, having left it to the discretion of the Committee of Revenue, appointed by him in 1781, to fix the time for which the ensuing settlement should be made, and the said Committee having declared, that, _with respect to the period of the lease, in general, it appeared to the Committee that to limit them to one year would be the best period_, he, the said Warren Hastings, approved of that limitation, in manifest contradiction to all his own arguments, professions, and declarations concerning the fatal consequences of _annual_ leases of the lands; that in so doing the said Warren Hastings did not hold himself bound or restrained by the orders of the Court of Directors, but acted upon his own discretion; and that he has, for partial and interested purposes, exercised that discretion in particular instances against his own general settlement for one year, by granting perpetual leases of farms and zemindaries to persons specially favored by him, and particularly by granting a perpetual lease of the zemindary of Baharbund to his servant Cantoo Baboo on very low terms.

That in all the preceding transactions the said Warren Hastings did act contrary to his duty as Governor of Fort William, contrary to the orders of his employers, and contrary to his own declared sense of expediency, consistency, and justice, and thereby did hara.s.s and afflict the inhabitants of the provinces with perpetual changes in the system and execution of the government placed over them, and with continued innovations and exactions, against the rights of the said inhabitants,--thereby destroying all security to private property, and all confidence in the good faith, principles, and justice of the British government. And that the said Warren Hastings, having subst.i.tuted his own instruments to be the managers and collectors of the public revenue, in the manner hereinbefore mentioned, did act in manifest breach and defiance of an act of the 13th of his present Majesty, by which _the ordering and management and government of all the territorial revenues in the kingdoms of Bengal, Bahar, and Orissa_ were vested in the Governor-General and Council, without any power of delegating the said trust and duty to any other persons; and that, by such unlawful delegation of the powers of the Council to a subordinate board appointed by himself, he, the said Warren Hastings, did in effect unite and vest in his own person the ordering, government, and management of all the said territorial revenues; and that for the said illegal act he, the said Warren Hastings, is solely answerable, the same having been proposed and resolved in Council when the Governor-General and Council consisted but of two persons present,--namely, the said Warren Hastings, and the late Edward Wheler, Esquire, and when consequently the Governor-General, by virtue of the casting voice, possessed the whole power of the government. That, in all the changes and innovations hereinbefore described, the pretence used by the said Warren Hastings to recommend and justify the same to the Court of Directors has been, that such changes and innovations would be attended with increase of revenue or diminution of expense to the East India Company; that such pretence, if true, would not have been a justification of such acts; but that such pretence is false and groundless: that during the administration of the said Warren Hastings the territorial revenues have declined; that the charges of collecting the same have greatly increased; and that the said Warren Hastings, by his neglect, mismanagement, and by a direct and intended waste of the Company's property, is chargeable with and answerable for all the said decline of revenue, and all the said increase of expense.

XVI.--MISDEMEANORS IN OUDE.

I. That the province of Oude and its dependencies were, before their connection with and subordination to the Company, in a flouris.h.i.+ng condition with regard to culture, commerce, and population, and their rulers and princ.i.p.al n.o.bility maintained themselves in a state of affluence and splendor; but very shortly after the period aforesaid, the prosperity both of the country and its chiefs began sensibly and rapidly to decline, insomuch that the revenue of the said province, which, on the lowest estimation, had been found, in the commencement of the British influence, at upwards of three millions sterling annually, (and that ample revenue raised without detriment to the country,) did not in the year 1779 exceed the sum of 1,500,000_l._, and in the subsequent years did fall much short of that sum, although the rents were generally advanced, and the country grievously oppressed in order to raise it.

II. That in the aforesaid year, 1779, the demands of the East India Company on the Nabob of Oude are stated by Mr. Purling, their Resident at the court of Oude, to amount to the sum of 1,360,000_l._ sterling and upwards, leaving (upon the supposition that the whole revenue should amount to the sum of 1,500,000_l._ sterling, to which it did not amount) no more than 140,000_l._ sterling for the support of the dignity of the household and family of the Nabob, and for the maintenance of his government, as well as for the payment of the public debts due within the province.

III. That by the treaty of Fyzabad a regular brigade of the Company's troops, to be stationed in the dominions of the Nabob of Oude, was kept up at the expense of the said Nabob; in addition to which a temporary brigade of the same troops was added to his establishment, together with several detached corps in the Company's service, and a great part of his own native Troops were put under the command of British officers.

IV. That the expense of the Company's temporary brigade increased in the same year (the year of 1779) upwards of 80,000_l._ sterling above the estimate, and the expense of the country troops under British officers in the same period increased upwards of 40,000_l._ sterling; and in addition to the aforesaid ruinous expenses, a large civil establishment was gradually, secretly, and without any authority from the Court of Directors, or record in the books of the Council-General concerning the same, formed for the Resident, and another under Mr. Wombwell, an agent for the Company; as also several pensions and allowances, in the same secret and clandestine manner, were charged on the revenues of the said Nabob for the benefit of British subjects, besides large occasional gifts to persons in the Company's service.

V. That in the month of November, 1779, the said Nabob did represent to Mr. Purling, the Company's Resident aforesaid, the distressed state of his revenues in the following terms. ”During three years past, the expense occasioned by the troops in brigade, and others commanded by European officers, has much distressed the support of my household, insomuch that the allowances made to the seraglio and children of the deceased Nabob have been reduced to _one fourth_ of what it had been, upon which they have subsisted in a very distressed manner for two years past. The attendants, writers, and servants, &c., of my court, have received no pay for two years past; and there is at present no part of the country that can be allotted to the payment of my father's private creditors, whose applications are daily pressing upon me. All these difficulties I have for these three years past struggled through, and found this consolation therein, that it was complying with the pleasure of the Honorable Company, and in the hope that the Supreme Council would make inquiry from impartial persons into my distressed situation; but I am now forced to a representation. From the _great increase of expense_, the revenues were necessarily farmed out _at a high rate;_ and deficiencies followed yearly. The country and cultivation is abandoned; and this year in particular, from the excessive drought, deductions of many lacs” (stated by the Resident, in his letter to the board of the 13th of the month following, to amount to twenty-five lac, or 250,000_l._ sterling) ”have been allowed the farmers, who were still left unsatisfied. I have received but just sufficient to support my absolute necessities, the revenues being deficient to the amount of fifteen lac [150,000_l._ sterling], and for this reason many of the old chieftains with their troops, and the useful attendants of the court, were forced to leave it, and there is now only a few foot and horse for the collection of my revenues; and should the zemindars be refractory, there is not left a sufficient number to reduce them to obedience.” And the said Nabob did therefore pray that the a.s.signments for the new brigade, the corps of horse, and the other detached bodies of the Company's troops might not be required from him: alleging, ”that the former was not only quite useless to his government, but, moreover, the cause of much loss, both in the revenues and customs; and that the detached bodies of troops under their European officers brought nothing but confusion into the affairs of his government, and were entirely their own masters.”

VI. That it appears that the said Nabob was not bound by any treaty to the maintenance, without his consent, _even of the old brigade_,--the Court of Directors having, in their letter of the 15th December, 1775, approved of keeping the same in his service, ”_provided it was done with the free consent of the Subah, and by no means without it_.” And the _new brigade_ and temporary corps were raised on the express condition, that the expense thereof should be charged on the Nabob only ”_for so long a time as he should require the corps for his service_.” And the Court of Directors express to the Governor-General and Council their sense of the said agreement in the following terms: ”But if you intend to exert your influence first to induce the Vizier to acquiesce in your proposal, and afterwards _to compel him to keep the troops in his pay during your pleasure, your intents are unjust; and a correspondent conduct would reflect great dishonor on the Company_.”

VII. That, in answer to the decent and humble representation aforesaid of the Nabob of Oude, the allegations of which, so far as they relate to the distressed state of the Nabob's finances, and his total inability to discharge the demands made on him, were confirmed by the testimony of the English Resident at Oude, and which the said Hastings did not deny in the whole or in any part thereof, he, the said Warren Hastings, did, on pretence of certain political dangers, declare the relief desired to be ”without hesitation _totally_ inadmissible,” and did falsely and maliciously insinuate, ”that the _tone_ in which the demands of the Nabob were a.s.serted, and the season in which they were made, did give cause for _the most alarming suspicions_.” And the said Warren Hastings did, in a letter to the Nabob aforesaid, written in haughty and insolent language, and without taking any notice of the distresses of the said Nabob, alleged and verified as before recited, ”require and insist upon your [the Nabob's] granting _tuncaws_ [a.s.signments] for the full amount of their [the Company's] demands upon you for the current year, and on your reserving funds sufficient to answer them, _even should the deficiencies of your revenues compel you to leave your own troops unprovided for, or to disband a part of them to enable you to effect it_.”

VIII. That, in a letter written at the same time to the Resident, Purling, and intended for his directions in enforcing on the Nabob the unjust demands aforesaid, the said Warren Hastings hath a.s.serted, in direct contradiction to the treaties subsisting between the said Nabob and the Company, ”that he [the Nabob] stands engaged to our government to maintain the English armies which at his own request have been formed for the protection of his dominions, and _that it is our part, and not his, to judge and determine in what manner and at what time these shall be reduced and withdrawn_.” And in a Minute of Consultation, when the aforesaid measure was proposed by the said Hastings to the Supreme Council, he did affirm and maintain that the troops aforesaid ”had now no _separate_ or distinct existence from ours, and may be properly said to consist of our _whole_ military establishment, with the exception only of our European infantry; and that they could not be withdrawn without imposing on the Company _the additional burden of them_, or disbanding nine battalions of disciplined sepoys and three regiments of horse.”

IX. That in the Minute of Consultation aforesaid, he, the said Warren Hastings, hath further, in justification of the violent and arbitrary proceedings aforesaid, a.s.serted, ”that the arrangement of measures between the British government and their allies, the native powers of India, must, in case of disagreement about the necessity thereof, _be decided by the strongest_”; and hath thereby advanced a dangerous and most indecently expressed position, subversive of the rights of allies, and tending to breed war and confusion, instead of cordiality and cooperation amongst them, and to destroy all confidence of the princes of India in the faith and justice of the English nation. And the said Hastings, having further, in the minute aforesaid, presumed to threaten to ”bring to punishment, if my influence” (his, the said Hastings's, influence) ”can produce that effect, _those incendiaries_ who have endeavored to make themselves the instruments of division between us,”

hath, as far as in him lay, obstructed the performance of one of the most essential duties of a prince engaged in an unequal alliance with a presiding state,--that of representing the grievances of his subjects to that more powerful state by whose acts they suffer: leaving thereby the governing power in total ignorance of the effects of its own measures, and to the oppressed people no other choice than the alternative of an unqualified submission, or a resistance productive of consequences more fatal.

X. That, all relief being denied to the Nabob, in the manner and on the grounds aforesaid, the demands of the Company on the said Nabob in the year following, that is to say, in the year 1780, did amount to the enormous sum of 1,400,000_l._ sterling, and the distress of the province did rapidly increase.

XI. That the Nabob, on the 24th of February of the same year, did again write to the Governor-General, the said Warren Hastings, a letter, in which he expressed his constant friends.h.i.+p to the Company, and his submission and obedience to their orders, and a.s.serting that he had not troubled them with any of his difficulties, trusting they would learn them from other quarters, and that he should be relieved by their friends.h.i.+p. ”But,” he says, ”when _the knife had penetrated to the bone_, and I was surrounded with such heavy distresses that I could no longer live in expectations, I then wrote an account of my difficulties.