of the revenue of that province, which his arts, and the misfortunes of his mafter, enabled him to convert to a permanent and hereditary poffeffion. This man, whom you have thus ranked amongst the princes of India, will be aftonithed, when he hears it, at an elevation fo unlooked for, nor lefs at the independent right which your commands have affigned him; rights which are fo foreign from his conceptions, that I doubt whether he will know in what language to affert them, unless the example which you have thought it confiftent with juftice, however oppofite to policy, to fhew, of becoming his advocates againft your own interefts, fhould infpire any of your own fervants to be his advifers and inftructors. I forbear to detail the proofs of thefe denials. In legal propriety I might, perhaps, claim a difpenfation from it, and require the charges to be proved, not my felf difprove them. But I have already difproved them in my narra tive of my proceedings at Benaris, which has been long fince in your hands, and is, I hope, in the hands of the public. To that I think it fufficient to refer, and to point out the ninth and following pages of the copy, which was printed in Calcutta, for a complete explanation; and, I prefume, as complete a demontiration of the mutual relation of Rajah Cheyt Sing, the vaffal and fubject of the Company, and of the Company his fovereign. The fubject to which I now proceed, and on which I reft my fulleft acquittal, is too delicate to admit of my entering upon it, without requesting your indulgence and pardon for whatever may appear offenfive in it, and declaring, that I fhould have fubmitted in filence to the ferereft expreffions of cenfure which you could pafs upon me, had they been no more than expreffions, and applied to real facts; but, where the confures are not applied to real facts, and are fuch as fubitantally affect my moral character, I fhould be myfelf an accomplice in the injury, if I fuffered the lighteft imputation to retain, which it was in my power wholly to efface. breach of faith neceffarily implies antecedent and exifting engagements, and can only be conftrued fuch by the exprefs terms of thofe engagements. I have been guilty of this crime in my treatment of Cheyt Sing, or of none; and I may be allowed to regret, that, while you flated fuch facts as implied it, you did not in terms declare it. There is an appearance of tenderness in this deviation from plain conftruction, of which, however meant, I have a right to complain, becaufe it impofes on me the neceflity of framing the terms of the accufation against myself, which you have not only made, but have ftated the leading argument to it fo ftrongly, that no one who reads thefe can avoid making it, or not know to have been intended. But, permit me to afk, may I not prefume that this deviation arofe from fomething more than a tenderness for my character or feelings? that it was dictated by a confcioufnefs that no fuch engagements exifted? For, if any fuch did exift, why were they not produced in fupport of the charges? Even the facts, which are affirmed in the refolutions, are fuch as must depend upon fome evidence, for they cannot exist independently. If the Bengal government "pledged itself," its pledge must be contained in the written inftruments which were exprefsly formed, and declared to define the reciprocal relation and obligation of the Rajah and the Company. The refolutions of your honourable Court, as they ftand unconnected in their original state, must be accepted as the conclufions from certain and eftablished evidence; and this evidence, I muft prefume, you meant to produce in the long procefs of detailed argument which precedes them in your ge neral letter. This confifts of picced extracts, from opinions delivered by me in the debates of the council, which not only preceded the fettlement made with the Rajah Cheyt Sing, when his Zemindary became the property of the Company; but, ftrange as it will appear, which paffed on an occafion wholly foreign from it, and at a time when the Company had not obtained the ceffion of the Zemindary. At the point of the fettlement fettlement your detail ftops. Had it proceeded, it must have exhibited the conditions of the fettlement, which would have contradicted every fact which you have afferted; and every man of candour will believe that this was the only reafon why it did not proceed. For why are my fpeculative opinions on the claim made upon the Nabob Affof ul Dowlah at the ceffion of the Zemindary of Benaria, which I thought an infringement of a treaty already fubfifting with him; and upon the mode by which we fhould allow Rajah Cheyt Sing to exercife the management of his Zemindary, when it had become the property of the Company, quoted in evidence againft me; when the actual deeds which conveyed to Cheyt Sing his poffeflion of the Zemindary, and all the conditions on which he held it, were the only criteria by which my conduct towards him could be tried? The debates from which my opinions are extracted are fo voluminous, and my fhare in them bears fo large a proportion, that it would take up much time and argument to prove, what I could prove, that in their collective and relative fenfe they are perfectly confiftent, fo far as they can apply at all to my fubfequent conduct; but were it otherwife they were not to be made rules of my conduct; and God forbid that every expreffion, dictated by the impulfe of prefent emergency, and unpremeditately uttered in the heat of party contention, fhould impofe upon me the obligation of a fixed principle, and be applied to every variable occafion! The wifdom of the legislature has declared, that the whole collective body of the Governor-General and Council fhall be bound by the opinion of the majority; but the doctrine implied in your quotation of my opinions is the reverfe of that obligation, if my opinions were not conformable to thofe of a majority of the board; and, if they were, the acts of the board, formed on fuch concurrent opinions, ought to be quoted as the rules of my conduct, not the opinions which only led to them. Having folemnly pronounced, that Rajah Cheyt Sing had performed his engagements with the Company, and that my conduct towards him was improper and unwarrantable," you proceed to fay, that "fuch further refolutions, as you may think proper to come to on this very important fubject, will be communicated to us by a future conveyance." This I cannot otherwife understand than as an indication of your intention, to order the reftoration of Rajah Cheyt Sing to the Zemindary of Benaris. It will be expected, after the judgment which you have paffed, as an act of indifpenfable juftice; and, whenever this promiffory declaration is made public, as it muft be, if not already known, what may have been expected will be regarded as a certainty. If any thing were wanting but the exprefs notification of your intention to confirm it, the recal of Mr. Markham, who was known to be the public agent of my own nomination at Benaris, and the re-appointment of Mr. Francis Fowke by your order, contained in the fame letter, would place it beyond a doubt. This order has been obeyed; and whenever you fall be pleafed to order the restoration of Cheyt Sing, I will venture to promife the fame ready and exact fubmiffion in the other members of your council. Of the confequences of fuch a policy I forbear to speak. Moft happily the wretch, whofe hopes may be excited by the appearances in his favour, is illqualified to avail himself of them; and the force which is ftationed in the province of Benaris is fufficient to fupprefs any fymptoms of internal fedition; but it cannot fail to create diftruft and fufpenfe in the minds both of the rulers and of the people, and fuch a ftate is always productive of diforder. But it is not in this partial confideration that I dread the effects of your commands. It is in your preclaimed indifpofition against the firft executive member of your first government in India. It is as well known to the Indian world as to the Court of Englith Proprietors, that the first declaratory inttruments of the diffolution of my influence, in the year 1774, were Mr. John Elitow and Mr. Francis 4 F 2 Fowke. Fowke. By your ancient and known conftitution, the Governor has been ever held forth and understood to poffefs the oftenfible powers of government. All the correfpondence with foreign princes is conducted in his name; and every perfon, refident with them for the management of your political concerns, is underflood to be more effecially his reprefentative, and of his choice and fuch ought to be the rule; for how otherwife can they truft an agent nominated against the will of his principal; or how, knowing him to act under the variable inftructions of a temporary influence, or the cafual dictates of a majority, can they rely on the meafures which he may propofe, and which a fudden change of influence, always expected in a deviation from conftitutional forms, may undo, and fubject them, in every inftance of their connection, to a continual fluctuation of affairs? When the fate of this adminiftration was fuch as feemed to admit of the appointment of Mr. Briftow to the refidence of Lucknow, without much diminution of my own influence, I gladly feized the occafion to fhew my readiness to fubmit to your commands. I propofed his nomination: he was nominated, and declared to be the agent of my own choice. Even this effect of my caution is defeated by your abfolute command for his re-appoint ment, independent of me, and with the fuppofition that I fhould be adverfe to it. I am now wholly deprived of my official powers, both in the province of Owd and in the Zemindary of Benaris. Nor will the evil ftop at thefe lines. My general influence, the effects of which have been happily manifefted for the fupport of your interefts, is now wholly loft, or what remains of it futained only by the prefeription of long poffeffion, and fomething perhaps of perfonal attachment, impreffed by the habits of frequent intercourfe. I almoft fhudder at the refection of what night have happened, had the fe denunciations againit your own nuniter, in favour of a man univerfaily confidered in this part of the world as juftly attainted for his crimes, the murderer of your fervants and foldiers, and the rebel to your authority, arrived two months earlier. You will learn, by our common dispatches, what difficulties Mahdajee Scindia has had to furmount in reconciling the dif ferent members of the Mahratta ftate to the ratification, and even, when ratified, to the interchange of the trea ty concluded by him in May laft with this government. I dare to appeal even to your judgement for the reply, and to afk, whether the minifters of the Pefhwa, poffeffing the knowledge of fuch a circumftance, would not have availed themfelves of it to withhold their confent to the treaty, either claiming to include Cheyt Sing as a party in it, or either overtly or fecretly fupporting his pretenfions, with the view of multiplying our difficulties; or, which is moft probable, waiting for the event of that change in the fuperior government of Bengal which fuch fymptoms portended, before they precipitated their interefts in a connection with a declining influence, which they might obviously conclude would render this, with all its other acts, obnoxious to that which fucceeded it. Their counterpart of the treaty is ratified, and in our poffeffion; and, fuch is the character of the man whom we have made our principal and the guarantee of it, that it will infure us against any change of fentiment, which might arife, from any caufe, in the breafts of his countrymen. I am hap Py in having been the fole inftrument of the accomplishment of fo great an event. It originated in a scene of univerfal revolt encompaffing my own perfon: it began with the immediate feparation of the first power of the Mahratta fate from the general war, and was followed by the inftant and general ceflation of hostilities; in ef feet, by a permanent peace; for I have a right now to affirm this, having pofitively affured you that it would prove fuch, while the formal confirmation of it remained fo long in a ítate of fufpenfe.in every progretive ftate of it, it has met with obtructions which might have difcouraged even the ract determined termined perfeverance; in the known difpofition of the prefidency of Bomay; in the calamities of the Carnatic; n the alarming interference of the Prefident and Select Committee of Fort St. George, by the exaggerated portrait of their affairs in a letter addreffed to our minifter, and fent in circulation through the midft of Deccan and Indoftan, intreating him at all events, and with whatever facrifices, to precipitate the conclufion of the treaty, and fave them from deftruction; but, above all, in the vehement exclamations for peace from men of every defcription in Great-Britain. To all these counteractions I have oppofed the principle of firmnefs and defiance; and, aided by the peculiar talents, and warinefs, [ and incomparable perfeverance of Mr. David Anderfon, I have at length brought my wishes and your's to their deftined point. Perhaps with a lefs able minifter I might yet have failed; but even the merits of his fervices I claim as my own; for it was my choice which called his mind into action, and gave it its beft exermy confidence that tion. Pardon, honourable Sirs, this digreffive exultation. I cannot fupprefs the pride which I feel in this fuccesful achievement of a meafure fo fortunate for your interefts and the national honour; for that pride is the fource of my zeal fo frequently exerted in your fupport, and never more happily than in thofe inftances in which I have departed from the preferibed and beaten path of action, and affumed a refponfibility which has too frequently drawn on me the moft pointed effects of your difpleafure. But, however I may yield to my private feelings in thus enlarging on the fubject, my motive in introducing it was immediately connected with its context, and was to contraft the actual ftate of your political affairs derived from a happier in fluence, with that which might have attended an earlier diffolution of it. It is now a complete period of eleven years fince I first received the nominal charge of your affairs. In the courfe of it I have invariably had to contend, not with ordinary difficulties. but fuch as moft unnaturally arofe from the oppofition of thofe very powers from which I primarily derived my authority, and which were required for the fupport of it. My exertions, though applied to an unvaried and confiftent line of action, have been occafional and defultory; yet I please myfelf with the hope, that, in the annals of your dominion, which fhall be written after the extinction of recent prejudices, this term of its adminiftration will appear not the leaft conducive to the intereft of the Company, nor the leaft reflective of the honour of the British name; and allow me to fuggeft the inftructive reflection of what good might have been done, and what evil prevented, had due fupport been given to that adminiftration which has performed fuch en:inent and fubftantial fervices without it. my You, honourable Sirs, can atteft the patience and temper with which I have fubmitted to all the indignities which have been heaped upon me in this long fervice. It was the duty of fidelity which I effentially owed to it; it was the return of gratitude which I owed, even with the facrifice of life, had that been exacted, to the Company, my original mafters and mott indulgent patrons. To thefe principles have I devoted every private feeling, and perfevered in the tiolent maintenance of office; because I was confcious that I poffeffed, in my integrity, and in the advantages of local knowledge, thofe means of difcharging the functions of it with credit to mm felf, and with advantage to my employers, which might be wanting in more fplendid talents; and becaufe I had always a ground of hope that my long fufferance would difarm the prejudices of my adverfaries, or the rotation of time produce that concurrence, in the crifis of your fortune with my own, which might place me in the fituation to which I afpired. In the mean time there was nothing in any actual state of your affairs which fould difcourage me from the profecution of this plan. There was, indeed, an interval, and that -of fome duration, in which my authority was wholly deftroyed; but another was fubftituted in its place, and that, though though irregular, was armed with the public belief of an influence invifibly upholding it, which gave it a vigour fcarce lefs effectual than that of a conflitutional power. Befides, your government had no external dangers to agitate, and difcover the looseness of its compofition. The cafe is now moft widely different. While your exiftence was threatened by wars with the most formidable powers of Europe, added to your Indian enemies; and while you confeffedly owed its prefervation to the feafonable and vigorous exertions of this government; you chofe that feafon to annihilate its conftitutional powers. You annihilated the influence of its executive member-you proclaimed its annihilation-you virtually called on his affociates to withdraw their fupport from him, and they have withdrawn it. But you have fubftituted no other inftrument of rule in his ftead, unlefs you fuppofe that it may exift, and can be effectually exercifed, in the body of your Council at large; poffeffing no power of motion, but an inert fubmiffion to the letter of your commands; which, however neceflary in the wife intention of the legislature, have never yet been applied to the establishment of any original plan or fyftem of meafures, and feldom felt but in inftances of perfonal favour or perfonal difpleafure. Under fuch a fituation, I feel my felf impelled by the fame fpirit which has hitherto animated me to retain my poft against all the attempts made to extrude me from it, to adopt the contrary line. The feafon for contention is paft. The prefent flate of affairs is not able to hear it. I am morally certain, that my fucceffor in this government, whoever he may be, will be allowed to poffefs and exercife the neceffary powers of his ftation, with the confidence and fupport of thofe, who, by their choice of him, will be interefled in lis fuccefs. I am become a burthen to the fervice; and would inftantly relieve it from the incumbrance, were I not apprehenfive of creating worfe confequences by my removal from it. Such an act would probably be confidered, by Mahdajee Scindia as a defertion of him in the inftant of his accomplishment of t treaty, and defeat the purposes of which remain yet to be effected by in agency. I am alfo perfuaded that would be attended with the lofs of the commander in chief, in whofe prefere alone I look for the restoration of pear to the Carnatic, which he, perhap would think too hazardous an unde taking with no other support than that of a broken government. I have now no wish remaining but to fee the cloie of this calamitous fcene, and for that i hope a few months will be fufficient My fervices may afterwards be fafely withdrawn; but will fill be due, in my conception of what I owe to my firt conftituents, until they can be regularly fupplied by thofe of my appointed fucceffor, or until his fucceffion fhall have been made known, and the interval but short for his arrival. It, therefore, remains to perform the duty which I had affigned to myself as the final purpose of this letter; to declare, as I now moft formally do, that it is my defire that you will be pleafed to obtain the early nomination of a perfon to fucceed me in the government of Fort-William; to declare that it is my intention to refign your fervice as foon as I can do it without prejudice to your affairs, after the allowance of a competent time for your choice of a perfon to fucceed me; and to declare, that if, in the intermediate time, you fhall proceed to order the reftoration of Rajah Cheyt Sing to the Zemindary, from which, by the powers I legally poffefed, and conceive myfelf legally bound to affert, against any fubfequent authority to the contrary derived from the fame common fource, he was dif poffeffed for crimes of the greateft enorinity, and your council fhall refolve to execute the order, I will inftantly give up my ftation and the fervice. To thefe declarations fuffer me to add this refervation: that if, in the mean time, the acts of which I complain fhall, on a mature revifion of them, be revoked, and, I fhall find myfelf poffefed of fuch a degree of your confidence as fhall enable me to fupport the duties of my ftation, I will continue in it until the peace of all your |