No More Learning

"At your Excellency's request,
I sent Sudder ul Hock Khln to take on him the administration of the affairs of the Adawlut and Phousdary, and hoped by that means not only to have given satisfaction to your Excellency, but that, through his
abilities and experience, these affairs would have been
conducted in such manner as to have secured the
peace of the country and the happiness of the people; and it is with the greatest concern I learn that
this measure is so far from being attended with the
expected advantages, that the affairs both of the
Phousdary and Adawlut are in the greatest confusion
imaginable, and daily robberies and murders, are perpetrated throughout the country. This is evidently
owing to the want of a proper authority in the person
appointed to superintend them. I therefore addressed
yoiur Excellency on the importance and delicacy of
VOL. IX. 13
? ? ? ? 194 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
the affairs in question, and of the necessity of lodging full power in the hands of the person chosen to
administer them; in reply to which your Excellency
expressed sentiments coincident with mine; notwithstanding which, your dependants and people, actuated by selfish and' avaricious views, have by their interference so impeded the business as to throw the
whole country into a state of confusion, from which
nothing can retrieve it but an unlimited power lodged
in the hands of the superintendent. I therefore request
that your Excellency will give the strictest iinjunctions
to all your dependants not to interfere in any manner
with any matter relative to the affairs of the Adawlut
and Phousdary, and that you will yourself relinquish
all interference therein, and leave them entirely to the
management of Sudder ul Hock Khan: this is absolutely necessary to restore the country to a state of
tranquillity. " And. he concluded by again recommending the Nabob to withdraw all interference with
the administrator aforesaid: " otherwise a measure
which I adopted at your Excellency's request, and
with a view to your satisfaction and the benefit of the
country, will be attended with quite contrary effects,
and bring discredit on me. "
XXIV. That the said Hastings, in the letter aforesaid, in which he so strongly condemns the acts and
so clearly marks out the mischievous effects of the
corrupt influence under which alone the Nabob acted,
and under which alone, from his known incapacity,
and his dependence on the person supported by the
said Hastings, he could act, did propose to put all the
offices of justice (which on another occasion he had
requested him to permit to remain in the hands whicl
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 195
then held them) into his own disposal, - telling him,
or rather the woman and eunuchs who governed him,
" that, if his Excellency has any plan for the manage
ment of the affairs ill future, be pleased to communi
cate it to me, and every attention shall be paid to give
your Excellency satisfaction ": by which means not
only particular parts, as before, but the whole system
of justice was to be afloat, and to be subject to the
purposes of the aforesaid corrupt cabal of women and
eunuchs.
XXV. That the Court of Directors, on receiving
an account of the above arrangements, and being
well apprised of the spirit, intention, and probable
effect of the same, did, in a clear, firm, and decisive
manner, express their condemnation of the measure,
and their rejection and reprobation of all the pretended grounds and reasons on which the same was supported, - marking distinctly his prevarication and
contradictions in the same, and pointing to him their
full conviction of the unworthy motives on which he
had made so shameful an arrangement: telling him,
in the 17th paragraph of their general letter of the
4th of February, 1779, " The Nabob's letters of the
25th and 30th of August, of the 3d of September,
and 17th of November, leave us no doubt of the true
design of this extraordinary business being to bring
forward Munny Begum, and again to invest her with
improper power and influence, notwithstanding our
former declaration, that so great a part of the Nabob's allowance had been embezzled and misapplied under her superintendence. "
XXVI. That, in consequence of the censure and
? ? ? ? 196 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
condemnation of the unwarrantable measures of the
said Warren Hastings by the Court of Directors,
on the aforesaid and other weighty and substantial
grounds, they did order and direct as follows, in the
20th paragraph of the general letter of the same
date. " As we deem it for the welfare of the country
that the office of Naib Subahdar be for the present
continued, and that this high office should be filled
by a person of wisdom, experience, and of approved
fidelity to the Company, and as we have no reason
to alter the opinion given of Mahomed Reza Khan
in our letter of the 24th of December, 1776, we positively direct, that you forthwith signify to the Nabob
Mobarek ul Dowlah our pleasure that Mahomed Reza
Kha'n be immediately restored to the office of Naib
Subahdar; and we further direct, that Mahomed Reza Khan be again assured of the continuance of our
favor, so long as a firm attachment to the interest
of the Company and a proper discharge of the duties
of his station shall render him worthy of our protection. "
XXVII. That the aforesaid direction did convey in
it such evident and cogent reason, and was so far enforced by justice to individuals and by regard to the
peace and happiness of the natives, as well as by the
common decorum to be observed in all the transactions of government, that the said Hastings ought to
have yielded-a cheerful obedience thereto, even if he
had not been by a positive statute, and his relation
of servant to the Company, bound to that just submission. Yet the said Hastings did, without denying or evading any one of the reasons assigned by the Court of Directors, or controverting the scandalous
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 197
motives assigned by them for his conduct, contumiaciously refuse obedience to the above positive order, on pretence that the Nabob, who, he had declared it
on record "to be as visible as the light of the sun,
is a mere pageant, and without even the shadow of
authority," did dissent from the same; and he did
encourage the said Nabob, or rather the eunuchs, the
corrupt ministers of Munny Begum, to oppose himself
and themselves to the authority of the said Court
of Directors: by which means the arrangement, three
times either ratified or expressly ordered by them,
was wholly defeated; the aforesaid corrupt system
was continued; Mahomed Reza Khan was not restored to his office; and a lesson was taught to the natives of all ranks, that the declared approbation,
the avowed sanction, and the decided authority of
the Court of Directors were wholly nugatory to their
protection against the corrupt influence of their servants.
XXVIII. That the said Warren Hastings, on a
reconciliation with Mr. Francis, one of the CouncilGeneral, who made it a condition thereof that certain
of the Company's orders should be obeyed, and that
Mahomed Reza Khan should be restored to his offices, did, a. considerable time after, notwithstanding the pretended reluctance of the Nabob, and his pretended freedom, make, for his convenience in the said accommodation, the arrangement which he had
unwarrantably and illegally refused to the orders of
the Court of Directors, and did of his own authority
and that of the board restore Mahomed Reza Khan
to his offices.
? ? ? ? 198 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
XXIX. That soon after the departure of the said
Mr. Francis he did again deprive the said Mahomed
Reza Khan of his said offices, and did make several
great changes in the constitution of the criminal
justice in the said country; and after having, under
pretence of the Nabob's sufficiency for the management of his own affairs, displaced, without any specific charge, trial, or inquiry whatsoever, the said Mahomed Reza KhAn, he did submit the said Nabob
to the entire direction, in all parts of his concerns, of
a Resident of his own nomination, Sir John D'Oyly,
Baronet, and did order an account of the most minute parts of his domestic economy to be made out,
and to be delivered to the said Sir John D'Oyly, in
the following words, contained in a paper by him
intituled, INSTRUCTIONS from the Governor-General to the Nabob Mobarek ul Dowlah respecting his
conduct in the management of his affairs. " You
will be pleased to direct your mu. tseddies to form
an account of the fixed sums of your monthly expenses, such as servJnts' wages in the different departments, pensions, and other allowances, as well as of the estimated amount of variable expenses, to be
delivered to Sir JohnI D'Oyly for my inspection. I
have given such orders to Sir John D'Oyly as will
enable him to propose to you such reductions of the
pensions and other allowances, and such a distribution of the variable expenses, as shall be proportionable to the total sum of your monthly income; and 1 must request you will conform to it. " And lie did, in
the subsequent articles of his said instructions, order
the whole management to be directed by Sir John
D'Oyly, subject to his own directions as aforesaid;
and did even direct what company lie should keep;
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 199
and did throw reflections on some persons, ill places
the nearest to him, as of bad character and base origin, - persons whom he should decline to name as
such, " unless he heard that they still availed themselves of his goodness to retain the places which they
improperly hold near his person. " And he did particularly order the said Nabob not to admit ally English, but such as the said Sir John D'Oyly should approve, to his presence; and did repeat the said
order in the following peremptory manner: " You
mustforbid any person of that nation to be intruded
into your presence without his introduction. " And
he did require his obedience in the following authoritative style: " I shall think myself obliged to interfere in another manner, if you neglect it. "
XXX. That he, the said Warren Hastings, did
insult the captive condition of the said Nabob by
informing him, in his imperious instructions aforesaid, that this total, blind, and implicit obedience,
in every respect whatsoever, to Sir John D'Oyly and
himself personally, and without any reference to the
board, "was the very conditions of the compliance
of the Governor-General and Council with his late
requisition"; which requisition was, that he should
enjoy the free and uncontrolled management of his
own affairs. And though the said captive did offer,
as he, the said Hastings, himself admits,four lacs of
his stipend, at that time reduced to sixteen lac, for
the free use of the remainder, yet he did place him,
the said Nabob, in the state of servitude in the said
instructions laid down but a very short time after he
had assumed and used the said Nabob's independent
rights as a ground for refusing to obey the Corn
? ? ? ? 200 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
pany's orders, -and although he has declared, o1
pretended, on another occasion, which he would have
thought similar, that any attempt to limit the household expenses of the Nabob of Oude was an indignity, " which no man living, however mean his rank in life, or dependent his condition in it, would permit to be exercised by any other, without the want
or forfeiture of every manly principle. "
XXXI. That the said Warren Hastings did order
the said stipend (which was to be distributed, in the
minutest particular, according to the said Hastings's
personal directions) to be paid monthly, not to any
officer of the Nabob, but to the said Resident, Sir
John D'Oyly. And whereas the Governor-General
and Council did, on the appointment of Mahomed
Reza Khan, according to their duty, instruct him,
that " he do conform to the orders of the Company,
which direct that an annual account of the Nabob's
expenses be transmitted through the Resident at the
Durbar, for the inspection of this board," the said
Hastings, in making his new establishment in favor
of his Resident, did wholly omit the said instruction,
and did confine the said communication to himself,
privately. And in fact it does not appear that any
account whatsoever of the disposition of the said
large sum, exceeding 160,0001. sterling a year, has
been laid before the board, or at least that any such
account has been transmitted to the Court of Directors; and it is not fitting that any British servant
of the Company should have the management of any
public money, much less of so great a sum, without
a public well-vouched account of the specific expenditure thereof:
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 201
XXXII. That the Court of Directors did, on the
17th of May, 1766, propose certain rules for regulating the correspondence of the Resident with the Nabob of Bengal, in which they did direct, as a principle for the said regulations, as follows (paragraph 16th). " We would have his correspondence to be
carried on with the Select Committee through the
channel of the President: he should keep a diary
of all his transactions. His correspondence with the
natives must be publicly conducted: copies of all his
letters, sent and received, be transmitted monthly to
the Presidency, with duplicates and triplicates to be
transmitted home in our general packet by every
ship. "
XXXIII. That the President and Select Committee (Lord Clive being then President) did approve of the whole substantial part of the said regulation (the diary excepted); and the principle, in
all matters of account, ought to have been strictly
adhered to, whatever limitations may have been given
to the office of Resident. Yet he, the said Warren
Hastings, in defiance of the aforesaid good rules, orders, and late precedent in conformity to the same,
did not only withhold any order for the purpose, but,
in order to carry on the business of the said durbar
in a clandestine manner for his own purposes, did,
as aforesaid, exclude all English from an intercourse
with' thle Nabob, who might carry complaints or
representations to the board, or the Court of Directors, of his condition, or the conduct of the Resident,-and did further, to defeat all possible publicity, insinuate to him to give the preference to
verbal communication above letters, in the words
? ? ? ? 202 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
following, of the ninth article of his instructions to
the Nabob: "Although I desire to receive your letters fiequently, yet, as many matters will occur which
cannot be so easily explained by letters as by conversation, I desire that you will on such occasions give
your orders to him respecting such points as you
may desire to have imparted to me; and I, postponing every other concern, will give an immediate
and the most satisfactory reply concerning them. "
Accordingly, no relation whatsoever has been received by the Court of Directors of the said Nabob's
affairs, nor any account of the money monthly paid,
except from public fame, which reports that his affairs are in great disorder, his servants unpaid, and
many of them dismissed, and all the Mussulmen dependent on his family in a state of indigence.
XVIII. -THE MOGUL DELIVERED UP TO THE MAHRATTAS.
I. THAT Shah Allumre, the prince commonly called
the Great MIogul, or, by eminence, The King, is, or
lately was, in the possession of the ancient capital
of Hindostan, and though without any considerable
territory, and without a revenue sufficient to maintain a moderate state, he is still much respected and
considered, and the custody of his person is eagerly
sought by many of the princes in India, on account
of the use to be made of his title and authority;
and it was for the interest of the East India Company, that, while on one hand no wars shall be entered into in support of his pretensions, on the other no steps should be taken which may tend to deliver
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 203
him into the hands of any of the powerful states of
that country, but that he should be treated with
friendship, good faith, and respectful attention.
II. That Warren Hastings, in contradiction to this
safe, just, and honorable policy, strongly prescribed
and enforced by the orders of the Court of Directors,
did, at a time when he was engaged in a negotiation
the declared purpose of which was to give peace to
India, concur with the captain-general of the Mah
ratta state, called Mahdajee Sindia, in hostile designs
against the few remaining territories of that same
Mogul emperor, by virtue of whose grant the Company actually possess the government and enjoy the revenues of great provinces, and also against the
possessions of a Mahomedan chief called Nudjif
Khan, a person of much merit with the East India
Company, in acknowledgment of which they had
granted him a pension, included in the tribute due
to the king, and, together with that tribute, taken
from him by the said Warren Hastings, though expressly guarantied to him by the Company. With both these powers the Company had been in friendship, and were actually at peace at the time of
the said clandestine concurrence in a design against
them; and the said Hastings hath since declared,
that the right of one of them, namely, "the right
of the Mogul emperor, to our assistance, has been
constantly acknowledged. "
III. That the said Warren Hastings, at the time
of his treacherous concurrence in a design against
a power which he was himself of opinion we were
bound to assist, and against whom there was no
? ? ? ? 204 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
doubt he was bound neither to form nor to concur
in any hostile attempt, did give a caution to Colonel
Muir, to whom the negotiation aforesaid was intrusted on the part of the Company, against "inserting
anything in the treaty which might expressly mark
our knowledge of his [the Mahratta general's] views,
or concurrence in them. " Which said transaction was
full of duplicity and fraud; and the crime of the said
Hastings therein is aggravated by his having some
years before withheld the tribute which by treaty was
solemnly agreed to be paid to the said king, on pretence that he had thrown himself, for the recovery of
his city of Delhi, on the protection of the Mahrattas,
whom the said Warren Hastings then called the natural enemies of the Company, and the growth of whose
power he then alleged to be highly dangerous to the
interests of this kingdom in India.
IV. That, after having concurred, in the manner
before mentioned, in a design of the Mahrattas against
the Mogul, and notwithstanding he, the said Warren
Hastings, had formerly declared, " that with him [the
Mogul] our connection had been a long time suspended, and he wvished never to see it renewed, as it
had proved a fatal drain to the wealth of Bengal and
the treasury of the Company, without yielding one
advantage -or possible resource, even of remote benefits, in return," the said Warren Hastings did nevertheless, on or about the month of March, 1783, with the privity and consent of the members of the board,
but by no authoritative act, dispatch, as agents of
him, the Governor-General only, and not as agents
of the Governor-General and Council, as they ought
to have been, certain persons, among whom were Ma
? ? ? ? AlGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 205
jor Browne and Major Davy, to the court of the king
at Delhi, and did there enter into certain engagements with the said king by the means of those agents, and did carry on certain private and dangerous intrigues for various purposes, particularly for making
war in favor of the said king against some powers or
princes not precisely described, but which, as may be
inferred from a subsequent correspondence, were certain Mahomedan princes in the neighborhood of Delhi in amity with the Company, and some of them at that
time in the actual service and in the apparent confidence and favor of the said Mogul; and he did order Major Browne to offer to the Mogul king to provide
for the entire expense of any troops the Shahll [the said
king] might require; and the proposal was accordingly accepted, with the conditions annexed: by
which proposal and acceptance thereof the East India
Company was placed in a situation of great and perplexing difficulty; since either they were to engage,
at an unlimited expense, in new wars, contrary to
their orders, contrary to their general declared policy, and contrary to the published resolutions of the House of Commons, and wholly incompatible with
the state of their finances, or, to preserve peace, they
must risk the imputation of a new violation of faith,
by departing from an agreement made on the voluntary proposal of their own government,-the agent
of the said Hastings having declared, in his letter
to the said Hastings, by him communicated to the
board, " that the business of assisting the Shah [the
Mogul emperor] can and must go on, if we wish to be
secure in India, or regarded as a nation of faith and
honor. "
? ? ? ? 206 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
V. That the said Warren Hastings did, on the 20th
day of January, 1784, send in circulation to the other members of the Council a letter to him from his
agent, Major. Browne, dated at Delhi, on the 30th of'
December, 1783, viz. , that letter to-which the foregoing references are made, in which the said Browne
did directly press, and indirectly (though sufficiently
and strongly) suggest, several highly dangerous measures for realizing the general offers and engagements
of the said Warren Hastings, - proposing, that, besides a proportion of field artillery, and a train of
battering cannon for the purpose of sieges, six regiments of sepoys in the Company's service should be
transferred to that of the said king, and that certain
other corps should also be raised for the said service
in the English provinces and dependencies, to be immediately under the king's [the Mogul's] orders, and
to be maintained by assignments of territorial revenue within the province of Oude, a dependent mem-,
ber of the British government, but with a caution
against having any British officer with the same; the
said Major Browne expressing his caution as followeth: "If any European officer be with this corps, a
very nice judgment indeed must direct the choice;
for scarce any are in the smallest degree fit for such
employ, but much more likely to do harm than good. "
And the letter aforesaid being without any observation thereon, or any disavowal of the matters of fact
or of the counsels so strongly and authoritatively delivered therein by the said Warren Hastings's agent,
and without any mark of disapprobation of any part
of his plan, whether that of the assignment of territory belonging to the Company's allies for the maintenance of troops which were to be by that plan put
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 207
under the orders of a foreign independent power, or
that of employing the said troops without any British
officer with them, or for his alarming observation by
him entered oni the Company's records, which, if not
an implied censure on the nature of the service in
which British officers are supposed improper to be
trusted, is a strong reflection on the character of the
British officers, which was to render them unfit to be
employed in an honorable service, -- the said Warren
J{astings did thereby give a countenance to the said
unwarrantable and dangerous proposals and reflections.
VI. That a considerable time before the production and circulation of Major Browne's letter, the said
Hastings did enter a Minute of Consultation containing a proposition similar in the general intent to that
in the said letter contained for assisting the Mogul
with a military force; but the other members of the
board did disagree thereto, and, being alarmed at the
disposition so strongly shown by the said Hastings to
engage in new wars and dangerous foreign connections, and possibly having intelligence of the proceedings of his agent, did call upon him to produce his instructions to Major Browne; and he did, on the 5th
of October, 1783, and not before, enter on the Consultations a certain paper purporting to be the instructions which he had given to Major Browne the preceding March, the time of his, the said Browne's,
appointment, in which pretended instructions no direction whatsoever was given to the effect of his, the
said Hastings's, Minute of Consultation propounded:
that is to say, no power was given in the said instructions to make a direct offer of military aid to the
? ? ? ? 208 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
Mogul, or to form the arrangements stated by the
said Browne, in his letter to the said Hastings, as having been made by the express authority of the said
Hastings himself; but the said instructions contained
nothing further on that subject but a conditional direction, that, in case a military force should be required for the Mogul's aid or protection, the Major is
to know the service on which it is to be employed,
and the resources from whence it is to be paid; and
the instructions produced as his real instructions by
the said Hastings are so guarded as to caution the
said Browne against taking any part in the intrigues
of those who are about the king's person. By which
letters, instructions, and transactions, compared with
each other, it appears that the said Warren Hastings,
after six months' delay in entering of (contrary to
the Company's order) any. instructions to the said
Browne, did at last enter a false paper as the true, or
that he did give other secret instructions, totally different from, and even opposite to, his public ostensible instructions, thereby to deceive the Council, and to carry on with less obstruction dark and dangerous
intrigues, contrary to the orders of the Court of Directors, to the true policy of this kingdom, and to the
safety of the British possessions in the East.
VII. That the said letter from Major Browne was
by the said Warren Hastings transmitted to the Court
of Directors, without being accompanied by any part
of the previous correspondence; by which wilful concealmrent the said Warren Hastings is guilty of an
high and criminal disrespect to the Court of Directors, and of a most flagrant breach and violation of
their orders, which he was bound by an act of Parliament to obey.
? ? ? ? AGAITNST WARREN HASTINGS. 209
VIII. That the said Hastings having early in the
year 1784 procured to himself a deputation to act in
the upper provinces, the Council, being well aware
of his disposition to engage in unwarrantable designs
against the neighboring states, did expressly confine
his powers to the circumstance of his actual residence within the Company's provinces. But it appears that ways were found out by which lie hoped to defeat the precautions of the board: for the said
Warren Hastings did write from Lucknow, the capital of the country of Oude, to the Court of Directors,
a certain postscript of a letter, dated the 4th of May,
1784, in which he informs the Court that the son and
heir-apparent of the Great Mogul had taken refuge
with him and the Nabob of Oude; that he had a
conference with that prince on the 10th of the same
month of May, "no person being either present or
within hearing" during the same; and that in the
said conference the prince had informed him of the
distresses of his father, and his wish for the relief of
the king and the restoration of the dominions of his
house, as well as to rescue him from the power of
certain persons not named, who degraded him into
a mere instrument of their interested and sordid designs, and that, on a failure of his application to him,
he would either return to his father, or proceed to,
Calcutta, and thence to England; and that the. said,
Warren Hastings did give him an answer to the following effect: "That our [the British] government
had just obtained relief from a state of universal
warfare, and required a term of repose; that; our
whole nation was weary of war, and dreaded the
renewal of it, and would' be equally alarmed at any
movement of which it could not see the issue or progress,
VOL. Ix. 14
? ? ? ? 210 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
but which might eventually tend to create new hostilhties; that he came hither [to Lucknow] with a limited authority, and could not, if he chose it, engage in a business of that Iiature without the concurrence of
his colleagues in office, who he believed would be adverse
to it; that he would represent the same to the joint
members of his own government, and wait their
determination. In the mean time he advised the
prince to make advances to Mahdajee Sindia, both
because our government was in intimate and sworn
connection with him, and because he was the effectual
head of the Mahratta state; besides that he [the said
Warren Hastings] feared his [Sindia's] taking the
other side of the question, unless he was early prevented. "
IX. That in the statement of this discourse there
is much criminal reserve towards the Court of Directors,-it not appearing distinctly what the objects
were, nor Wlio the persons concerned, nor what the
side was which he apprehended the Mahrattas might
take, if not prevented by his advances; and in the'discourse itself there were many particulars highly
criminal, namely, - for that in the said conversation,
in which he describes himself as declining a compliance with the request of the prince on account of
the aversion (therein strongly expressed) of his colleagues, of the Company, and of the whole British
nation, to engage in any measures which might even
" eventually lead to hostilities," he spoke to the prince
as if he had been entirely ignorant of the offers which
but five months before had been made, to the king,
his father, on the part of that very government,. (whose repugnance to such measures he then for the
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 211
first time chose to profess, but which he always. had
known,) through Major Browne, the Company's representative at the court of Delhi, "to provide for the
entire expense of any troops which the Shah [the
king] might require," and that this was " what the
Resident had always proposed to the king and his
confidential ministers," - the said Browne further declaring, "tlhat, if, in consequence of the said proposals, certain arrangements for the Shah's service by troops were not immediately ordered, in his opinion
all our [EEnglish government's] offers and promises
will be considered as false and insidious. " This being the known state of the business, as represented
by' the said Hastings's own agent, and this the public
opinion of it, although to impose on the ignorance
of the prince with regard to the proceedings at. his
father's court would have been unworthy in itself,
yet he, the said Warren Hastings, could not hope to
succeed in such imposition, as in the postscript aforesaid he represents the said prince (who was the king's
eldest son, and thirty-six years of age) as a person of
considerable qualifications, and perfectly acquainted
with the transactions at his fatller's court, and as
one who had long held the principal and most active
part ill the little that remained of the administration
of Shah Allum. And the said Hastings conferring
with a prince so well instructed, without making the
slightest allusions to his said positive and recent engagements, or without giving any explanation with
regard to them, the said Warren Hastings must fappear to the said prince either as a person not only
contracting -engagements, but actually being the first
mover and proposer of them, without any authority
from his colleagues, and against theirs and the gen
? ? ? ? 212 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
oral inclination of the British nation, and on that
ground not to be trusted, or that he had used this
plea of disagreement between him and his Council
as a pretence, set up without color or decency, for a
gross violation of his own engagements, leaving the
princes and states of the country no solid ground on
which they can or ought to contract with the Company, to the utter destruction of all public confidence,
and to the equal disgrace of the national candor, integrity, and wisdom.
X. That in a letter dated from the same place,
Lucknow, the 16th of the following June, 1784, the
said Warren Hastings informs the Court of Directors,
that Major Browne, their agent to the Mogul, had
arrived there in the character also of agent from the
Mogul, with two sets of instructions from two opposite parties in his ministry, which instructions were
directly contrary to each other: the first, which were
the ostensible instructions, being to engage the said
Hastings, in the Mogul's name, to enter into a treaty
of mutual alliance with a chief of the country, then
minister to the said Mogul, called Afrasaib Khaln; the
second were from another principal person, called
Mudjed'ul Dowlah, also a minister of the said Mogul,
(but styled in the said letter confidential, for distinction,) which were directly destructive of the former;
and the said latter instructions, to which it seems
credence was to be given, were sent " under the most
solemn adjurations of secrecy. " The purpose of these
latter and secret instructions was to require the Company's aid in freeing the Mogul from the oppressions of his servants, namely, from the oppressions of the said Afrasaib, between whom and the Com
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 213
pany Major Browne (at once agent to that Company,
and to two opposite factions in the Mogul's court)
accepted a power to make a treaty of mutual alliance
under the sanction. of his sovereign. And it does not
appear that he, Warren Hastings, did discountenance
the doquble-dealing ald fraudulent agencies of his
and the Company's minister at that court, or did disavow any particular in the letter from him, the said Browne, of the 30th of December, 1783, stating the
offers made on his part to the Mogul, so contradictory to his late declarations to the heir-apparent of that monarch, or did give any reprimand to the said
Browne, or did show any mark of displeasure against
him, as having acted without orders, but did again
send him, with renewed confidence, to the court aforesaid.
XI. That the said Warren Hastings, still pursuing his said evil designs, did apply to the Council for discreiionary powers relative to the intrigues and
factions in the Mogul's court, giving assurances of
his resolution not to proceed against their sense; but
the said Council, being fully aware of his disposition, and having Major Browne's letter, recorded by himself, the said Warren Hastings, before them, did
refuse to grant the said discretionary powers, but,
on the contrary, did exhort him "most sedulously
and cautiously to avoid, in his correspondence with'the different princes in India, whatever may commit, or be strained into an interpretation of committing
the Company, either as to their army or treasure," -
observing, "that the Company's orders are positive
against their interference in the objects of dispute
between the country powers. "
? ? ? ? 214 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
XII. That, in order to subvert the plain and natural interpretation given by the Council to the orders
of the Court of Directors, and to justify his dangerous
intrigues, the said Warren Hastings, in his letter of
the 16th June, 1784, to the said Court, did, in a most
insolent and contemptuous manner, endeavor to persuade them of their ignorance of the true sense of their own orders, and to limit their prohibition of interference with the disputes of the country powers to such country powers as are perrmnnent, - expressing
himself as follows: " The faction which now surrounds
the throne [the Mogul's throne] is widely different
from the idea which your commands are intended to
convey by the expressions to which you have generally
applied them, of country powers, to which that of permanency is a necessary adjunct, and which may be more properly compared to a splendid bubble, which
the slightest breath of opposition may dissipate with
every trace of its existence. " By which construction
the said Hastings did endeavor to persuade the'Court
of Directors that they meant to confine their prohi
bition of sinister intrigues to those powers only who
could not be easily hurt by them, and whose strength
was such that their resentment of such clandestine
interference was to be dreaded; but that, where the
powers were weak and fragile, such intrigues might
be allowed.
XIII. That the said Hastings, further to persuade
the Court of Directors to involve themselves in the
affairs of the Mogul, and to reconcile this measure
with his former conduct and declared opinions, did
write to them to the following effect: That " at that
former period to which the ancient policy with regard
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 215
to the Mogul applied, the king's authority was sufficiently respected" (which he knew not to be true, -
having himself declared, in his minute of the 25th
of October, 1774, "that he remained at Delhi, the
ancient capital of the empire, a mere cipher in the administration of it") to maintain itself against com
monl vicissitudes; that he would not have advised interference, if the king himself retained the exercise
of it, however feeble, in his own hands; that, if it [the
Mogul's authority] is suffered to receive its final extinction, it is impossible to foresee what power may
arise out of its ruins, or what events may be linked in
the same chain of revolution with it: but your interests may suffer by it, your reputation certainly will, as
his right to our assistance has been constantly acknowledged, and by a train of consequences to which our government has not intentionally given birth, but most especially by the movements which its influence, by too
near an approach, has excited, it has unfortunately become the efficient instrumqnt of a great portion of
the king's present distresses and dangers," - intimating (as well as the studied obscurity of his expressions
will permit anything to be discerned) that his own
late intrigues had been among the causes of the distresses and dangers, which by new intrigues he did
pretend to remove: and he did conclude this part of
his letter with some loose general expressions of his
caution not to affect the Company's interests or revenues by any measures he might at that time take.
XIV. That the principle, so far as the same hath
been directly avowed, of the said proceedings at the
Mogul's court, was as altogether irrational, and the
pretended object as impracticable, as the means taken
? ? ? ? 216 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
in pursuit of it were fraudulent and dishonorable,
namely, the restoration of the Mogul in some degree
to the dignity of his situation, and to his free agency
in the conduct of his affairs.
For the said Hastings,
at the very time in which he did with the greatest
apparent earnestness urge the purpose which he pretended to have in view with regard to the dignity and liberty of the Mogul emperor, did represent him as
a person wholly disqualified, and even indisposed, to
take any active part whatsoever in the conduct of his
own affairs, and that any attempt for that purpose
would be utterly impracticable; and this he hath
stated to the Court of Directors as a matter of public
notoriety, in his said letter of the 16th of June, 1784,
in the following emphatical and decisive terms.
" You need not be told the character of the king,
whose inertness, and the habit of long-suffering, has
debased his dignity and the fortunes of his house
beyond the power of retrieving either the one or the other.
Whilst his personal repose is undisturbed, he will
prefer to live in the meanest state of indigence, under
the rule of men whose views are bounded by avarice'
and the power which they derive from his authority,
rather than commit any share of it to his own sons,
(though his affection for. them is boundless in every
other respect,) from a natural jealousy, founded on
the experience of a very different combination of
those circumstances which once served as a temptation and example of unlawful ambition in the princes of the royal line. His ministers, from a policy more
reasonable, have constantly employed every means of
influence to confirm this disposition, and to prevent
his sons from having any share in the distribution of
affairs, so as to have established a complete usurpation
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 217
of the royal prerogative under its own sanction and
patronage. "
XV. That the said Warren Hastings, having given
this opinion of the sovereign for whose freedom he
pretended so anxious a concern, did describe the minister with whom he had long acted in concurrence,
and from whom he had just received the extraordinary secret embassy aforesaid for the purpose of effecting the deliverance of his master, the Mogul, from the usurpations of his ministers, as follows. "The first
minister, Mudjed ul Dowlah, is totally deficient in
every military quality, conceited of his own superior
talents, and formed to the practice of that crooked policy which generally defeats its own purpose, but sincerely attached to his master. " The reality of the
said attachment was not improbable, but altogether
useless, as the said minister was the only one among
the principal persons about the king who (besides the
total want of all military and civil ability) possessed
no territories, troops, or other means of serving and
supporting him, but was himself solely upheld by his
influence over his master: neither doth the said Hastings free him, any more than the persons more eficient, who were to be destroyed, from a disposition to alienate the king from an attention to his affairs, and
from all confidence in his own family; but, on the
contrary, he brings him forward as the very first
among the instances he adduces to exemplify the
practices of the ministers against their sovereign and
his children.
XVI. That the said Warren Hastings, recommending in general terms, and yet condemning in detail,
? ? ? ? 218 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
every part of his own pretended plan, as impractica.
ble in itself, and as undertaken in favor of persons all
of whom he describes as incapable, and the principal
as indisposed to avail himself thereof, must have had
some other motives for this long, intricate, dark, and
laborious proceeding with the Mogul, which must be
sought in his actions, and the evident drift and tendency thereof, and in declarations which were brought
out by him to serve other purposes, but which serve
fully to explain his real intentions in this intrigue.
XVII. That the other members of the CouncilGeneral having- abundantly certified their averseness
to his intrigues, and even having shown apprehensions of his going personally to the Mogul and the
Mahrattas for the purpose of carrying on the same,
the said Hastings was driven headlong to acts which
did much more openly indicate the true nature and
purpose of his machinations. For he at length recurred directly, and with little disguise, to the Mallrattas, and did open an intrigue with them, although he was obliged. to confess, in his letter aforesaid of
the 16th June, 1784, that the exception which he
contended to be implied in the orders of the Court of
Directors forbidding the intermeddling in the disputes
of " the country powers," namely,'"~powers not permanent," did by no means apply to the Mahrattas;
and he informs the Court of Directors that he did,
on the very first advice he received of the flight of
the Mogul's son, write to Mr. James Anderson to apprise the Mahratta chief, Sindia, of that event, -" for
which as he was unprepared, he desired his [the
said Sindia's] advice for his conduct on the occasion
of it. " Which method of calling for the advice of a
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN EHASTINGS. 219
foreigrn power to regulate his political conduct, instead of being regulated therein by the advice of the
British Council aild the standing orders of the Court
of Directors, was a procedure highly criminal; and
the crime is aggravated by his not communicating
the said correspondence to the Council-General, as by
his duty he was bound to do; but it does abundantly
prove his concert with the Mlahrattas in all that related to his negotiations in the Mogul court, which were
carried- on agreeably to their advice, and in subserviency to their views and purposes.
XVIII. That, in consequence of the cabal begun
with the Mahrattas, the said chief, Sindia, did send
his " familiar and confidential ministers" to him, the
said Hastings, being at Lucknow, with whom the said
Hastings did hold several secret conferences, without
any secretary or other assistant: and the said tHastings hath not conveyed to the Court of Directors any
minutes thereof, but bath purposely involved even the
general effect and tendency of these conferences in
such obscurity that it is no otherwise possible to perceive the drift and tendency of the same, but by the
general scope of councils and acts relative to the politics of the Mogul and of the Mahrattas together, and
by the final event of the whole, which is sufficiently
visible. For
XIX. That the said Hastings had declared, in his
said letter of the 16th June, 1784, that the Mogul's
right to our assistance had been constantly acknowledged, that the Mogul had been oppressed by the lesser Mahomedan princes in the character of his officers of state and military commanders, and he did
? ? ? ? 220 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
plainly intimate that the said Mogul ought to be relieved from that servitude. And he did, in giving an account to the Court of Directors of the conferences
aforesaid, assure them that "' his inclinafions [the inclinations of the Mahratta chief aforesaid] were not very dissimilar from his own "; and that " neither in
this nor in any other instance would he suffer himself
to be drawn into measures which shall tend to weaken
their. connection, nor in this even to oppose his [the
said chief's] inclinations": the said Hastings well
knowing, as in his letter to Colonel Muir of the
he has confessed, that the inclinations of
the said Sindia were to seize on the Mogul's territories, and that he himself did secretly concur therein, though he did not formally insert his concurrence in
the treaty with the said Mahratta chief. It is plain,
therefore, that he did all along concur with the Mahrattas in their designs against the said king and his ministers, under the treacherous pretence of supporting the authority of the former against the latter, and did contrive and effect the ruin of them all. For,
first, he did give evil and fraudulent counsel to the
heir-apparent of the Mogul "to make advances to the
Mahrattas," when he well knew, and had expressly
concurred in, the designs of that state against his
father's, the Mogul's, dominions; and further to
engage and entrap the said prince, did assert that
"our government" (meaning the British government) "' was in intimate and sworn connection with Maldajee Sindia," when. no alliance, offensive or defensive, appears to exist between the said Sindia and the East India Company, nor can exist, otherwise
than ill virtue of some secret agreement between
him, the said Sindia, and Warren Hastings, entered
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 221
into by the latter without the knowledge of his colleagues and the government, and never communicated to the Court of Directors. And, secondly, he did,
in order to further the designs of the Mahrattas, contrive and effect the ruin of the said Mogul and his
authority, by setting on foot, through the aforesaid
Major Browne, sundry perplexed and intricate negotiations, contrary to public faith, and to the honor
of the British nation; by which he did exceedingly
increase the confusion and disorders of the Mogul's
court, exposing the said Mogul to new indignities, insults, and distresses, and almost all of the northern
parts of India to great and ruinous convulsions, until three out of four of the principal chieftains, some
of them possessing the territories lately belonging to
Nudjif Klhan, and maintaining among them eighty
thousand troops of horse and foot, and some of which
chiefs were the ministers aforesaid, being cut off by
their mutual dissensions, and the fort of Delhi being
at length delivered to the Mahrattas, the said Sindia
became the uncontrolled ruler of the royal army, and
the person of the Mogul, with the use of all his pretensions and claims, fell into the hands of a nation
already too powerful, together with an extensive territory, which entirely covers the Company's possessions and dependencies on one side, and particularly these of the Nabob of Oude.
XX. That the circumstances of these countries did,
in the opinion of the said Warren Hastings himself,
sufficiently indicate to him the necessity of not aggrandizing any power whatsoever on their borders,
he having in the aforesaid letter of the 16th June
given a deliberate opinion of the situation of Oude in
? ? ? ? 222 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
the words following: "That, whilst we are at peace
with the powers of Europe, it. is only in this quarter
that your possessions under the government of Bengal are vulnerable. " And he did further in the said
letter state, that, " if things had continued as they had
been to that time, with a divided government," (viz. ,
the Company's and the Vizier's, which government
he had himself established, and under which it ever
must in a great degree remain, whilst the said country continues in a state of dependence,) " the slightest shock from a foreign hand, or even an accidental
internal commotion, might have thrown the whole into confusion, and produced the most fatal consequences. " In this perilous situation he made the aboverecited sacrifices to the ambition of the Mallrattas, and did all along so actively countenance and forward
their proceedings, and with so full a sense of their effect, that in his minute of the 24thl December, 1784,
he has declared, " that in the countries which border
on the dominions of the Nabob Vizier, or on that
quarter of our own, in effect there is no other power. "
And he did further admit, that the presence of the
Mahratta chief aforesaid, so near the borders of the
Nabob's dominions, was no cause of suspicion; for'" that it is the effect of his own solicitation, and is so
far the effect of an act of that government. "
XXI. That, in further pursuit of the same pernicious design, he, the said Warren Hastings, did enter
into an agreement to withdraw a very great body of
the British troops out of the Nabob's dominions, - asserting, however truly, yet in direct contradiction to
his own declarations, that " this government " (meaning the British government) "has not any right to
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 223
force defence with its maintenance upon him" (the
Nabob); and he did thus not only avowedly aggrandize the Mahratta state, and weaken the defence upon
the frontier, but did as avowedly detain their captaingeneral in force on that very frontier, notwithstanding he was well apprised that they had designs against those dependent territories of Oude, which they had
with great difficulty been persuaded, even in appearance, to include in the treaty of peace, --and that
they have never renounced their claims upon certain
large and valuable portions of them, and have shown
evident signs of their intentions, on the first opportunity, of asserting' and enforcing them. And, fisnally,
the said Warren Hastings, in contradiction to sundry
declarations of his own concerning the necessity of
curbing the power of the Mahrattas, and to the principle of sundry measures undertaken by himself professedly for that purpose, and to the sense of the House of Commons, expressed in their resolution of
28tll May, 1782, against any measures that tended to
unite the dangerous powers of the Mahratta empire
under one active command, has endeavored to persuade the Company, that, " while Sindia lives, every
accession of territory obtained by him will be an advantage to this [the British] government"; which
if it was true as respecting the personal dispositions
of Sindia, which there is no reason to believe, yet it
was highly criminal to establish a power in the Mahllrattas which must survive the man in confidence of
whose personal dispositions a power more than personal was given, and which may hereafter fall into
hands disposed to make a more hostile use of it.
XXII. That, in consequence of all the before
? ? ? ? 224 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
recited intrigues, the Mogul emperor being in the
hands of the Mlahrattas, he, the said Mogul, has been
obliged to declare the head of the Mabratta state
to be vicegerent of. the Mogul empire, an authority
which supersedes that of Vizier, and has thereby
consolidated in the Mahratta state all the powers
acknowledged to be of legal authority in India; in
consequence of which, they have acquired, and have
actually already attempted to use, the said claims of
general superiority against the Company itself, - the
Mahrattas claiming a right in themselves to a fourth
part of the revenues of all the provinces in the Company's possession, and claiming, in right of the Mogul,
the tribute due to him: by which actings and doings
the said Hastings has to the best of his power brought
the British provinces in India into a dependence on
the Mahratta state: and in order to add to the aforesaid enormous claims a proportioned force, he did
never cease, during his stay in India, to contrive the
means for its increase; for it is of public notoriety,
that one great object of the Mahratta policy is to
unite under their dominion the nation or religious
sect of the Seiks, who, being a people abounding with
soldiers, and possessing large territories, would extend the Mabratta power over the whole of the vast
countries to the northwest of India.
XXIII. That the said Warren Hastings, further
to augment the power of the said Mahrattas, and to
endanger the safety of the British possessions, having
established in force the said Mahrattas on the frontier, as afore-recited, and finding the Council-General averse in that situation to the withdrawing the British forces therefrom, and for disbanding them to
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 225
the extent required -by the said Hastings, did, in a
minute of the 4th December, 1784, after stating a
supposition, that, contrary to his opinion, the said
troops should not be reduced, propose to employ them
under the command of the Mogul's son, then under
the influence of the Mahrattas, in a war against the
aforesaid people or religious sect called Seiks, defending the same on the following principles: "I feel the sense of an obligation, imposed on me by the supposition I have made, to state a mode of rendering the detachment of use in its prescribed station, and of affording the appearance of a cause for its retention. " XXIV. That the said Hastings did admit that
there was no present danger to the Company's possessions from that nation which could justify him in such a war, as he had declared that the Mahrattas
were the only power that bordered on the Company's
possessions and those of the Vizier; but he did assign
as a reason for going to war with them their mili-,
tary and enthusiastic spirit, --the hardiness of their
natural constitution, -the dangers which might arise
from them in some future time, if they should ever
happen to be united under one head, they existing
at present in a state little different from anarchy;
and he did predict great danger from them, and at
no very remote period, "if this people be permitted
to grow into maturity without interruption. " And
though he doth pretend that the solicitations of the
heir-apparent of the Mogul, who, he says, did repeatedly and earnestly solicit him to obtain the permission to use the Company's troops for the purpose aforesaid,
had weight with him, yet he doth declare, as he expresses himself in the minute aforesaid, that "a
VOL. IX. 15
? ? ? ? 226 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
stronger impulse, arising from the hope of blasting the
growth of a generation whose strength might become
fatal to our own, strongly pleaded in my mind for supporting his wishes. "
XXV. That the said Warren Hastings, after forcibly recommending the plan aforesaid, did state strong
objections, that did,:" in his judgment, outweigh the
advantages which might arise from a compliance with
it. " Yet the said Hastings, being determined to pursue his scheme for aggrandizing at any rate the Mallratta power, in whose adult growth and the recent effects of it he could see no danger, did pursue the
design of war against a nation or sect of religion in
its infancy, from' whom he had received no injury,
and in whose present state of government he did not
apprehend ally mischief whatsoever; and finding the
Council fixed and determined on not disbanding the
frontier regiments, and thinking that therein he had
found an advantage, he did ground thereon the following proposition.
"If the expense [of the frontier troops] is to be
continued, it may be surely better continued for some
useful purpose than to keep up the parade of a great
military corps designed merely to lie inactive in its
quarters. On this ground, therefore, and on the
supposition premised, I revert to my original sentiments in favor of the prince's plan; but as this will
require some qualification in the execution of it, I
will state my recomlmendation of it in the terms of a
proposition, viz. , that, if it shall be the resolution of
the board to continue the detachment now under the
command of Colonel Sir John Cumming at Furruckabad, and if the prince Mirza Jehander Shah shall
apply, with the. authority of the king, and the concurrence
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 227
of Mahdajee Sindia, for the assistance of an English
military force, to act in conjunction with him,. to expel the Seiks from the territories of which they have lately possessed themselves in the neighborhood of
Delhi, it may be granted, and such a portion of the
said detachment allotted to that service as shall be
hereafter judged adequate to it. "
XXVI. That the said Warren Hastings did, in the
said proposal, endeavor to circumvent and overreach
the Council-General, by converting an apparent and
literal compliance with their resolution into a real
and substantial opposition to and disappointment
thereof. For his first proposal was, to withdraw the
Company's troops from the Vizier's country on the
pretence of relieving him from the burden of that
establishment, but in reality with a view of facilitating the Alahratta pretensions on that province, which would then be deprived of the means of defence.
And when the Council rejected the said proposal on
the express ground of danger to the province by withdrawing from the Mahrattas the restraint of our troops, the said Hastings, finding his first scheme in
favor of the Mahrattas against the provinces dependent on the Company defeated by the refusal of the Council to concur in the said measure of withdrawing
the troops, did then endeavor to obtain the same purpose in a different way; and instead of leaving the troops, according to the intention and policy of the
Council, as a check to the ambition and progress of
the Mahrattas, he proposed to employ them in the
actual furtherance of those schemes of aggrandizement of which his colleagues were jealous, and which it was the object of their resolution to counteract.
? ? ? ? 228 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
XXVII. That, in the whole of the letters, negotiations, proposals, and projects of the said Warren
Hastings relative to the Mogul, he did appear to pursue but one object, namely, the aggrandizement of
the lately hostile and always dangerous power of the
Mahrattas, and did pursue the same by means highly dishonorable to the British character for honor,
justice, candor, plain-dealing, moderation, and humanity.
XIX. -LIBEL ON THE COURT OF DIRECTORS.
I. THAT Warren Hastings, Esquire, was, during
the whole of the year 1783, a servant of the East India Company, and was bound by the duties of that
relation not only to yield obedience to the orders of
the Court of Directors, but to give to the whole of
their service an example of submission, reverence,
and respect to their authority; and that, if they
should in the course of their duty call in question
ally part of his conduct, he was bound to conduct his
defence with temper and decency; and while his conduct was under their consideration, it was not allowable to print and publish any of his letters to them without their consent first had and obtained; and he
was bound by the same principles of duty, enforced
by still more cogent reasons, to observe, in a paper
intended for publication, great modesty and moderation, and to treat the said Court of Directors, his
lawful masters, with respect.
II. That the said Warren Hastings did print and
publish, or cause to be printed and published, at
Calcutta in Bengal, the narrative of his transactions
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 229
at'Benares, in a letter written at that place, without
leave had of the Court of Directors, in order to preoccupy the judgment of the servants in that settlement, and to gain from them a factious countenance and support, previous to the judgment and opinion
of the Court of Directors, his lawful superiors.
III. That the Court of Directors, having come to
certain resolutions of fact relative to the engagements subsisting between them and the Rajah of
Benares, and the manner in which the same had
been fulfilled on the part of the Rajah, did, in the
fifth resolution, which was partly a resolution of opinion, declare as follows: "That it appears to this
Court that the conduct of the Governor-General towards the Rajah, whilst he was at Benares, was improper; and that the imprisonment of his person, thereby disgracing him in the eyes of his subjects
and others, was unwarrantable and highly impolitic,
and may tend to weaken the confidence which the
native princes of India ought to have in the justice
and moderation of the Company's government. "
IV. That the said resolutions being transmitted
to the said Warren Hastings, he, the said Warren
Hastings, did write, and cause to be printed and
published, a certain false, insolent, malicious, and
seditious libel, purporting to be a letter from him,
the said Warren Hastings, to the Court of Directors,
dated Fort William, 20th March, 1783, " calculated,"
as the Directors truly affirm, " to bring contempt, as
well as an odium, on the Court of Directors, for
their conduct on that occasion"; and the said libel
had a direct tendency to excite a spirit of disobe
? ? ? ? 230 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
dience to the lawful government of this nation in
India through all ranks of their service.
V. That he, the said Warren Hastings, among
other insolent and contumacious charges and aspersions on the Court of Directors, did address them in the printed letter aforesaid as follows. "I deny that
Rajah Cheyt Sing was -a native prince of India.
Cheyt Sing is the son of a collector of the revenue of
that' province, which his arts, and the misfortunes of
his master, enabled him to convert to a permanent
and hereditary possession. This man, whom you
have thus ranked among the princes of India, will be
astonished, when he hears it, at an elevation so unlooked for, nor less at the independent rights which your commands have assigned him, -- rights which
are so foreign to his conceptions, that I doubt whether
he will know in what language to assert them, u. nless
the example which you have thought it consistent with
justice, however opposite to policy, to show, of becoming
his advocates against your own interests, should inspire
any of your own servants to be his advisers and instructors. " And he did further, to bring into contempt the authority of the Company, and to excite a resistance to their lawful orders, frame a supposition
that the Court of Directors had intended the restoration of the Rajah of Benares, and on that ground
did presume in the said libel to calumniate, in disrespectful and contumelious terms, the policy of the Court of Directors, as well as the person whom he
did conceive to be the object of their protection, as
followeth. ' Of the consequences of such a policy I
forbear to speak. Most happily, the wretch whose
hopes may be excited by the appearances in his favor is
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 231
t1l qualified to avail himself of them, and the force
which is stationed in the province of Benares is sufficient
to suppress any symptoms of internal sedition; but it
cannot fail to create distrust and suspense in the
minds both of the rulers and of the people, and such
a state is always productive of disorder. But it is
not in this partial consideration that I dread the effects of your commands; it is in your proclaimed
indisposition against the first executive member of
your first government in India. I almost shudder
at the reflection of what might have happened, had
these denunciations against your own minister, in favor of a man universally considered in this part of
the world as justly attainted for his crimes, the murderer of your servants and soldiers, and the rebel to
your authority, arrived two months earlier. "
VI. That the said Warren Hastings did also presume to censure and asperse the Court of Directors
for the moderate terms in which they had expressed
their displeasure against him, as putting him under
the necessity of stating in his defence a strong accusation against himself, and as implying in the said
Court a consciousness that he was not guilty of the
offences charged upon him, -being, as he asserts,
in the resolutions of the Court of Directors, "arraigned and prejudged of a violation of national faith,
in acts of such complicated aqggravation, that, if they
were true, no punishment SHORT OF DEATH could
atone for the injury which the interest and credit of
the public had sustained in them "; and he did therefore censure the said Court for applying no stronger or more criminating epithets than those of " improper, unwarrantable, and highly impolitic," to an
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offence so by them charged, and by him described.
And though it be true that the. expressions aforesaid
are much too reserved for the purpose of duly characterizing the offences of the said Hastings, yet was
it in him most indecent to libel the Court of Directors for the same; and his implication, from the
tenderness of the epithets and descriptions aforesaid used towards him, was not only indecent, but
ungrounded, malicious, and scandalous, -- he having
himself highly, though truly, aggravated " the charge
of the injuries done by him to the Rajah of Benares," in order to bring the said Directors into contempt and suspicion, the paragraphs in the said libel being as follow. -" Here I must crave leave to say,
that the terms' improper, unwarrantable, and highly
impolitic' are much too gentle, as deductions from
such premises; and as every reader of the latter will
obviously feel, as he reads, the deductions which inevitably belong to them, I will add, that the strict
performance of solemn engagements on one part, followed by acts directly subversive of them and by
total dispossession on the other, stamps on the perpetrators of the latter the guilt of the greatest possible violation of faith and justice. " -- " There is an appearance of tenderness in this deviation from plain
construction, of which, however meant, I have a right
to complain; because it imposes on me the necessity
of framing the terms of the accusation against myself, which you have only not made, but have stated
the leading arguments to it so strongly, that no one
who reads these can avoid making it, or not know it
to have been intended. "
VII. That the said Hastings, being well aware that
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 233
his own declarations did contain the clearest condemnation of his own conduct from his own pen, did in
the said libel attempt to overturn, frustrate, and render of none effect all the proofs to be given of prevarication, contradiction, and of opposition of action to principle, which can be used against men. in public
trust, and did contend that the same could not be used
against him; and as if false assertions could be justified by factious motives, he did endeavor to do away
the authority of his own deliberate, recorded declarations, entered by him in writing on the Council-Books
of the Presidency; for, after asserting, but not attempting to prove, that his declarations were consistent with
his conduct, he writes in the said libel as follows: For
" were it otherwise, they were not to be made the
rules of my conduct; and God forbid that every expression dictated by the impulse of present emergency, and unpremeditatedly uttered in the heat of party contention, should impose upon me the obligation of
a fixed principle, and be applied to every variable occasion! "
VIII. That the said Hastings, in order to draw the
lawful dependence of the servants of the Company
from the Court of Directors to a factious dependence
on himself, did, in the libel aforesaid, treat the acts
and appointments of their undoubted authority, when
exercised in opposition to his arbitrary will, as ruinous
to their affairs, in the following terms. " It is as well
known to the Indian world as to the Court of English
Proprietors, that the first declaratory instruments
of the dissolution of my influence, in the year 1774,
were Mr. John Bristow and Mr. Francis Fowke. By
your ancieiit and known constitution the Governor
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has been ever held forth and understood to possess
the ostensible powers of government; all the correspondence with foreign princes is conducted in his
name; and every person resident with them for the
management of your political concerns is understood
to be more especially his representative, and of his
choice: and such ought to be the rule; for how
otherwise can they trust an agent nominated against
the will of his principal? When the state of this administration was such as seemed to admit of the appointment of Mr. Bristow to the Residency of Lucknow without much diminution of my own influence, I gladly seized the occasion to show my readiness to
submit to your commands; I proposed 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 absolute command for his reappointment independen t of me, and with the supposition that 1
should be adverse to it. - I am now wholly deprived of
my official powers, both in the province of Oude, and
in the zemindary of Benares. "
IX. That, further to emancipate others and himself from due obedience to the Court of Directors, he
did, in the libel aforesaid, enhance his services, which,
without specification or proof, he did suppose in the
said libel to be important and valuable, by representing them as done under their displeasure, and doth
attribute his not having done more to their opposition,
as followeth. "It is now a complete period of eleven
years since I first received the first nominal charge
of your affairs; in the course of it I have invariably
had to conlteld, not with ordinary difficulties, but
such as most unnaturally arose from the opposition of
? ? ? ? AGAINST WARREN HASTINGS. 235
those very powers from which I primarily derived my
authority, and which were required for the support of it.
My exertions, though applied to an unvaried and consistent line of action, have been occasional and desultory; yet I please myself with the hope, that, in the allllals of your dominion, which shall be written after
tile extinction of recent prejudices, this term of its
administration will appear not the least conducive
to the interests of the Company, nor the least reflective of the honor of the British name: and allow me
to suggest the instructive reflection of what good might
haze been done, and what evil prevented, had due support been given to that administration which has performed such eminent and substantial services without it. "
And the said Hastings, further to render the authority of the said Court perfectly contemptible, doth,
in a strain of exultation for his having escaped out of
a measure in which by his guilt he had involved the
Company in a ruinous war, and out of which it had
escaped by a sacrifice of almnost all the territories before acquired (from that enemy which he had made)
either by war or former treaties, and by the abandonillg the Company's allies to their mercy, attribute the
said supposed services to his acting in such a mannler
as had on former occasions excited their displeasure,
in the following words. Pardon, Honorable Sirs,
this digressive exultation. I cannot suppress the
pride which I feel in this successful achievement of
a measure so fortunate for your interests and the national honor; for that pride is the source of my zeal,
so frequently exerted in your support, and never more
happily than in those instances in which I have departed from the prescribed and beaten path of action,
? ? ? ? 236 ARTICLES OF CHARGE
and assumed a responsibility which has too frequentil
drawn on me the most pointed effects of your displeasure. But however I may yield to my private feelings
in tlius enlarging on thle subject, my motive in introducing it was immediately connected with its context,
and was to contrast the actual state of your political
affairs, derived from a happier influence, with that which
might have attended an earlier dissolution of it": and
lie did value himself upon " the patience and temper
with which he had submitted to all the indignities
which have been heaped upon him" (meaning, by
the said Court of Directors) " in this long service";
and he did insolently attribute to an unusual strain
of zeal for their service, that he "persevered in the
VIOLENT MAINTENANCE OF HIS OFFICE. "
X.