The Works Of The Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IX. (of 12) written by Edmund Burke

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LIX. That, instead of the said support or instruction, he, the said
Hastings, did countenance, or more probably cause or direct, a
representation to be made to him by the acting minister of the Nabob of
Oude, complaining grievously of the proceedings of the Resident
aforesaid, as usurpations on the Nabob's authority and indignities on
his person. And although he, the said Hastings, did instruct the
Resident, Bristow, to inform the said Hyder Beg Khan that he would not
receive from the Nabob, as _his_, letters directed by the spirit of
opposition, but should consider every such attempt as his, the
minister's, as an insult on our government, yet he did receive as _his_
the Nabob's own letters, and as written from the impressions on his own
mind, and as the suggestions of his own judgment, letters to the same
effect as those written by the minister, although he had declared upon
record that the said "Nabob was a mere cipher in his, the said
minister's, hands," and "that he had dared to use both the Nabob's name,
and even his seal, affixed to letters either directed to the Nabob or
written as from him without his knowledge," and although he did assert
or record as aforesaid, that, in a letter which he had lately received
from the Nabob, the minister had the presumption to make the Nabob
declare that which was _true_ to be _false_, and that "his _making use_
of the Nabob in such a manner did show how thin the veil was by which
_he_ covered _his own acts_, and that such artifices would only tend to
make them the more criminal from _the falsehood and duplicity with which
they were associated_."

LX. That the said Hastings did act upon the letters pretended to be
written by the Nabob, as well as on those actually written by the
minister, without previously communicating the matter of the said
complaint to the said Resident, and did give credit to the same, and
coming, as aforesaid, from a person by himself, the said Hastings,
charged with artifice, falsehood, and duplicity, and with abusing to his
own evil purposes the name and seal of his master without his knowledge,
and without any previous inquiry into the facts and circumstances; and
did thereon ground an accusation against the said Resident, Bristow,
before the board at Calcutta, in which he did represent the conduct of
the said Bristow, in attempting to limit the household expenses of the
Nabob, as 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, but with the want or forfeiture of every manly principle."
And he did further accuse the said Bristow for that, in his proceedings
in the regulation of the Nabob's household, "he should receive to
himself, or Mr. Cowper for him, or a treasurer for both, (for the
arrangement has never been well defined,) the money assigned for the
support of the Nabob's household,--issue it as he pleased, not to the
Nabob, but to the menial officers of his household,--dispose of his
superfluous horses, and other cattle,--determine how many elephants were
necessary to the state of the Vizier of the Empire, the number of
domestics for his attendance, and pry into the kitchen for the purpose
of ascertaining the quantity of victuals which ought to be dressed in
it,--control the accounts of these disbursements,--and appropriate to
his own use (for that the consequence was inevitable, if he chose it)
the residue produced by those economical retrenchments."

LXI. That the said charge is malicious and insidious; because the
attempt to introduce proper officers for the management of household
expenses so considerable that the said Hastings has stated the allotment
for the same at three hundred thousand pounds sterling yearly, and that
other accounts have carried it to four hundred thousand pounds sterling
and upwards, and to keep proper and regular accounts thereof, was a
necessary regulation, and agreeable to the dignity of the Nabob, and by
no means a degradation either of his person or authority, which was
specially provided for in the regulations, as no expense could be
incurred but by his own personal warrant under his sign manual; nor doth
there appear therein anything but what is of absolute necessity to
prevent embezzlement to his prejudice. And the said Hastings hath
declared, in the fifth article of the instructions to the said Resident,
that _no_ administration can be properly conducted without regular
offices; and that in the whole province of Oude "there was _not one_,
the _whole_ being engrossed by the minister": of which minister, in the
fourteenth article, he declares his suspicion that the Nabob did not
receive the whole and punctual payment of the sum assigned for the
purpose of the household, but that some part had been by him withheld
from the Nabob; and that, from private information he had lately
received, he had reason to believe that this was actually the case. And
the said Hastings well knew that the Nabob's household had been ill
conducted, that the allowances of his servants had not been paid, that
his distress was scandalous, and that his nearest relations were in a
famishing condition; and the said Hastings did also well know that the
household of the Nabob was provided for or neglected, not at his own
discretion, but at that of the said Hyder Beg Khan; and he did, in the
fourteenth article aforesaid, instruct the Resident, Bristow, to show
every ostensible and external mark of respect to the Nabob, in order to
induce him to become himself the mover of every act necessary for the
advancing of his own interests and the discharge of his debts to the
Company,--declaring, "that they never could be effected while the
minister retained that ascendency over him which he at present holds by
the means of a nearer and more private intercourse, and by affecting to
be the mediator of his rights against the claims of our government." And
the said Hastings did further well know that there was no way of
ascertaining the payment of the assignments for the Nabob's household,
either for the general purposes of their destination or to the
particular objects to which they ought to be applied, without regular
offices of receipt and of account, which might prevent the said
minister, Hyder Beg Khan, or the British Resident, or any other, from
embezzling or misapplying the same. But the total want of offices
aforesaid in every department of government did furnish occasion of
concealing all frauds, clandestine presents, or pensions to a
Governor-General, Commander-in-Chief, or other servant of the Company.

LXII. That the said Warren Hastings, who did pretend so deep a concern
for the indignities supposed to be suffered by the Nabob merely in the
limitation and regulation of unnecessary expenses relative to his
kitchen, domestics, &c., did show no attention or compassion to the said
Nabob, when, in the year 1779, the said Nabob represented, that the
pensions of his old servants for thirty years, the expenses of his
family and kitchen, together with the jaghires of his grandmother,
mother, and aunts, and of his brothers and dependants, given for their
support, were not _regulated_, but _stopped_.

LXIII. That the other articles of regulation, namely, the reform of the
troops in number and in arrangement, the appointment of proper
collectors for the revenues, and the general constitution of offices for
the executive administration, were in like manner totally defeated by
the said Hyder Beg Khan. And the said Hastings did receive a charge from
him, and did adopt it as his own, representing the endeavors of the
Resident to act in the regulations aforesaid agreeably to the spirit of
his instructions, and in confidence of the powers vested in and the
responsibility imposed upon him, the said Resident, as usurpations of
the authority and prerogative of the Nabob; and he, the said Hastings,
did make criminal charges thereon against the said Resident, Bristow, of
which charges the Council Board did, on hearing the same, and the
defence of the said Bristow, fully acquit him.

LXIV. That the said Hastings, by abetting Hyder Beg Khan, a person
described by him as aforesaid, in his opposition to all the plans of
necessary reformation proposed by the said Hastings himself, and having
suggested no other whatever in lieu thereof, to answer the purposes for
which he had stipulated in the treaty of Chunar the interference of the
Resident in every branch of the Nabob's government, did thereby
frustrate every one of the good ends proposed by him in the said treaty
of Chunar, and did grossly abuse his trust in giving the exorbitant
powers before recited, and asserting them to exist in the British
Resident, without suffering them even in appearance to answer any of the
proper and justifiable ends for which any power or influence can or
ought to exist in any government.

LXV. That there is just ground to violently presume that not only the
letters in the name of the Nabob aforesaid were dictated to him by his
minister, Hyder Beg Khan, in whose hands the said Hastings has described
his master to be "a mere cipher," &c., but which Hyder Beg was the known
instrument of the said Hastings, but that the conduct and letters of
complaint of the said Hyder Beg were in effect and substance prescribed
and dictated to him by the said Warren Hastings, or his secret agent,
Palmer, by his direction: because it is notorious that the powers of the
said Hyder Beg were solely supported by him, the said Hastings, who,
according to the state of favor or displeasure in which he stood, hath
frequently promised him support or threatened him with dismission and
punishment, and therefore it is not to be thought that he would take so
material a step as to oppose the Company's Resident, acting under the
instructions of the Governor-General and Council, and to accuse him with
so much confidence, and in a manner so different from the usual style of
supplication on all other occasions employed by that court, if he had
not been previously well assured that his writing in that manner would
be pleasing to the person upon whom he solely depended for his power,
his fortune, and perhaps for his life;--secondly, because, when it
suited the purposes of the said Hastings on a former occasion, that is,
in the year 1784 [1781?], to remove the Resident Bristow aforesaid from
his office, a letter from the Nabob was laid before the Council Board at
Calcutta, proposing, that, in order to prevent the effects of the said
Bristow's application to Europe for redress, the said Hastings should
send him drafts of letters which he, the said Nabob, would write in his
own name and character to the King, to his Majesty's ministers, and to
the Court of Directors, expressing himself, in the letter aforesaid, in
the words following, viz., "To prevent his [Bristow's] applying to
Europe, send me, if _you_ think proper, the drafts of letters which _I_
may write to the King, the Vizier, and the chiefs of the
Company";--thirdly, that, though the said Hastings, and his secret
agent, Palmer, did pretend and positively assert that they had no share
in the letters aforesaid from the Nabob and his minister, there was an
original note to the Nabob's letters of accusation, referring to
distinct parts and specified numbers of the agent Palmer's secret
correspondence with the said Warren Hastings, and the said letter, with
the said reference, was, through inadvertence, laid before the board.

LXVI. That the said Warren Hastings, having thrown the government of
Oude into great confusion and distress, and thereby prevented the
discharge of the debt, or pretended debt, to the Company, did, by all
the said intrigues, machinations, and charges, aim at the filling the
said office of Resident at Oude with his own dependants or by himself
personally; as it appears that he did first propose to place in the said
office his secret agent, Palmer, and that afterwards, when he was not
able to succeed therein, he did propose nominally to abolish the said
office, but in effect to fill it by himself,--proposing to the Council
and rendering himself responsible (but not in fortune) for the payment
of the Company's debt within a certain given time, if he were permitted
and commissioned by the Council to act for the board in that province,
and did inform them that he was privately well assured that in a few
days he should receive an invitation to that effect; and he did state,
(as in the year 1781 he had stated as a reason for his former
delegation,) "that the state of the country was so disordered in its
revenue and administration, and the credit and influence of the Nabob
himself so much shook by _the late usurpation_ of his authority, and the
contests which attended it, as to require the accession of an
extraneous aid to restore the powers and to reanimate the constitution
of his government,"--although he, the said Hastings, did for a long time
before attribute the weakness of his government to an extraneous
interference. And the said Council, on his engagement aforesaid, did
consent thereto; and he did accordingly receive a commission, enabling
him to act in the affairs of Oude, not only as the Resident might have
done, but as largely as the Council-General might legally delegate their
own powers.

LXVII. That the said Warren Hastings, in accepting the said commission,
did subject his character and the reputation of his office to great
imputations and suspicions, by taking upon himself an inferior office,
out of which another had upon his intrigues been removed by a perpetual
obstruction which rendered it impossible for him to perform his duty or
to obey his instructions; and he did increase the said grounded
suspicions by exercising that office in a government from whence it was
notorious he had himself received an unlawful gift and present from the
ministers, and in which he had notoriously suffered many, and had
himself actually directed some, acts of peculation, by granting various
pensions and emoluments, to the prejudice of the revenue of a distressed
country, which he was not authorized to grant.

LXVIII. That the said Warren Hastings did proceed unto the said province
of Oude under color of providing a remedy for the disorders described to
be existing in the same, and for the recovery of the Company's
pretended debt. And the said Warren Hastings, who had thought fit to
recall the Company's Resident, appointed to that office by the Court of
Directors, and to suspend his office, did, notwithstanding, of his own
choice and selection, and on his own mere authority, take with him in
his progress a large retinue, "and a numerous society of English
gentlemen to compose his family," which he represents as necessary,
although, in a letter from that very place to which he took that very
numerous society, he informs the Court of Directors "that his own
consequence and that of the nation he represents are independent of
show." And after his arrival there, he, the said Warren Hastings, did
write from Lucknow, the capital of that province, a letter, dated the
30th of April, 1784, to the Court of Directors, in which are several
particulars to the following purport or tenor, and which he points out
to the Directors "to be circumstances of no trivial information,"
namely,--"that he had found that the lands in that province, as well as
in some parts more immediately under the Company, have suffered in a
grievous manner, being completely exhausted of their natural moisture by
the total failure of one entire season of the periodical rains," with a
few exceptions, which were produced only "by the uncommon labor of the
husbandman." And in a letter to Edward Wheler, Esquire, a member of the
Council-General, from Benares, the 20th of September, 1784, he says,
that "_the public revenues_ had declined with the failure of the
cultivation _in three successive years_; and all the stores of grain
which the _providence_ of the husbandmen, (as he was informed is their
_custom_,) in defiance of the _vigilance_ of the aumils [collectors],
_clandestinely reserved for their own use_, were of course exhausted,
in which state no person would accept of the charge of the collections
on a positive engagement; nor did the rain fall till the 10th of July."
And in another letter, dated from Benares, the 1st of October following,
he repeats the same accounts, and that the "country could not bear
further additions of expense: that it had _no inlets of trade_ to supply
the issues that were made from it" (the exceptions stated there being
inconsiderable); "therefore _every rupee_ which is drawn into your
treasury [the Company's] from its circulation will accelerate the period
at which its ability must cease _to pay even the stipulated subsidy_."
Notwithstanding this state of the country, of which he was well apprised
before he left Calcutta, and the poverty and distress of the prince
having been frequently, but in vain, represented to him, in order to
induce him to forbear his oppressive exactions, he did, in order to
furnish the Council with a color for permitting him to recall the
Company's Resident, and to exercise the whole powers of the Company in
his own person, without any check whatsoever, or witness of his
proceedings, except the persons of his own private choice, make the
express and positive engagement aforesaid, which, if understood of a
real and substantial discharge of debt for the relief of the total of
the Company's finances, was grossly fallacious: because at the very time
he must have been perfectly sensible, that, in the then state of the
revenues and country of Oude, (which are in effect the Company's
revenues and the Company's country,) the debt or pretended debt
aforesaid, asserted to be about five hundred thousand pounds, or
thereabouts, could not be paid without contracting another debt at an
usurious interest, without encroaching on the necessary establishments
or on private property or on the pay of the army, or without grievous
oppression of the country, or all these together. And it doth appear
that one hundred thousand pounds towards the said payment of debts was
borrowed at Calcutta by the Nabob's agent there, but at what interest is
not known; it appears also that other sums were borrowed for arrear of
the interest, on which forty thousand pounds sterling appears in the
Company's claims for the current year, and that various deductions were
made from the jaghires restored to the Begums, as well as other parts of
the Nabob's family; and it did and doth appear that an arrear is still
due to the old and new brigade,--but whether the same be growing or not
doth not appear: yet he hath not hesitated to assert that he had
"provided for the _complete_ discharge, in _one_ year, of a debt
contracted by _the accumulation of many_, and from a country whose
resources have been wasted and dissipated by three successive years of
drought and one of anarchy." But the said Hastings never did even
realize the payments to be made in the first year, (as he confesses in
the said letter,) except by an anticipation of the second; and though he
states in his letter aforesaid the following facts and engagements, that
is to say, "_that a recovery of so large a part of your property_ [the
Company's] will afford a seasonable and substantial relief to the
necessities of your government, and enable it (for such is my confident
hope) _to begin on the reduction of your debt at interest_ before the
conclusion of this year (I mean the year of this computation)." Whereas
the said Warren Hastings did apply the whole produce of the revenue to
the mere pay of some part of the British army in Oude; and did not
mention in his correspondence that he had remitted any money whatsoever
to Calcutta, nor to any other place, (except the fifty thousand pounds
taken from Almas Ali Khan, and said to be remitted to Surat,) for the
said "substantial relief," in consequence of the said pretended
"recovery of property,"--admitting that it had been suggested to him,
and not by him denied, that he had "disappointed the popular expectation
by not adopting the policy which he had, _on the conception of better
grounds_, rejected; nor did he begin the reduction of the interest debt"
at the time stated, nor at any time; but the whole (he well knowing the
state of the country from whence the resources aforesaid were by him
promised) was a premeditated deceit and imposition on the Board of
Council, his colleagues, and on the Court of Directors, his masters.

LXIX. That no traces of regulation appear to have been adopted by the
said Warren Hastings during his residence at Lucknow, in conformity to
the spirit and intentions of the treaty of Chunar, or of his
instructions to Middleton and Bristow, or of the proposed objects of his
own commission. But he did, in lieu thereof, pretend to free the Nabob's
government from the interference of the Company's servants, and the
usurpation (as he called it) of a Resident, and thereby to restore it to
its proper tone and energy; whereas the measures he took were such as to
leave no useful or responsible superintendence in the British, and no
freedom in the Nabob's government: for he did confirm the sole,
unparticipated, and entire administration, with all the powers annexed
to the government, on the minister, Hyder Beg Khan, to whom he
_prevailed_ on the Nabob Vizier to commit the entire charge of his
revenues, although he knew that his master was a cipher in his
hands,--that he "had affixed his seal to letters written without his
knowledge, and such as evidently tended to promote Hyder Beg Khan's
influence and interest,"--that his said master did not consider him as a
minister of his choice, but as an instrument of his degradation,--that
"he exists as a minister by his dependence on the Calcutta government,
and that the Nabob himself had no other opinion of him,--that it is by
its _declared_ and most _obvious_ support _alone_ that he could maintain
his authority and influence." And in his instructions to his secret
agent, Major Palmer, dated 6th of May, 1782, to ease his mind and remove
his jealousy with regard to British interference, he did instruct him,
"that much delicacy and caution will be required in your declarations on
this subject, lest they should be construed to extend to an immediate
change in the administration of his affairs, or the instruments of it.
Their persons must be considered as _sacred, while_ they act with the
_participation of our influence_. This distinction the Nabob
_understands_; nor will it be either necessary or proper to allude to
it, unless he himself should first introduce the subject." And the said
Hastings did assume, as to a dependant of the lowest order, to prescribe
to him the conditions on which he is to hold his place,--to threaten him
with scrutinies into his conduct, with dismission, with
punishment,--that he was guilty of falsehood and duplicity, and that he
had made his master assert what was true to be false,--that he suspected
he had withheld from his master what he ought to have paid to him,--that
the event of his having _prevailed_ on the Nabob to intrust him as
aforesaid was, according to his, the said Hastings's, own letter,
written to the said Hyder Beg Khan himself, "an accumulation of
distress, debasement, and dissatisfaction to the Nabob, and of
disappointment and disgrace to me. Every measure which he had himself
proposed, and to which he had solicited my assistance, has been so
conducted as to give him cause of displeasure; there are no officers
established by which his affairs could be regularly conducted; mean,
incapable, and indigent man have been appointed aumils of the districts,
without authority, and without the means of personal protection; some of
them have been murdered by the zemindars, and those zemindars, instead
of punishment, have been permitted to retain their zemindaries with
independent authority; all the other zemindars suffered to rise up in
rebellion, and to insult the authority of the sircar, without any
attempt made to suppress them; and the Company's debt, instead of being
discharged by the assignments, and extraordinary sources of money
provided for that purpose, is likely to exceed even the amount at which
it stood at the time in which the arrangement with his Excellency was
concluded. _The growth of these evils was early made known to me, and
their effects foreboded in the same order and manner as they have since
come to pass._ In such a state of calamity and disgrace, I can no longer
remain a passive spectator; nor would it be becoming to conceal my
sentiments, or qualify the expression of them. I now plainly tell you,
that you are answerable for every misfortune and defect of the Nabob
Vizier's government." And after giving orders, and expressing some hopes
of better behavior, he adds, "If I am disappointed, you will impose on
me the painful and humiliating necessity of acknowledging to him that I
have been deceived, and of recommending the examination of your conduct
to his justice, both for the redress of his own and the Company's
grievances, and for the injury sustained by both in their mutual
connection. _Do not reply to me_, that what I have written is from the
suggestion of your enemies; nor imagine that I have induced myself to
write in such plain and declaratory terms, without a clear insight into
all the consequences of it, and a fixed determination upon them."

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