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

E >> Edmund Burke >> The Works Of The Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IX. (of 12)




That the intention of the said Warren Hastings, in pressing for a peace
with the Mahrattas on terms so dishonorable and by measures so rash and
ill-concerted, was not to restore and establish a general peace
throughout India, but to engage the India Company in a new war against
Hyder Ali, and to make the Mahrattas parties therein. That the eagerness
and passion with which the said Hastings pursued this object laid him
open to the Mahrattas, who depended thereon for obtaining whatever they
should demand from us. That, in order to carry the point of an offensive
alliance against Hyder Ali, the said Hastings exposed the negotiation
for peace with the Mahrattas to many difficulties and delays. That the
Mahrattas were bound by a clear and recent engagement, which Hyder had
never violated in any article, to make no peace with us which should not
include him; that they pleaded the sacred nature of this obligation in
answer to all our requisitions on this head, while the said Hastings,
still importunate for his favorite point, suggested to them various
means of reconciling a substantial breach of their engagement with a
formal observance of it, and taught them how they might at once be
parties in a peace with Hyder Ali and in an offensive alliance for
immediate hostility against him. That these lessons of public duplicity
and artifice, and these devices of ostensible faith and real treachery,
could have no effect but to degrade the national character, and to
inspire the Mahrattas themselves, with whom we were in treaty, with a
distrust in our sincerity and good faith. That the object of this
fraudulent policy (viz., the utter destruction of Hyder Ali, and a
partition of his dominions) was neither wise in itself, or authorized by
the orders and instructions of the Company to their servants; that it
was incompatible with the treaty of peace, in which Hyder Ali was
included, and contrary to the repeated and best-understood injunctions
of the Company,--being, in the first place, a bargain for a new war,
and, in the next, aiming at an extension of our territory by conquest.
That the best and soundest political opinions on the relations of these
states have always represented our great security against the power of
the Mahrattas to depend on its being balanced by that of Hyder Ali; and
the Mysore country is so placed as a barrier between the Carnatic and
the Mahrattas as to make it our interest rather to strengthen and repair
that barrier than to level and destroy it. That the said treaty of
partition does express itself to be _eventual_ with regard to the making
and keeping of peace; but through the whole course of the said
Hastings's proceeding he did endeavor to prevent any peace with the
Sultan or Nabob of Mysore, Tippoo Sahib, and did for a long time
endeavor to frustrate all the methods which could have rendered the
said treaty of conquest and partition wholly unnecessary.

That the Mahrattas having taken no effectual step to oblige Hyder Ali to
make good the conditions for which they had engaged in his behalf, and
the war continuing to be carried on in the Carnatic by Tippoo Sultan,
son and successor of Hyder Ali, the Presidency of Fort St. George
undertook, upon their own authority, to open a negotiation with the said
Tippoo: which measure, though indispensably necessary, the said Hastings
utterly disapproved and discountenanced, expressly denying that there
was any ground or motive for entering into any direct or separate treaty
with Tippoo, and not consenting to or authorizing any negotiation for
such treaty, until after a cessation of hostilities had been brought
about with him by the Presidency of Fort St. George, in August, 1783,
and the ministers of Tippoo had been received and treated with by that
Presidency, and commissioners, in return, actually sent by the said
Presidency to the court of Poonah: which late and reluctant consent and
authority were extorted from him, the said Hastings, in consequence of
the acknowledgment of his agent at the court of Mahdajee Sindia, upon
whom the said Warren Hastings had depended for enforcing the clauses of
the Mahratta treaty, of the precariousness of such dependence, and of
the necessity of that direct and separate treaty with Tippoo, so long
and so lately reprobated by the said Warren Hastings, notwithstanding
the information and entreaties of the Presidency of Fort St. George, as
well as the known distresses and critical situation of the Company's
affairs. That, though the said Warren Hastings did at length give
instructions for negotiating and making peace with Tippoo, expressly
adding, that those instructions extended to _all_ the points which
occurred to _him or them_ as capable of being agitated or gained upon
the occasion,--though the said instructions were sent after the said
commissioners by the Presidency of Fort St. George, with directions to
obey them,--though not only the said instructions were obeyed, but
advantages gained which did not occur to the said Warren
Hastings,--though the said peace formed a contrast with the Mahratta
peace, in neither ceding any territory possessed by the Company before
the war, or delivering up any dependant or ally to the vengeance of his
adversaries, but providing for the restoration of all the countries that
had been taken from the Company and their allies,--though the Supreme
Council of Calcutta, forming the legal government of Bengal in the
absence of the said Warren Hastings, ratified the said treaty,--yet the
said Warren Hastings, then absent from the seat of government, and out
of the province of Bengal, and forming no legal or integral part of the
government during such absence, did, after such ratification, usurp the
power of acting as a part of such government (as if actually sitting in
Council with the other members of the same) in the consideration and
unqualified censure of the terms of the said peace.

That the Nabob of Arcot, with whom the said Hastings did keep up an
unwarrantable clandestine correspondence, without any communication with
the Presidency of Madras, wrote a letter of complaint, dated the 27th of
March, 1784, against the Presidency of that place, without any
communication thereof to the said Presidency, the said complaint being
addressed to the said Warren Hastings, the substance of which complaint
was, that he, the Nabob, had not been made a party to the late treaty;
and although his interest had been sufficiently provided for in the said
treaty, the said Warren Hastings did sign a declaration, on the 23d of
May, at Lucknow, forming the basis of a new article, and making a new
party to the treaty, after it had been by all parties (the Supreme
Council of Calcutta included) completed and ratified, and did transmit
the said new stipulation to the Presidency at Calcutta, solely for the
purposes and at the instigation of the Nabob of Arcot; and the said
declaration was made without any previous communication with the
Presidency aforesaid, and in consequence thereof orders were sent by the
Council at Calcutta to the Presidency of Fort St. George, _under the
severest threats in case of disobedience_: which orders, whatever were
their purport, would, as an undue assumption of and participation in the
government, from which he was absent, become a high misdemeanor; but,
being to the purport of opening the said treaty after its solemn
ratification, and proposing a new clause and a new party to the same,
was also an aggravation of such misdemeanor, as it tended to convey to
the Indian powers an idea of the unsteadiness of the councils and
determinations of the British government, and to take away all reliance
on its engagements, and as, above all, it exposed the affairs of the
nation and the Company to the hazard of seeing renewed all the
calamities of war, from whence by the conclusion of the treaty they had
emerged, and upon a pretence so weak as that of proposing the Nabob of
Arcot to be a party to the same,--though he had not been made a party by
the said Warren Hastings in the Mahratta treaty, which professed to be
for the relief of the Carnatic,--though he was not a party to the former
treaty with Hyder, also relative to the Carnatic,--though it was not
certain, if the treaty were once opened, and that even Tippoo should
then consent to that Nabob's being a party, whether he, the said Nabob,
would agree to the clauses of the same, and consequently whether the
said treaty, once opened, could afterwards be concluded: an uncertainty
of which he, the said Hastings, should have learned to be aware, having
already once been disappointed by the said Nabob's refusing to accede to
a treaty which he, the said Warren Hastings, made for him with the
Dutch, about a year before.

That the said Warren Hastings,--having broken a solemn and honorable
treaty of peace by an unjust and unprovoked war,--having neglected to
conclude that war when he might have done it without loss of honor to
the nation,--having plotted and contrived, as far as depended on him, to
engage the India Company in another war as soon as the former should be
concluded,--and having at last put an end to a most unjust war against
the Mahrattas by a most ignominious peace with them, in which he
sacrificed objects essential to the interests, and submitted to
conditions utterly incompatible with the honor of this nation, and with
his own declared sense of the dishonorable nature of those
conditions,--and having endeavored to open anew the treaty concluded
with Tippoo Sultan through the means of the Presidency of Fort St.
George, upon principles of justice and honor, and which established
peace in India, and thereby exposing the British possessions there to
the renewal of the dangers and calamities of war,--has by these several
acts been guilty of sundry high crimes and misdemeanors.




XXI.--CORRESPONDENCE.


That, by an act of the 13th year of his present Majesty, intituled, "An
act for establishing certain regulations for the better management of
the affairs of the East India Company, as well in India as in Europe,
the Governor-General and Council are required and directed to pay due
obedience to all such orders as they shall receive from the Court of
Directors of the said United Company, and to correspond from time to
time, and constantly and diligently transmit to the said Court an exact
particular of all advices or intelligence and of all transactions and
matters whatsoever that shall come to their knowledge, relating to the
government, commerce, revenues, or interest of the said United Company."

That, in consequence of the above-recited act, the Court of Directors,
in their general instructions of the 29th March, 1774, to the
Governor-General and Council, did direct, "that the correspondence with
the princes or country powers in India should be carried on through the
Governor-General only; but that all letters to be sent by him should be
first approved in Council; and that he should lay before the Council, at
their next meeting, all letters received by him in the course of such
correspondence, for their information."

And the Governor-General and Council were therein further ordered,
"that, in transacting the business of their department, they should
enter with the utmost perspicuity and exactness all their proceedings
whatsoever, and all dissents, if such should at any time be made by any
member of their board, together with all letters sent or received in the
course of their correspondence; and that broken sets of such
proceedings, to the latest period possible, be transmitted to them [the
Court of Directors], a complete set at the end of every year, and a
duplicate by the next conveyance."

That, in defiance of the said orders, and in breach of the above-recited
act of Parliament, the said Warren Hastings has, in sundry instances,
concealed from his Council the correspondence carried on between him and
the princes or country powers in India, and neglected to communicate the
advices and intelligence he from time to time received from the British
Residents at the different courts in India to the other members of the
government, and, without their knowledge, counsel, or participation, has
dispatched orders on matters of the utmost consequence to the interests
of the Company.

That, moreover, the said Warren Hastings, for the purpose of covering
his own improper and dangerous practices from his employers, has
withheld from the Court of Directors, upon sundry occasions, copies of
the proceedings had, and the correspondence carried on by him in his
official capacity as Governor-General, whereby the Court of Directors
have been kept in ignorance of matters which it highly imported them to
know, and the affairs of the Company have been exposed to much
inconvenience and injury.

That, in all such concealments and acts done or ordered without the
consent and authority of the Supreme Council, the said Warren Hastings
has been guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors.




XXII.--FYZOOLA KHAN.


PART I.

RIGHTS OF FYZOOLA KHAN, ETC., BEFORE THE TREATY OF LALL-DANG.

I. That the Nabob Fyzoola Khan, who now holds of the Vizier the
territory of Rampoor, Shahabad, and certain other districts dependent
thereon, in the country of the Rohillas, is the second son of a prince
renowned in the history of Hindostan under the name of Ali Mohammed
Khan, some time sovereign of all that part of Rohilcund which is
particularly distinguished by the appellation of the Kutteehr.

II. That, after the death of Ali Mohammed aforesaid, as Fyzoola Khan,
together with his elder brother, was then a prisoner of war at a place
called Herat, "the Rohilla chiefs took possession of the ancient
estates" of the captive princes; and the Nabob Fyzoola Khan was from
necessity compelled to waive his hereditary rights for the
inconsiderable districts of Rampoor and Shahabad, then estimated to
produce from six to eight lacs of annual revenue.

III. That in 1774, on the invasion of Rohilcund by the united armies of
the Vizier Sujah ul Dowlah and the Company, the Nabob Fyzoola Khan,
"with some of his people, was present at the decisive battle of St.
George," where Hafiz Rhamet, the great leader of the Rohillas, and many
others of their principal chiefs were slain; but, escaping from the
slaughter, Fyzoola Khan "made his retreat good towards the mountains,
with all his treasure." He there collected the scattered remains of his
countrymen; and as he was the eldest surviving son of Ali Mohammed Khan,
as, too, the most powerful obstacle to his pretensions was now removed
by the death of Hafiz, he seems at length to have been generally
acknowledged by his natural subjects the undoubted heir of his father's
authority.

IV. That, "regarding the sacred _sincerity_ and friendship of the
English, whose _goodness_ and celebrity is everywhere known, _who
dispossess no one_," the Nabob Fyzoola Khan made early overtures for
peace to Colonel Alexander Champion, commander-in-chief of the Company's
forces in Bengal: that he did propose to the said Colonel Alexander
Champion, in three letters, received on the 14th, 24th, and 27th of May,
to put himself under the protection either of the Company, or of the
Vizier, through the mediation and with the guaranty of the Company; and
that he did offer, "whatever was conferred upon him, to pay as much
without damage or deficiency as any other person would agree to do":
stating, at the same time, his condition and pretensions hereinbefore
recited as facts "evident as the sun"; and appealing, in a forcible and
awful manner, to the generosity and magnanimity of this nation, "by
whose means he hoped in God that he should receive justice"; and as "the
person who designed the war was no more," as "in that he was himself
guiltless," and as "he had never acted in such a manner as for the
Vizier to have taken hatred to his heart against him, that he might be
reinstated in his ancient possessions, the country of Ins father."

V. That on the last of the three dates above mentioned, that is to say,
on the 27th of May, the Nabob Fyzoola Khan did also send to the
commander-in-chief a _vakeel_, or ambassador, who was authorized on the
part of him, the Nabob Fyzoola Khan, his master, to make a specific
offer of three propositions; and that by one of the said propositions
"an annual increase of near 400,000_l._ would have accrued to the
revenues of our ally, and the immediate acquisition of above 300,000_l._
to the Company, for their influence in effecting an accommodation
perfectly consistent with their engagements to the Vizier," and strictly
consonant to the demands of justice.

VI. That, so great was the confidence of the Nabob Fyzoola Khan in the
just, humane, and liberal feelings of Englishmen, as to "lull him into
an inactivity" of the most essential detriment to his interests: since,
"in the hopes which he entertained from the interposition of our
government," he declined the invitation of the Mogul to join the arms of
his Majesty and the Mahrattas, "refused any connection with the Seiks,"
and did even neglect to take the obvious precaution of crossing the
Ganges, as he had originally intended, while the river was yet
fordable,--a movement that would have enabled him certainly to baffle
all pursuit, and probably "to keep the Vizier in a state of disquietude
for the remainder of his life."

VII. That the commander-in-chief, Colonel Alexander Champion aforesaid,
"thought nothing could be more honorable to this nation than the support
of so exalted a character; and whilst it could be done on terms so
advantageous, supposed it very unlikely that the vakeel's proposition
should be received with indifference"; that he did accordingly refer it
to the administration through Warren Hastings, Esquire, then Governor of
Fort William and President of Bengal; and he did at the same time
inclose to the said Warren Hastings a letter from the Nabob Fyzoola Khan
to the said Hastings,--which letter does not appear, but must be
supposed to have been of the same tenor with those before cited to the
commander-in-chief,--of which also copies were sent to the said Hastings
by the commander-in-chief; and he, the commander-in-chief aforesaid,
after urging to the said Hastings sundry good and cogent arguments of
policy and prudence in favor of the Nabob Fyzoola Khan, did conclude by
"wishing for nothing so much as for the adoption of some measure that
might strike all the powers of the East with admiration of our justice,
in contrast to the conduct of the Vizier."

VIII. That, in answer to such laudable wish of the said
commander-in-chief, the President, Warren Hastings, preferring his own
prohibited plans of extended dominion to the mild, equitable, and wise
policy inculcated in the standing orders of his superiors, and now
enforced by the recommendation of the commander-in-chief, did instruct
and "desire" him, the said commander-in-chief, "instead of soliciting
the Vizier to relinquish his conquest to Fyzoola Khan, to discourage it
as much as was in his power"; although the said Hastings did not once
express, or even intimate, any doubt whatever of the Nabob Fyzoola
Khan's innocence as to the origin of the war, or of his hereditary
right to the territories which he claimed, but to the said pleas of the
Nabob Fyzoola Khan, as well as to the arguments both of policy and
justice advanced by the commander-in-chief, he, the said Hastings, did
solely oppose certain speculative objects of imagined expediency,
summing up his decided rejection of the proposals made by the Nabob
Fyzoola Khan in the following remarkable words. "With respect to Fyzoola
Khan, _he appears not to merit our consideration. The petty sovereign of
a country estimated at six or eight lacs ought not for a moment to prove
an impediment to any of our measures, or to affect the consistency of
our conduct_."

IX. That, in the aforesaid violent and arbitrary position, the said
Warren Hastings did avow it to be a public principle of his government,
that no right, however manifest, and no innocence, however unimpeached,
could entitle the weak to our protection against others, or save them
from our own active endeavors for their oppression, and even
extirpation, should they interfere with our notions of political
expediency; and that such a principle is highly derogatory to the
justice and honor of the English name, and fundamentally injurious to
our interests, inasmuch as it hath an immediate tendency to excite
distrust, jealousy, fear, and hatred against us among all the
subordinate potentates of Hindostan.

X. That, in prosecution of the said despotic principle, the President,
Warren Hastings aforesaid, did persist to obstruct, as far as in him
lay, every advance towards an accommodation between the Vizier Sujah ul
Dowlah and the Nabob Fyzoola Khan; and particularly on the 16th of
September, only eight days after the said Hastings, in, conjunction with
the other members of the Select Committee of Bengal, had publicly
testified his _satisfaction_ in the prospect of _an accommodation_, and
had _hoped_ that "his Excellency [the Vizier] would be disposed to
conciliate the affections [of the Rohillas] to his government _by
acceding to lenient terms_," he, the said Hastings, did nevertheless
write, and without the consent or knowledge of his colleagues did
privately dispatch, a certain answer to a letter of the
commander-in-chief, in which answer the said Hastings did express other
_contradictory hopes_, namely, that the commander-in-chief _had resolved
on prosecuting the war to a final issue_,--"because" (as the said
Hastings explains himself) "it appears very plainly that Fyzoola Khan
and his adherents _lay at your mercy_, because I apprehend much
inconveniency from delays, and because _I am morally certain that no
good will he gained by negotiating_": thereby artfully suggesting his
wishes of what might be, in his hopes of what had been, resolved; and
plainly, though indirectly, instigating the commander-in-chief to much
effusion of blood in an immediate attack on the Rohillas, posted as they
were "in a very strong situation," and "combating for all."

XI. That the said Hastings, in the answer aforesaid, did further
endeavor to inflame the commander-in-chief against the Nabob Fyzoola
Khan, by representing the said Nabob "as highly presuming, insolent, and
evasive"; and knowing the distrust which the Nabob Fyzoola Khan
entertained of the Vizier, the said Hastings did "expressly desire it
should be left wholly to the Vizier to treat with the enemy by _his own
agents_ and _in his own manner_,"--though he, the said Hastings, "by no
means wished the Vizier to lose time by seeking an accommodation, since
it would be more effectual, more decisive, and more _consistent with his
dignity, indeed with his honor, which he has already pledged_, to abide
by his first offers, to dictate the conditions of peace, and to admit
only an acceptance without reservation, or a clear refusal, from his
adversary": thereby affecting to hold up, in opposition to and in
exclusion of the substantial claims of justice, certain ideal
obligations of dignity and honor,--that is to say, the gratification of
pride, and the observance of an arrogant determination once declared.

XII. That, although the said answer did not reach the commander-in-chief
until peace was actually concluded, and although the dangerous
consequences to be apprehended from the said answer were thereby
prevented, yet, by the sentiments contained in the said answer, Warren
Hastings, Esquire, did strongly evince his ultimate adherence to all the
former violent and unjust principles of his conduct towards the Nabob
Fyzoola Khan, which principles were disgraceful to the character and
injurious to the interests of this nation; and that the said Warren
Hastings did thereby, in a particular manner, exclude himself from any
share of credit for "the honorable period put to the Rohilla war, which
has in some degree done away the reproach so wantonly brought on the
English name."


PART II.

RIGHTS OF FYZOOLA KHAN UNDER THE TREATY OF LALL-DANG.

I. That, notwithstanding the culpable and criminal reluctance of the
President, Hastings, hereinbefore recited, a treaty of peace and
friendship between the Vizier Sujah ul Dowlah and the Nabob Fyzoola Khan
was finally signed and sealed on the 7th October, 1774, at a place
called Lall-Dang, in the presence and with the attestation of the
British commander-in-chief, Colonel Alexander Champion aforesaid; and
that for the said treaty the Nabob Fyzoola Khan agreed to pay, and did
actually pay, the valuable consideration of half his treasure, to the
amount of fifteen lacs of rupees, or 150,000_l._ sterling, and upwards.

II. That by the said treaty the Nabob Fyzoola Khan was established in
the quiet possession of Rampoor, Shahabad, and "some other districts
dependent thereon," subject to certain conditions, of which the more
important were as follow.

"That Fyzoola Khan should retain in his service five thousand _troops_,
and not a single man more.