counsellor, having the country entirely in his hand, and every obstacle
that could impede his course swept out of the arena, what does he do
under these auspicious circumstances? You would imagine, that, in the
first place, he would have sent down to the Council at Calcutta a
general view of his proceedings, and of their consequences, together
with a complete statement of the revenue; that he would have recommended
the fittest persons for public trusts, with such other measures as he
might judge to be most essential to the interest and honor of his
employers. One would have imagined he would have done this, in order
that the Council and the Court of Directors might have a clear view of
the whole existing system, before he attempted to make a permanent
arrangement for the administration of the country. But, on the contrary,
the whole of his proceedings is clandestinely conducted; there is not
the slightest communication with the Council upon the business, till he
had determined and settled the whole. Thus the Council was placed in a
complete dilemma,--either to confirm all his wicked and arbitrary acts,
(for such we have proved them to be,) or to derange the whole
administration of the country again, and to make another revolution as
complete and dreadful as that which he had made.
The task which the Governor-General had imposed upon himself was, I
admit, a difficult one; but those who pull down important ancient
establishments, who wantonly destroy modes of administration and public
institutions under which a country has prospered, are the most
mischievous, and therefore the wickedest of men. It is not a reverse of
fortune, it is not the fall of an individual, that we are here talking
of. We are, indeed, sorry for Cheyt Sing and Durbege Sing, as we should
be sorry for any individual under similar circumstances.
It is wisely provided in the constitution of our heart, that we should
interest ourselves in the fate of great personages. They are therefore
made everywhere the objects of tragedy, which addresses itself directly
to our passions and our feelings. And why? Because men of great place,
men of great rank, men of great hereditary authority, cannot fall
without a horrible crash upon all about them. Such towers cannot tumble
without ruining their dependent cottages.
The prosperity of a country, that has been distressed by a revolution
which has swept off its principal men, cannot be reëstablished without
extreme difficulty. This man, therefore, who wantonly and wickedly
destroyed the existing government of Benares, was doubly bound to use
all possible care and caution in supplying the loss of those
institutions which he had destroyed, and of the men whom he had driven
into exile. This, I say, he ought to have done. Let us now see what he
really did do.
He set out by disposing of all the property of the country as if it was
his own. He first confiscated the whole estates of the _Baboos_, the
great nobility of the country, to the amount of six lacs of rupees. He
then distributed the lands and revenue of the country according to his
own pleasure; and as he had seized the lands without our knowing why or
wherefore, so the portion which he took away from some persons he gave
to others, in the same arbitrary manner, and without any assignable
reason.
When we were inquiring what jaghires Mr. Hastings had thought proper to
grant, we found, to our astonishment, (though it is natural that his
mind should take this turn,) that he endowed several charities with
jaghires. He gave a jaghire to some Brahmins to pray for the perpetual
prosperity of the Company, and others to procure the prayers of the same
class of men for himself. I do not blame his Gentoo piety, when I find
no Christian piety in the man: let him take refuge in any superstition
he pleases. The crime we charge is his having distributed the lands of
others at his own pleasure. Whether this proceeded from piety, from
ostentation, or from any other motive, it matters not. We contend that
he ought not to have distributed such land at all,--that he had no
right to do so; and consequently, the gift of a single acre of land, by
his own private will, was an act of robbery, either from the public or
some individual.
When he had thus disturbed the landed property of Benares, and
distributed it according to his own will, he thought it would be proper
to fix upon a person to govern the country; and of this person he
himself made the choice. It does not appear that the people could have
lost, even by the revolt of Cheyt Sing, the right which was inherent in
them to be governed by the lawful successor of his family. We find,
however, that this man, by his own authority, by the arbitrary exercise
of his own will and fancy, did think proper to nominate a person to
succeed the Rajah who had no legal claims to the succession. He made
choice of a boy about nineteen years old; and he says he made that
choice upon the principle of this boy's being descended from Bulwant
Sing by the female line. But he does not pretend to say that he was the
proper and natural heir to Cheyt Sing; and we will show you the direct
contrary. Indeed, he confesses the contrary himself; for he argues, in
his defence, that, when a new system was to be formed with the successor
of Cheyt Sing who was not his heir, such successor had no claim of
right.
But perhaps the want of right was supplied by the capacity and fitness
of the person who was chosen. I do not say that this does or can for one
moment supersede the positive right of another person; but it would
palliate the injustice in some degree. Was there in this case any
palliative matter? Who was the person chosen by Mr. Hastings to succeed
Cheyt Sing? My Lords, the person chosen was a minor: for we find the
prisoner at your bar immediately proceeded to appoint him a guardian.
This guardian he also chose by his own will and pleasure, as he himself
declares, without referring to any particular claim or usage,--without
calling the Pundits to instruct him, upon whom, by the Gentoo laws, the
guardianship devolved.
I admit, that, in selecting a guardian, he did not, in one respect, act
improperly; for he chose the boy's father, and he could not have chosen
a better guardian for his person. But for the administration of his
government qualities were required which this man did not possess. He
should have chosen a man of vigor, capacity, and diligence, a man fit to
meet the great difficulties of the situation in which he was to be
placed.
Mr. Hastings, my Lords, plainly tells you that he did not think the
man's talents to be extraordinary, and he soon afterwards says that he
had a great many incapacities. He tells you that he has a doubt whether
he was capable of realizing those hopes of revenue which he (Mr.
Hastings) had formed. Nor can this be matter of wonder, when we consider
that he had ruined and destroyed the ancient system, the whole scheme
and tenor of public offices, and had substituted nothing for them but
his own arbitrary will. He had formed a plan of an entire new system, in
which the practical details had no reference to the experience and
wisdom of past ages. He did not take the government as he found it; he
did not take the system of offices as it was arranged to his hand; but
he dared to make the wicked and flagitious experiment which I have
stated,--an experiment upon the happiness of a numerous people, whose
property he had usurped and distributed in the manner which has been
laid before your Lordships. The attempt failed, and he is responsible
for the consequences.
How dared he to make these experiments? In what manner can he be
justified for playing fast and loose with the dearest interests, and
perhaps with the very existence, of a nation? Attend to the manner in
which he justifies himself, and you will find the whole secret let out.
"The easy accumulation of too much wealth," he says, "had been Cheyt
Sing's ruin; it had buoyed him up with extravagant and ill-founded
notions of independence, which I very much wished to discourage in the
future Rajah. Some part, therefore, of the superabundant produce in the
country I turned into the coffers of the sovereign by an augmentation of
the tribute."--Who authorized him to make any augmentation of the
tribute? But above all, who authorized him to augment it upon this
principle?--"I must take care the tributary prince does not grow too
rich; if he gets rich, he will get proud."--This prisoner has got a
scale like that in the almanac,--"War begets poverty, poverty peace,"
and so on. The first rule that he lays down is, that he will keep the
new Rajah in a state of poverty; because, if he grows rich, he will
become proud, and behave as Cheyt Sing did. You see the ground,
foundation, and spirit of the whole proceeding. Cheyt Sing was to be
robbed. Why? Because he is too rich. His successor is to be reduced to a
miserable condition. Why? Lest he should grow rich and become
troublesome. The whole of his system is to prevent men from growing
rich, lest, if they should grow rich, they should grow proud, and seek
independence. Your Lordships see that in this man's opinion riches must
beget pride. I hope your Lordships will never be so poor as to cease to
be proud; for, ceasing to be proud, you will cease to be independent.
Having resolved that the Rajah should not grow rich, for fear he should
grow proud and independent, he orders him to pay forty lacs of rupees,
or 400,000_l._, annually to the Company. The tribute had before been
250,000_l._, and he all at once raised it to 400,000_l._ Did he
previously inform the Council of these intentions? Did he inform them of
the amount of the gross collections of the country, from any properly
authenticated accounts procured from any public office?
I need not inform your Lordships, that it is a serious thing to draw out
of a country, instead of 250,000_l._, an annual tribute of 400,000_l._
There were other persons besides the Rajah concerned in this enormous
increase of revenue. The whole country is interested in its resources
being fairly estimated and assessed; for, if you overrate the revenue
which it is supposed to yield to the great general collector, you
necessitate him to overrate every under-collector, and thereby instigate
them to harass and oppress the people. It is upon these grounds that we
have charged the prisoner at your bar with having acted arbitrarily,
illegally, unjustly, and tyrannically: and your Lordships will bear in
mind that these acts were done by his sole authority, which authority we
have shown to have been illegally assumed.
My Lords, before he took the important steps which I have just stated,
he consulted no one but Mr. Markham, whom he placed over the new Rajah.
The Rajah was only nineteen years old: but Mr. Markham undoubtedly had
the advantage of him in this respect, for he was twenty-one. He had also
the benefit of five months' experience of the country: an abundant
experience, to be sure, my Lords, in a country where it is well known,
from the peculiar character of its inhabitants, that a man cannot
anywhere put his foot without placing it upon some trap or mine, until
he is perfectly acquainted with its localities. Nevertheless, he puts
the whole country and a prince of nineteen, as appears from the
evidence, into the hands of Mr. Markham, a man of twenty-one. We have no
doubt of Mr. Markham's capacity; but he could have no experience in a
country over which he possessed a general controlling power. Under these
circumstances, we surely shall not wonder, if this young man fell into
error. I do not like to treat harshly the errors into which a very young
person may fall: but the man who employs him, and puts him into a
situation for which he has neither capacity nor experience, is
responsible for the consequences of such an appointment; and Mr.
Hastings is doubly responsible in this case, because he placed Mr.
Markham as Resident merely to show that he defied the authority of the
Court of Directors.
But, my Lords, let us proceed. We find Mr. Hastings resolved to exact
forty lacs from the country, although he had no proof that such a
tribute could be fairly collected. He next assigns to this boy, the
Rajah, emoluments amounting to about 60,000_l._ a year. Let us now see
upon what grounds he can justify the assignment of these emoluments. I
can perceive none but such as are founded upon the opinion of its being
necessary to the support of the Rajah's dignity. Now, when Mr. Markham,
who is the sole ostensible actor in the management of the new Rajah, as
he had been a witness to the deposition of the former, comes before you
to give an account of what he thought of Cheyt Sing, who appears to have
properly supported the dignity of his situation, he tells you that about
a lac or a lac and a half (10,000_l._ or 15,000_l._) a year was as much
as Cheyt Sing could spend. And yet this young creature, settled in the
same country, and who was to pay 400,000_l._ a year, instead of
250,000_l._, tribute to the Company, was authorized by Mr. Hastings to
collect and reserve to his own use 60,000_l._ out of the revenue. That
is to say, he was to receive four times as much as was stated by Mr.
Hastings, on Mr. Markham's evidence, to have been necessary to support
him.
Your Lordships tread upon corruption everywhere. Why was such a large
revenue given to the young Rajah to support his dignity, when, as they
say, Cheyt Sing did not spend above a lac and half in support of
his,--though it is known he had great establishments to maintain, that
he had erected considerable buildings adorned with fine gardens, and,
according to them, had made great preparations for war?
We must at length imagine that they knew the country could bear the
impost imposed upon it. I ask, How did they know this? We have proved to
you, by a paper presented here by Mr. Markham, that the net amount of
the collections was about 360,000_l._ This is their own account, and was
made up, as Mr. Markham says, by one of the clerks of Durbege Sing,
together with his Persian moonshee, (a very fine council to settle the
revenues of the kingdom!) in his private house. And with this account
before them, they have dared to impose upon the necks of that unhappy
people a tribute of 400,000_l._, together with an income for the Rajah
of 60,000_l._ These sums the Naib, Durbege Sing, was bound to furnish,
and left to get them as he could. Your Lordships will observe that I
speak of the net proceeds of the collections. We have nothing to do with
the gross amount. We are speaking of what came to the public treasury,
which was no more than I have stated; and it was out of the public
treasury that these payments were to be made, because there could be no
other honest way of getting the money.
But let us now come to the main point, which is to ascertain what sums
the country could really bear. Mr. Hastings maintains (whether in the
speech of his counsel or otherwise I do not recollect) that the revenue
of the country was 400,000_l._, that it constantly paid that sum, and
flourished under the payment. In answer to this, I refer your Lordships,
first, to Mr. Markham's declaration, and the Wassil Baakee, which is in
page 1750 of the printed Minutes. I next refer your Lordships to Mr.
Duncan's Reports, in page 2493. According to Mr. Duncan's public
estimate of the revenue of Benares, the net collections of the very year
we are speaking of, when Durbege Sing had the management, and when Mr.
Markham, his Persian moonshee, and a clerk in his private house, made
their estimates without any documents, or with whatever documents, or
God only knows, for nothing appears on the record of the
transaction,--the collections yielded in that year but 340,000_l._, that
is, 20,000_l._ less than Mr. Markham's estimate. But take it which way
you will, whether you take it at Mr. Markham's 360,000_l._, or at Mr.
Duncan's 340,000_l._, your Lordships will see, that, after reserving
60,000_l._ for his own private expenses, the Rajah could not realize a
sum nearly equal to the tribute demanded.
Your Lordships have also in evidence before you an account of the
produce of the country for I believe full five years after this period,
from which it appears that it never realized the forty lacs, or anything
like it,--yielding only thirty-seven and thirty-nine lacs, or
thereabouts, which is 20,000_l._ short of Mr. Markham's estimate, and
160,000_l._ short of Mr. Hastings's. On what data could the prisoner at
your bar have formed this estimate? Where were all the clerks and
mutsuddies, where were all the men of business in Benares, who could
have given him complete information upon the subject? We do not find the
trace of any of them; all our information is Mr. Markham's moonshee, and
some clerk of Durbege Sing's employed in Mr. Markham's private
counting-house, in estimating revenues of a country.
The disposable revenue was still further reduced by the jaghires which
Mr. Hastings granted, but to what amount does not appear. He mentions
the increase in the revenue by the confiscation of the estates of the
Baboos, who had been in rebellion. This he rates at six lacs. But we
have inspected the accounts, we have examined them with that sedulous
attention which belongs to that branch of the legislature that has the
care of the public revenues, and we have not found one trace of this
addition. Whether these confiscations were ever actually made remains
doubtful; but if they were made, the application or the receipt of the
money they yielded does not appear in any account whatever. I leave your
Lordships to judge of this.
But it may be said that Hastings might have been in an error. If he was
in an error, my Lords, his error continued an extraordinary length of
time. The error itself was also extraordinary in a man of business: it
was an error of account. If his confidential agent, Mr. Markham, had
originally contributed to lead him into the error, he soon perceived it.
He soon informed Mr. Hastings that his expectations were erroneous, and
that he had overrated the country. What, then, are we to think of his
persevering in this error? Mr. Hastings might have formed extravagant
and wild expectations, when he was going up the country to plunder; for
we allow that avarice may often overcalculate the hoards that it is
going to rob. If a thief is going to plunder a banker's shop, his
avarice, when running the risk of his life, may lead him to imagine
there is more money in the shop than there really is. But when this man
was in possession of the country, how came he not to know and understand
the condition of it better? In fact, he was well acquainted with it; for
he has declared it to be his opinion that forty lacs was an overrated
calculation, and that the country could not continue to pay this tribute
at the very time he was imposing it. You have this admission in page 294
of the printed Minutes; but in the very face of it he says, if the Rajah
will exert himself, and continue for some years the regular payment, he
will then grant him a remission. Thus the Rajah was told, what he well
knew, that he was overrated, but that at some time or another he was to
expect a remission. And what, my Lords, was the condition upon which he
was to obtain this promised indulgence? The punctual payment of that
which Mr. Hastings declares he was not able to pay,--and which he could
not pay without ruining the country, betraying his own honor and
character, and acting directly contrary to the duties of the station in
which Mr. Hastings had placed him. Thus this unfortunate man was
compelled to have recourse to the most rigorous exaction, that he might
be enabled to satisfy the exorbitant demand which had been made upon
him.
But let us suppose that the country was able to afford the sum at which
it was assessed, and that nothing was required but vigor and activity in
the Rajah. Did Mr. Hastings endeavor to make his strength equal to the
task imposed on him? No: the direct contrary. In proportion as he
augmented the burdens of this man, in just that proportion he took away
his strength and power of supporting these burdens. There was not one of
the external marks of honor which attended the government of Cheyt Sing
that he did not take away from the new Rajah; and still, when this new
man came to his new authority, deprived of all external marks of
consequence, and degraded in the opinion of his subjects, he was to
extort from his people an additional revenue, payable to the Company, of
fifteen lacs of rupees more than was paid by the late Rajah in all the
plenitude of undivided authority. To increase this difficulty still
more, the father and guardian of this inexperienced youth was a man who
had no credit or reputation in the country. This circumstance alone was
a sufficient drawback from the weight of his authority; but Mr. Hastings
took care that he should be divested of it altogether; for, as our
charge states, he placed him under the immediate direction of Mr.
Markham, and consequently Mr. Markham was the governor of the country.
Could a man with a reduced, divided, contemptible authority venture to
strike such bold and hardy strokes as would be efficient without being
oppressive? Could he or any other man, thus bound and shackled, execute
such vigorous and energetic measures as were necessary to realize such
an enormous tribute as was imposed upon this unhappy country?
My Lords, I must now call your attention to another circumstance, not
mentioned in the charge, but connected with the appointment of the new
Rajah, and of his Naib, Durbege Sing, and demonstrative of the unjust
and cruel treatment to which they were exposed. It appears from a letter
produced here by Mr. Markham, (upon which kind of correspondence I shall
take the liberty to remark hereafter,) that the Rajah lived in perpetual
apprehension of being removed, and that a person called Ussaun Sing was
intended as his successor. Mr. Markham, in one part of his
correspondence, tells you that the Rajah did not intend to hold the
government any longer. Why? Upon a point of right, namely, that he did
not possess it upon the same advantageous terms as Cheyt Sing; but he
tells you in another letter, (and this is a much better key to the whole
transaction,) that he was in dread of that Ussaun Sing whom I have just
mentioned. This man Mr. Hastings kept ready to terrify the Rajah; and
you will, in the course of these transactions, see that there is not a
man in India, of any consideration, against whom Mr. Hastings did not
keep a kind of pretender, to keep him in continual awe. This Ussaun
Sing, whom Mr. Hastings brought up with him to Benares, was dreaded by
Cheyt Sing not less than by his successor. We find that he was at first
nominated Naib or acting governor of the country, but had never been put
in actual possession of this high office, and Durbege Sing was appointed
to it. Although Ussaun Sing was thus removed, he continued his
pretensions, and constantly solicited the office. Thus the poor man
appointed by Mr. Hastings, and actually in possession, was not only
called upon to perform tasks beyond his strength, but was overawed by
Mr. Markham, and terrified by Ussaun Sing, (the mortal enemy of the
family,) who, like an accusing fiend, was continually at his post, and
unceasingly reiterating his accusations. This Ussaun Sing was, as Mr.
Markham tells you, one of the causes of the Rajah's continued dejection
and despondency. But it does not appear that any of these circumstances
were ever laid before the Council; the whole passed between Mr. Hastings
and Mr. Markham.