CHAPTER XIII.

REIGN OF GEORGE III.--(_continued_).

Victory of Pitt--The King's delight--Pitt's Finance--The India

Bill--Pitt's Budget--The Westminster Election--The Scrutiny--Fox

is returned--The Volunteers in Ireland--Flood's Reform Bill--Riots

in Ireland--Pitt's Commercial Policy for Ireland--Opposition

of the English Merchants--Abandonment of the Measure--Pitt's

Reform Bill--His Administrative Reforms--Bill for fortifying

Portsmouth and Plymouth--Pitt's Sinking Fund--Favourable

Reception of the Bill--Pitt's Excise Bill--Commercial Treaty

with France--Impeachment of Warren Hastings--Retrospect of

Indian Affairs: Deposition of Meer Jaffier--Resistance of Meer

Cossim--Massacre of Patna--Battle of Buxar and Capture of

Allahabad--Clive's Return to India--Settlement of Bengal and

Oude--Domestic Reforms--Rise of Hyder Ali--His Treaty with the

English--He is defeated by the Mahrattas--Deposition of the

Rajah of Tanjore--Failure of Lord Pigot to reinstate him--Lord

North's Regulating Bill--Death of Clive--Warren Hastings becomes

Governor-General--His dealings with the Famine--Treatment of

Reza Khan and the Nabob of Bengal--Resumption of Allahabad and

Corah--Massacre of the Rohillas--Arrival of the New Members of

Council--Struggle for Supremacy--Robbery of Cheyte Sing--Nuncomar's

Charges--His Trial and Execution--Hastings' Constitutional

Resignation--His Final Victory--Wars against the Mahrattas--Hyder

Ali's Advance--Defeat of Baillie--Energy of Hastings--Victories of

Sir Eyre Coote--Capture of Dutch Settlements--Naval Engagements

between the British and French--Death of Hyder Ali--Tippoo

continues the War--He invokes Peace--Hastings' extortions

from Cheyte Sing--Hastings' visit to Benares--Rising of the

People--Rescue of Hastings and Deposition of Cheyte Sing--Extortion

from the Begums of Oude--Parliamentary Inquiries--Hastings'

Reception in England--Burke's Motion of Impeachment--Pitt's

Change of Front--The Prince of Wales and the Whigs--Inquiry into

his Debts--Alderman Newnham's Motion--Denial of the Marriage

with Mrs. Fitzherbert--Sheridan's Begum Speech--Impeachment of

Hastings--Growth of the Opposition to the Slave Trade--The Question

brought before Parliament--Evidence Produced--Sir W. Dolben's

Bill--Trial of Warren Hastings--Speeches of Burke, Fox, and

Sheridan--Illness of the King--Debates on the Regency Bill--The

King's Recovery--Address of the Irish Parliament to the Prince of

Wales.

The General Election of 1784 secured for Pitt a prolonged tenure of

power. The king, in opening the Session, could not repress the air

of triumph, and congratulated the Houses on the declared sense of

his people, not forgetting to designate Fox's India Bill as a most

unconstitutional measure. In fact, no one was so delighted as the king.

He had contemplated the victory of Fox and his friends over Pitt with

actual horror. He had never liked Fox, and the violent and overbearing

manner in which he had endeavoured to compel the king to dismiss his

Ministers had increased his aversion into dread and repugnance. In

his letters to Pitt he had said, "If these desperate and factious men

succeed, my line is a clear one, to which I have fortitude to submit."

Again: "Should not the Lords stand boldly forth, this Constitution must

soon be changed; for if the two remaining privileges of the Crown are

infringed, that of negativing the Bills which have passed both Houses

of Parliament, and that of naming the Ministers to be employed, I

cannot but feel, as far as regards my person, that I can be no longer

of utility to this country, nor can with honour, remain in the island."

In fact, George was menacing, a second time, a retreat to Hanover; a

step, however, which he was not very likely to adopt. The sentiment

which the words really express is his horror of the heavy yoke of

the great Whig Houses. The Addresses from both Houses of Parliament

expressed equal satisfaction in the change, Pitt's triumphant majority

having now rejected the amendments of the Opposition.

On the 21st of June Pitt introduced and carried several resolutions,

which formed the basis of his Commutation Act. These went to check

smuggling, by reducing the duty on tea from fifty to twelve and a half

per cent., and to raise the house and window tax so as to supply the

deficiency. A Bill was then passed to make good another deficiency in

the Civil List, to the amount of sixty thousand pounds. Early in August

Mr. Pitt brought in his India Bill, which differed chiefly from his

former one in introducing a Government Board of Commissioners, with

power to examine and revise the proceedings of the Court of Directors.

This, which afterwards acquired the name of the Board of Control, was

opposed by Fox, but passed both Houses with little trouble.

Before this great measure had passed, Pitt had introduced his Budget.

On the 30th of June he made his financial statement. He said that

the resources of the country were in a very burthened and disordered

state; but that was not his work, but the work of his predecessors. The

outstanding arrears, owing to the late war, were already ascertained

to amount at least to fourteen million pounds. These operated very

injuriously on the public credit, being at a discount of from fifteen

to twenty per cent.; and that without greatly affecting the public

securities, he should not be able to find more than six million six

hundred thousand six hundred pounds of them at once. To meet the

interest, he proposed to raise taxes to the amount of nine hundred

thousand pounds a year. The imposts--some entirely new, and some

augmented--were on hats, ribbons, gauzes, coals, saddle and pleasure

horses, printed linens and calicoes, candles, paper, and hackney

coaches; licences to deal in excisable commodities, bricks, and tiles;

licences for shooting game.

[Illustration: GENERAL ELECTION OF 1784: MASTER BILLY'S PROCESSION TO

GROCERS' HALL--PITT PRESENTED WITH THE FREEDOM OF THE CITY OF LONDON.

(_Reduced facsimile of the Caricature by T. Rowlandson._)]

The duties on bricks and tiles were opposed, as affecting brick-makers

rather than the public, because stones and slates were not included.

These duties were, however, carried, and the Bill passed; but great

discontent arising regarding the duties on coals and on licences to

deal in excisable commodities, the Chancellor of the Exchequer was

obliged to produce a supplementary Budget, and, after withdrawing

these, to lay others on the sale of ale, gold and silver plate, the

exportation of lead, and postage of letters, at the same time limiting

the privilege of franking. It was high time that the latter practice

were put under regulation, for the privilege was enormously abused.

Till this time, a simple signature of a member of Parliament, without

name of the post town whence it was sent, or date, freed a letter all

over the kingdom. Many persons had whole quires of these signatures,

and letters were also addressed to numbers of places where they did not

reside, so that, by an arrangement easily understood, the persons they

were really meant for received them post-free. The loss to Government

by this dishonest system was calculated at one hundred and seventy

thousand pounds a year. By the present plan, no member was to permit

any letter to be addressed to him except at the place where he actually

was; and he was required, in writing a frank, to give the name of the

post town where he wrote it, with the dates of day and year, and to

himself write the whole address.

On the 20th of August the Appropriation Bill and other measures of

routine having been carried through with great triumph by the Ministry,

the king prorogued the Parliament, which did not meet again till the

25th of January following. Fox came into the new Parliament in a very

remarkable and anomalous position. In the election for Westminster,

the candidates had been, besides himself, Admiral Lord Hood and Sir

Cecil Wray. The election was of the most violent kind, distinguished

by drunkenness, riot, and gross abuses. It continued from April the

1st to the 16th of May, and the numbers on the poll-books, at its

termination, stood as follows:--For Lord Hood, 6,694; for Fox, 6,233;

for Sir Cecil Wray, 5,598. The Prince of Wales had shown himself one of

the most ardent partisans of Fox, all the more, no doubt, because Fox

was detested by the king. The prince had displayed from his carriage

the "Fox favour and laurel," and, at the conclusion of the poll, had

given a grand _fête_ at Carlton House to more than six hundred Foxites,

all wearing "blue and buff." The Duchess of Devonshire and other lady

politicians also gave Fox substantial help. But Fox was not allowed

to triumph so easily. The Tory candidate, Sir Cecil Wray, as was well

understood, instigated and supported by the Government, demanded a

scrutiny; and Corbett, the high bailiff, in the circumstances, could

make no return of representatives for Westminster. As a scrutiny in so

populous a district, and with the impediments which Government and its

secret service money could throw in the way, might drag on for a long

period, and thus, as Government intended, keep Fox out of Parliament,

he got himself, for the time, returned for a small Scottish borough, to

the no small amusement of his enemies.

[Illustration:

_Sir Cecil Wray._ _Sam House (Publican on the side of Fox)._

_Charles James Fox._

GENERAL ELECTION OF 1784: THE HUSTINGS, COVENT GARDEN: THE WESTMINSTER

DESERTER DRUMMED OUT OF THE REGIMENT--DEFEAT OF SIR CECIL WRAY.

(_Reduced facsimile of the Caricature by T. Rowlandson._)]

Almost immediately on the meeting of the House of Commons, Welbore

Ellis demanded whether a return had been made for Westminster, and

being answered in the negative, moved that Mr. Corbett, the high

bailiff, with his assessor, should attend the House; and the next

day, February 2nd, Colonel Fitzpatrick presented a petition from the

electors of Westminster, complaining that they were not legally and

duly represented. In fact, the scrutiny had now been going on for

eight months, and as not even two of the seven parishes of Westminster

were yet scrutinised, it was calculated that, at this rate, the whole

process would require three years, and the city would, therefore,

remain as long unrepresented. The high bailiff stated that the

examinations, cross-examinations, and arguments of counsel were so

long, that he saw no prospect of a speedy conclusion; and Mr. Murphy,

his assessor, gave evidence that each vote was tried with as much form

and prolixity as any cause in Westminster Hall; that counsel--and this

applied to both sides--claimed a right to make five speeches on one

vote; and that propositions had been put in on the part of Sir Cecil

Wray to shorten the proceedings, but objected to on the part of Mr. Fox.

On the 18th of February, Colonel Fitzpatrick, Fox's most intimate

friend, presented another petition from the electors of Westminster,

praying to be heard by counsel, in consequence of new facts having

come to light, but Lord Frederick Campbell, on the part of Government,

moved that such counsel should not argue against the legality of the

scrutiny. The counsel, on being admitted, refused to plead under

such restrictions. The House then called in the high bailiff, and

demanded what the new facts were on which the petition was based, and

he admitted that they were, that the party of Mr. Fox had offered to

take the scrutiny in the parishes of St. Margaret's and St. John's

alone, where Mr. Fox's interest was the weakest, in order to bring the

scrutiny to an end, and that Sir Cecil Wray had declined the offer.

Colonel Fitzpatrick then moved that the high bailiff should be directed

to make a return, according to the lists on the close of the poll on

the 17th of May last. This motion was lost, but only by a majority of

nine, showing that the opinion of the House was fast running against

the new Minister, and on the 3rd of March Alderman Sawbridge put the

same question again, when it was carried by a majority of thirty-eight.

It was clear that the Government pressure could be carried no further.

Sawbridge moved that the original motion should be put, and it was

carried without a division. The next day the return was made, and

Fox and Lord Hood were seated as the members for Westminster. Fox

immediately moved that the proceedings on this case should be expunged

from the journals, but without success. He also commenced an action

against the high bailiff for not returning him at the proper time, when

duly elected by a majority of votes. He laid his damages at two hundred

thousand pounds, and the trial came on before Lord Loughborough,

formerly Mr. Wedderburn, in June of the following year, 1786, when

the jury gave him immediately a verdict, but only for two thousand

pounds, which he said should be distributed amongst the charities of

Westminster.

The king's speech, at the opening of this Session, recommended a

consideration of the trade and general condition of Ireland; and

indeed it was time, for the concessions which had been made by the

Rockingham Ministry had only created a momentary tranquillity. The

Volunteers retaining their arms in their hands after the close of the

American war, were evidently bent on imitating the proceedings of the

Americans, and the direction of the movement passed from Grattan to

Flood. In September, 1785, delegates from all the Volunteer corps in

Ireland met at Dungannon, representing one hundred thousand men, who

passed resolutions declaring their independence of the legislature

of Great Britain. The delegates at Dungannon claimed the right to

reform the national Parliament, and appointed a Convention to meet

in Dublin in the month of November, consisting of delegates from the

whole Volunteer army in Ireland. Accordingly, on the 10th of November,

the great Convention met in Dublin, and held their meetings in the

Royal Exchange. They demanded a thorough remodelling of the Irish

Constitution. They declared that as matters stood the Irish House of

Commons was wholly independent of the people; that its term of duration

was equally unconstitutional; and they passed zealous votes of thanks

to their friends in England. These friends were the ultra-Reformers of

England, who had freely tendered the Irish Reformers their advice and

sympathy. The Irish people were ready to hail the delegates as their

true Parliament, and the regular Parliament as pretenders. Within

Parliament House itself the most violent contentions were exhibited

between the partisans of the Volunteer Parliament and the more orthodox

reformers. Henry Flood was the prominent advocate of the extreme

movement, and Grattan, who regarded this agitation as certain to end

only in fresh coercion, instead of augmented liberty for Ireland,

vehemently opposed it.

On the 29th of November Flood moved for leave to bring in a Bill for

the more equal representation of the people. This was the scheme of

the Volunteer Parliament, and all the delegates to the Convention who

were members of the House, or had procured admittance as spectators,

appeared in uniform. The tempest that arose is described as something

terrific. The orders of the House, the rules of debate, the very rules

of ordinary conduct amongst gentlemen, were utterly disregarded. The

fury on both sides was uncontrollable. The motion was indignantly

rejected by one hundred and fifty-seven votes against seventy-seven;

and the House immediately voted a cordial Address to his Majesty,

declaring their perfect satisfaction with the blessings enjoyed

under his auspicious reign, and the present happy Constitution, and

their determination to support him with their lives and fortunes.

On the 13th of March Mr. Flood introduced his Bill once more, for

equalising the representation of the people in Parliament. It proposed

to abolish the right of boroughs altogether to send members, and to

place the franchise in the people at large. Sir John Fitzgibbon, the

Attorney-General, stoutly opposed it; Grattan dissented from it, and it

was thrown out on the motion to commit it.

Exasperated at the failure of this measure, a furious mob broke into

the Irish House of Commons on the 15th of April, but they were soon

quelled, and two of the ringleaders seized. The magistrates of Dublin

were censured for observing the gathering of the mob and taking no

measures to prevent its outbreak. The printer and supposed publisher

of the _Volunteers' Journal_ were called before the House and

reprimanded, and a Bill was brought in and passed, to render publishers

more amenable to the law. The spirit of violence still raged through

the country. Tumultuous associations were formed under the name of

Aggregate Bodies.

Commercial and manufacturing distress was severe in the country, and

the unemployed workmen flocked into Dublin and the other large towns,

demanding relief and menacing the police, and directing their fury

against all goods imported from England. On the 2nd of January, 1785,

a Congress sat in Dublin, consisting of delegates from twenty-seven

counties, and amounting to about two hundred individuals. They held

adjourned meetings, and established corresponding committees in

imitation of their great models, the Americans. In truth, many of the

leaders of these present movements drew their inspiration now from

American Republican correspondents, as they did afterwards from those

of France, by whom they were eventually excited to rebellion.

The Government of England saw the necessity of coming to some

conclusion on the subject of Irish commerce, which should remove the

distress, and, as a consequence, the disorder. The Irish Government, at

the instigation of the English Administration, sent over Commissioners

to consult with the Board of Trade in London, and certain terms being

agreed upon, these were introduced by Mr. Orde, the Secretary to the

Lord-Lieutenant, to the Irish House of Commons, on the 7th of February.

These were, that all articles not of the growth of Great Britain or

Ireland should be imported into each country from the other, under

the same regulations and duties as were imposed on direct importation,

and with the same drawbacks; that all prohibitions in either country

against the importation of articles grown, produced, or manufactured

in the other should be rescinded, and the duties equalised. There were

some other resolutions relating to internal taxation, to facilitate the

corn trade, and some details in foreign and international commerce.

These, after some debate, were passed on the 11th, and, being agreed to

by the Lords, were transmitted to England.

On the 22nd of February the English House of Commons resolved itself

into a Committee, on the motion of Pitt, to consider these resolutions.

Pitt spoke with much freedom of the old restrictive jealousy towards

Ireland. He declared that it was a system abominable and impolitic;

that to study the benefit of one portion of the empire at the expense

of another was not promoting the prosperity of the empire as a whole.

He contended that there was nothing in the present proposals to alarm

the British manufacturer or trader. Goods, the produce of Europe,

might now be imported through Ireland into Britain by authority of the

Navigation Act. The present proposition went to allow Ireland to import

and then to export the produce of our colonies in Africa and America

into Great Britain. Beyond the Cape of Good Hope, or the Straits of

Magellan, they could not go, on account of the monopoly granted to the

East India Company.

Delay was demanded, to hear what was the feeling of merchants and

manufacturers in England, and these soon poured in petitions against

these concessions, from Liverpool, Manchester, and other places; one

of them, from the Lancashire manufacturers, being signed by eighty

thousand persons. After two months had been spent in receiving these

petitions, hearing evidence and counsel, Mr. Pitt introduced his

propositions on the 12th of May. It was then found that British

interests, as usual, had triumphed over the Ministerial intentions of

benefiting Ireland. Not only was Ireland to be bound to furnish, in

return for these concessions, a fixed contribution out of the surplus

of the hereditary revenue towards defraying the expenses of protecting

the general commerce, but to adopt whatever navigation laws the British

Parliament might hereafter enact. Lord North and Fox opposed these

propositions, on the ground that the cheapness of labour in Ireland

would give that country an advantage over the manufacturers in this.

The resolutions were at length carried both in the Committee and in

the House at large on the 25th of July.

But the alterations were fatal to the measure in Ireland. Instead

now of being the resolutions passed in the Irish Parliament, they

embraced restrictive ones originating in the British Parliament--a

point on which the Irish were most jealous, and determined not to

give way. No sooner did Mr. Orde, the original introducer of the

resolutions to the Irish Parliament, on the 2nd of August, announce his

intention to introduce them as they now stood, than Flood, Grattan,

and Dennis Browne declared the thing impossible; that Ireland never

would surrender her birthright of legislating for herself. Mr. Orde,

however, persisted in demanding leave to introduce a Bill founded

on these resolutions, and this he did on the 12th of August. Flood

attacked the proposal with the utmost vehemence. Grattan, Curran, and

others declared that the Irish Parliament could hear no resolutions

but those which they themselves had sanctioned. Accordingly, though

Mr. Orde carried his permission to introduce his Bill, it was only by

a majority of nineteen, and under such opposition that, on the 15th,

he moved to have it printed for the information of the country, but

announced that he should proceed no further in it at present. This

was considered as a total abandonment of the measure, and there was

a general rejoicing as for a national deliverance, and Dublin was

illuminated. But in the country the spirit of agitation on the subject

remained: the non-importation Associations were renewed, in imitation

of the proceedings in Boston, and the most dreadful menaces were

uttered against all who should dare to import manufactured goods from

England. The consequences were the stoppage of trade--especially in

the seaports--the increase of distress and of riots, and the soldiers

were obliged to be kept under arms in Dublin and other towns to prevent

outbreaks.

Before the Irish affairs were done with, Pitt moved for leave to bring

in his promised Reform Bill. If Pitt were still desirous of reforming

Parliament, it was the last occasion on which he showed it, and it may

reasonably be believed that he introduced this measure more for the

sake of consistency than for any other purpose. He had taken no steps

to prepare a majority for the occasion; every one was left to do as he

thought best, and his opening observations proved that he was by no

means sanguine as to the measure passing the House. "The number of

gentlemen," he said, "who are hostile to reform are a phalanx which

ought to give alarm to any individual upon rising to suggest such a

motion." His plan was to transfer the franchise from thirty-six rotten

boroughs to the counties, giving the copyholders the right to vote.

This plan would confer seventy-two additional members on the counties,

and thus, in fact, strengthen the representation of the landed interest

at the expense of the towns; and he proposed to compensate the boroughs

so disfranchised by money, amounting to £1,000,000. Wilberforce,

Dundas, and Fox spoke in favour of the Bill; Burke spoke against it.

Many voted against it, on account of the compensation offered, Mr.

Bankes remarking that Pitt was paying for what he declared was, in

any circumstances, unsaleable. The motion was lost by two hundred and

forty-eight against one hundred and seventy-four.

But though Pitt ceased to be a Parliamentary reformer--and by degrees

became the most determined opponent of all reform--he yet made an

immediate movement for administrative reform. He took up the plans of

Burke, praying for a commission to inquire into the fees, gratuities,

perquisites, and emoluments received in the public offices, with

reference to existing abuses. He stated that, already--acting on the

information of reports of the Board of Commissioners appointed in Lord

North's time--fixed salaries, instead of fees and poundages, had been

introduced in the office of the land-tax, and the Post Office was so

improved as to return weekly into the Treasury three thousand pounds

sterling, instead of seven hundred sterling. Similar regulations he

proposed to introduce into the Pay Office, the Navy and Ordnance

Office. He stated, also, that he had, when out of office, asserted that

no less than forty-four millions sterling was unaccounted for by men

who had been in different offices. He was ridiculed for that statement,

and it was treated as a chimera; but already twenty-seven millions of

such defalcations had been traced, and a balance of two hundred and

fifty-seven thousand pounds sterling was on the point of being paid in.

In fact, the state of the Government offices was, at that time, as it

had long been, such that it was next to impossible for any one to get

any business transacted there without bribing heavily. As a matter of

course, this motion was strongly opposed, but it was carried, and Mr.

Francis Baring and the two other Comptrollers of army accounts were

appointed the Commissioners.

[Illustration: VIEW OF LONDON FROM THE TOWER TO LONDON BRIDGE IN THE

LATTER PART OF THE 18TH CENTURY. (_After the Picture by Maurer._)]

The great financial questions of 1786 were the Duke of Richmond's

plan of fortifying Portsmouth and Plymouth, and Pitt's proposal of a

sinking fund to pay off the national debt, an excise duty on wines,

and Pitt's commercial treaty with France. During the previous Session

the Duke of Richmond, Master-General of the Ordnance, had proposed

a plan of fortifying these large arsenals, so that, in the supposed

absence of our fleet on some great occasion, they would be left under

the protection of regiments of militia, for whom enormous barracks

were to be erected. A board of officers had been appointed to inquire

into the advantages of the plan, and their report was now brought up

on the 27th of February, and introduced by Mr. Pitt, who moved that

the plan be adopted. This scheme was strongly opposed by General

Burgoyne, Colonel Barré, and others. Mr. Bastard moved an amendment

declaring the proposed fortifications inexpedient. He said the militia

had been called the school of the army, but to shut them up in these

strongholds, separate from their fellow-subjects, was the way to

convert them into universities for prætorian bands. He protested

against taking the defence of the nation from our brave fleet and

conferring it on military garrisons; tearing the ensign of British

glory from the mast-head, and fixing a standard on the ramparts of

a fort. The Bill was rejected, Fox, Sheridan, Windham, and all the

leading Oppositionists declaiming against it.

On the 21st of March a Committee which had been appointed early

in the Session to inquire into the public income and expenditure,

and to suggest what might in future be calculated on as the clear

revenue, presented its report through Mr. Grenville, their chairman.

On the 29th, Pitt, in a Committee of the whole House, entered upon

the subject, and detailed the particulars of a plan to diminish

progressively and steadily the further debt. It appeared from the

report of the Select Committee that there was, at present, a clear

surplus revenue of nine hundred thousand pounds sterling, and that this

surplus could, without any great additional burthen to the public, be

made a million per annum. This he declared to be an unexpected state of

financial vigour after so long and unfortunate a war. The plan which

he proposed was to pay two hundred and fifty thousand pounds quarterly

into the hands of Commissioners appointed for the purpose to purchase

stock to that amount, which was under par, or to pay stock above par,

and thus cancel so much debt. In addition to this, the annuities for

lives, or for limited terms, would gradually cancel another portion.

All dividends arising from such purchases were to be similarly applied.

Pitt calculated that by this process, and by the compound interest

on the savings to the revenue by it, in twenty-eight years no less

than four millions sterling per annum of surplus revenue would be

similarly applied, or employed for the exigencies of the State. By

this halcyon process he contemplated the eventual extinction of that

enormous debt, to pay the mere interest of which every nerve had been

stretched, and every resource nearly exhausted. In a delightful state

of self-gratulation, Pitt declared that he was happy to say that all

this was readily accomplishable; that we had nothing to fear, except

one thing--the possibility of any Minister in need violating this fund.

Had the original Sinking Fund, he said, been kept sacred, we should

have had now very little debt. To prevent the recurrence of this fatal

facility of Ministers laying their hands on this Fund, he proposed

to place it in the hands of Commissioners, and he declared that "no

Minister could ever have the confidence to come down to that House and

desire the repeal of so beneficial a law, which tended so directly to

relieve the people from their burthens." He added that he felt that he

had by this measure "raised a firm column, upon which he was proud to

flatter himself that his name might be inscribed." He said not a word

about the name of Dr. Price being inscribed there, to whom the whole

merit of the scheme belonged; he never once mentioned his name at all.

On his own part, Dr. Price complained not of this, but that he had

submitted three schemes to Pitt, and that he had chosen the worst.

The greater part of the House, as well as the public out of doors, were

captivated with the scheme, which promised thus easily to relieve them

of the monster debt; but Sir Grey Cooper was the first to disturb these

fairy fancies. He declared that the whole was based on a fallacious

statement; that it was doubtful whether the actual surplus was as

described; but even were it so, that it was but the surplus of a

particular year, and that it was like the proprietor of a hop-ground

endeavouring to borrow money on the guarantee of its proceeds in a

particularly favourable year. Fox, Burke, and Sheridan followed in the

same strain. They argued that, supposing the assumed surplus actually

to exist, which they doubted, it would immediately vanish in case of

war, and a fresh mass of debt be laid on. Sheridan said, the only mode

of paying off a million a year would be to make a loan of a million a

year, for the Minister reminded him of the person in the comedy who

said, "If you won't lend me the money, how can I pay you?" On the 14th

of May he moved a string of fourteen resolutions unfavourable to the

report of the Committee, which he said contained facts which could not

be negatived; but the House did negative them all without a division,

and on the 15th of May passed the Bill. In the Lords it met with some

proposals from Earl Stanhope, which were to render the violation of the

Act equivalent to an act of bankruptcy, but these were negatived, and

the Bill was passed there on the 26th. It was not until 1828 that the

fallacy on which the Bill rested was finally exposed by Lord Grenville,

who, curiously enough, had been chairman of the Committee which

recommended its adoption.

In order to enable the revenue to furnish the required million surplus

for the Sinking Fund, Pitt found it necessary to propose to extend

the excise laws to foreign wine, which had hitherto been under the

jurisdiction of the Custom House. He contended that, on a moderate

calculation, the sum lost to the revenue by the frauds in the trade

in wine amounted to upwards of two hundred and eighty thousand pounds

per annum. To remedy this, and to prevent at once smuggling and the

adulteration of wine, the excise officers were to have free access to

the cellars of all who sold wine, but not into private ones. To abate

that repugnance to the law which excise laws awaken in the public mind,

Pitt stated that the change would not amount to more than thirteen

thousand pounds a year, and that not more than one hundred and seventy

additional officers would be required, who could add little to the

influence of the Crown, as they were by law incapable of voting at

elections. He carried his Bill with little difficulty through the

Commons; but in the Lords, Lord Loughborough made a decided set against

it, and pointed out one most shameful provision in it--namely, that in

case of any suit against an exciseman for improper seizure, a jury was

prohibited giving more damages than twopence, or any costs of suit,

or inflicting a fine of more than one shilling if the exciseman could

show a probable cause for such a seizure. Lord Loughborough declared

justly that this was a total denial of justice to the complaint

against illegal conduct on the part of excisemen, for nothing would

be so easy as for the excise to plead false information as a probable

cause. It was a disgraceful infringement of the powers of juries, and

Lord Loughborough called on Lord Camden to defend the sacred right of

juries as he had formerly done. Camden was compelled to confess that

the clause was objectionable; but that to attempt an alteration would

destroy the Bill for the present Session, and so it was suffered to

pass with this monstrous provision.

The commercial treaty with France, Pitt's greatest achievement as a

financier, was not signed until the recess--namely, in September. It

was conceived entirely in the spirit of Free Trade, and was an honest

attempt to establish a perpetual alliance between the two nations. Its

terms were:--That it was to continue in force for twelve years; with

some few exceptions prohibitory duties between the two countries were

repealed; the wines of France were admitted at the same rate as those

of Portugal; privateers belonging to any nation at war with one of the

contracting parties might no longer equip themselves in the ports of

the other; and complete religious and civil liberty was granted to the

inhabitants of each country while residing in the other. One result of

the treaty was the revival of the taste for light French wines which

had prevailed before the wars of the Revolution, and a decline in the

sale of the fiery wines of the Peninsula. But the treaty was bitterly

attacked by the Opposition. Flood reproduced the absurd argument that

wealth consists of money, and that trade can only be beneficial to

the country which obtains the largest return in gold. Fox and Burke,

with singular lack of foresight, declaimed against Pitt for making a

treaty with France, "the natural political enemy of Great Britain," and

denounced the perfidy with which the French had fostered the American

revolt. In spite of the illiberality of these arguments, Pitt, with

the acquiescence of the commercial classes, carried the treaty through

Parliament by majorities of more than two to one.

But, in spite of the importance of these measures, there was one

question which engrossed the attention of both parliament and the

public far more than any other. This was the demand by Burke for the

impeachment of Warren Hastings, late Governor-General of Bengal,

for high crimes and misdemeanours there alleged to have been by him

committed. It therefore becomes necessary at this point to resume our

narrative of Indian affairs from the year 1760, which our connected

view of the events of the American war necessarily suspended.

At the point at which our former detail of Indian affairs ceased,

Lord Clive had gone to England to recruit his health. He had found us

possessing a footing in India, and had left us the masters of a great

empire. He had conquered Arcot and other regions of the Carnatic;

driven the French from Pondicherry, Chandernagore, and Chinsura; and

though we had left titular princes in the Deccan and Bengal, we were,

in truth, masters there; for Meer Jaffier, though seated on the throne

of Bengal, was our mere instrument.

The English having deposed Suraja Dowlah, the nabob of Bengal, and set

up their tool, the traitor Meer Jaffier, who had actually sold his

master, the nabob, to them, the unfortunate Nabob was soon assassinated

by the son of Meer Jaffier. But Meer Jaffier, freed thus from the

fear of the restoration of the Nabob, soon began to cabal against his

patrons, the English. Clive was absent, and the government conducted by

Mr. Henry Vansittart, a man of little ability in his course of policy.

All discipline ceased to exist amongst the English; their only thought

was of enriching themselves by any possible means. Meer Jaffier was not

blind to this. He saw how hateful the English were making themselves

in the country, and was becoming as traitorous to them as he had been

to his own master. Early, therefore, in the autumn of 1760, Vansittart

and Colonel Caillaud marched to Cossimbazar, a suburb of Moorshedabad,

where Meer Jaffier lived, at the head of a few hundred troops, and

offered certain terms to him. Meer Jaffier appeared to shuffle in his

answer; and, without more ceremony, the English surrounded his palace

at the dead of night, and compelled him to resign, but allowed him to

retire to Fort William, under the protection of the British flag; and

they then set up in his stead Meer Cossim, his son-in-law.

Meer Cossim, for a time, served their purpose. They obtained, as

the price of his elevation, a large sum of money and an accession

of territory. But he was not a man of the obsequious temper of Meer

Jaffier. He removed his court from Moorshedabad to Monghyr, two hundred

miles farther from Calcutta. He increased and disciplined his troops;

he then made compulsory levies on the English traders, from which

they had always claimed exemption. There was a loud outcry, and a

determined resistance on the part of the English; but Meer Cossim not

only continued to compel them to pay the same revenue dues as others,

but imprisoned or disgraced every man of note in his dominions who

had ever shown regard to the English. It was clear that he chafed

under the impositions of his elevators, and meant to free himself from

them and their obligations together. It was in vain that the English

Council in Calcutta uttered warning and remonstrance; there was the

most violent controversy between the English factory at Patna and Meer

Cossim. Vansittart hastened to Monghyr, to endeavour to arrange matters

with Cossim. He consented to the payment, by the English, of the inland

revenue to the amount of nine per cent.; and on his part he accepted a

present for himself from Cossim of seven lacs of rupees, or upwards of

seventy thousand pounds. But on this occasion, though Vansittart had

pocketed this large bribe from Meer Cossim, the council in Calcutta,

who got nothing, voted the terms most dishonourable, and sent a fresh

deputation to Cossim at Monghyr. This deputation was headed by Mr.

Amyott; but as it went to undo what Vansittart had just done, Cossim,

who saw no end of exactions, and no security in treating with the

English, caused his troops to fall on the unfortunate deputation as

they passed through Moorshedabad, and they were all cut to pieces. Here

was an end to all agreement with this impracticable man, so the Council

immediately decreed the deposition of Meer Cossim, and the restoration

of the more pliant puppet, Meer Jaffier.

The English took the field in the summer of 1763 against Meer Cossim

with six hundred Europeans and one thousand two hundred Sepoys. Major

Adams, the commander of this force, was vigorously resisted by Meer

Cossim, but drove him from Moorshedabad, gained a decided victory

over him on the plains of Geriah, and, after a siege of nine days,

reduced Monghyr. Driven to his last place of strength in Patna, and

feeling that he must yield that, Meer Cossim determined to give one

parting example of his ferocity to his former patrons, as, under

their protection, he had given many to his own subjects. He had taken

prisoners the English belonging to the factory at Patna, amounting to

one hundred and fifty individuals. These he caused to be massacred by a

renegade Frenchman in his service, named Sombre. On the 5th of October

his soldiers massacred all of them except William Fullarton, a surgeon

known to the Nabob. The mangled bodies of the victims were thrown

into two wells, which were then filled up with stones. This done, the

monster Cossim fled into Oude, and took refuge with its Nabob, Sujah

Dowlah. The English immediately entered Patna, which was still reeking

with the blood of their countrymen, and proclaimed the deposition of

Meer Cossim, and the restoration of Meer Jaffier as Nabob of Bengal.

[Illustration: DEPOSITION OF MEER JAFFIER. (_See p._ 316.)]

The Nabob of Oude zealously embraced the cause of Meer Cossim. He

possessed not only great resources in his own province, but he

possessed additional authority with the natives from having received

also at his court the titular emperor of Delhi, Shah Allum, who, though

driven from his throne and territory by the Mahrattas, was still in the

eyes of the people the Great Mogul. With the Great Mogul in his camp,

and appointed vizier by him, Sujah Dowlah advanced at the head of fifty

thousand men against Major Adams and his little army, now numbering

about one thousand two hundred Europeans and eight thousand Sepoys.

Before the two armies came in sight of each other Adams died, and the

command was assumed by Major, afterwards Sir Hector Munro. Munro led

his army to Buxar, more than a hundred miles higher up the Ganges.

There, in the month of October, 1764, he came into conflict with the

army of Oude, and put it thoroughly to the rout, killing four thousand

men and taking one hundred and thirty pieces of cannon and much spoil.

The next day the Great Mogul went over to the stronger party. He had

no further hope of assistance from Sujah Dowlah, and so he rode, with

a few followers, to the British camp. He was received most willingly,

for, though the British had shown no disposition to recognise his

authority, now he was in their hands they acknowledged him as the

rightful sovereign of Hindostan, and lost no time in concluding a

treaty with him; and, on condition of his yielding certain territories

to them, they agreed to put him in possession of Allahabad and the

other states of the Nabob of Oude. After this, Munro continuing the

war against Sujah Dowlah, endeavoured to take the hill fort of Chunar,

in which all the treasures of Cossim were said to be deposited,

but failed. On his part, Sujah Dowlah had obtained the assistance

of Holkar, a powerful Mahratta chief, and, with this advantage,

endeavoured to make a better peace with Munro; but that officer

declined treating, unless Cossim and the assassin, Sombre, were first

given up to him. Dowlah proposed, instead of this surrender of those

who had sought his protection, the usually triumphant argument with

the English, a large sum of money. But Munro replied that all the

lacs of rupees in Dowlah's treasury would not satisfy him without the

surrender of the murderers of his countrymen at Patna. Dowlah, though

he would not surrender the fugitives, had no objection to give a secret

order for the assassination of Sombre; but Munro equally spurned this

base proposal, and the war went on. Munro was victorious, and early in

1765, having reduced the fort of Chunar and scattered Dowlah's army, he

entered Allahabad in triumph, and put the Mogul in possession of it.

In 1765 Clive embarked for India for the third and last time. He

went out with the firm determination to curb and crush the monster

abuses that everywhere prevailed in our Indian territories. He

had made a fortune of forty thousand pounds a year, and he was,

therefore, prepared to quash the system by which thousands of others

were endeavouring to do the same. No man was sharper than Clive in

perceiving, where his own interest was not concerned, the evils which

were consuming the very vitals of our power, and making our name odious

in Hindostan. The first and most glaring abuse of power which arrested

his attention was as regarded his old puppet, Meer Jaffier. He had

lately died, and his own court had proposed to set up his legitimate

grandson; but the Council preferred his natural son, Nujeem-ul-Dowlah,

a poor spiritless youth, who agreed that the English should take the

military defence of the country, and also appoint a Prime Minister to

manage the revenue and other matters of government. The Council agreed

to this, and received a present from the nabob of their creation of

one hundred and forty thousand pounds, which they divided amongst

themselves. This was directly in opposition to the recent order of the

Court of Directors, not to accept any presents from the native princes;

but, as Clive states, he found them totally disregarding everything but

their own avarice.

Nujeem-ul-Dowlah, their new puppet, proposed to have one Nuncomar as

his Prime Minister, but Nuncomar was too great a rogue even for them.

He had alternately served and betrayed the English, and his master,

Meer Jaffier, and the Council set him aside, and appointed to that

office Mohammed Reza Khan, a Mussulman of far better character. Clive

confirmed the appointment of Mohammed, but compelled Nujeem-ul-Dowlah

to retire from the nominal office of Nabob, on a pension of thirty-two

lacs of rupees.

The very name of Clive brought the war with Oude to a close. Sujah

Dowlah was encamped on the borders of Bahar, strongly reinforced by

bands of Mahrattas and Afghans, and anxious for another battle. But no

sooner did he learn that Clive was returned, than he informed Cossim

and Sombre that as he could no longer protect them, they had better

shift for themselves. He then dismissed his followers, rode to the

English camp, and announced that he was ready to accept such terms

of peace as they thought reasonable. Clive proceeded to Benares to

settle these terms. The council of Calcutta had determined to strip

Sujah Dowlah of all his possessions, but Clive knew that it was far

more politic to make friends of powerful princes. He therefore allowed

Sujah Dowlah to retain the rank and title of vizier, and gave him back

all the rest of Oude, except the districts of Allahabad and Corah,

which had been promised to Shah Allum as an imperial domain. On Shah

Allum, as Great Mogul, he also settled, on behalf of the Company, an

annual payment of twenty-six lacs of rupees. Thus the heir of the great

Aurungzebe became the tributary of the East India Company.

In return for this favour, Clive obtained one of infinitely more

importance. It was the transfer of the sole right of dominion

throughout the provinces of Bengal, Orissa, and Bahar. All that vast

territory was thus made the legal and valid property of the East

India Company. The conveyance was ratified by public deed, which was

delivered by the Great Mogul to Clive in presence of his court, the

throne on which he was elevated during this most important ceremony

being an English dining-table, covered with a showy cloth. And of this

prince--who was entirely their own puppet--the British still continued

to style themselves the vassals, to strike his coins at their mint,

and to bear his titles on their public seal! Clive saw the immense

importance of maintaining the aspect of subjects to the highest native

authority, and of avoiding alarming the minds of the native forces by

an open assumption of proprietorship. By this single treaty, at the

same time that he had freed the Company from all dependence on the

heirs of Meer Jaffier, he derived the Company's title to those states

from the supreme native power in India; and he could boast of having

secured to his countrymen an annual revenue of two millions of money.

Thus began a system which has played a leading part in our Indian

history.

Having thus arranged with the natives, Clive came to the far more

arduous business of compelling the Europeans to conform to the orders

of the Company, that no more presents should be received. In his

letters home he recommended that to put an end to the examples of

corruption in high places, it was necessary that the Governor of Bengal

should have a larger salary; that he and others of the higher officers

should be prohibited from being concerned in trade; that the chief seat

of government should be at Calcutta; and the Governor-General should

have the authority, in cases of emergency, to decide independently of

the Council. These were all sound views, but to carry them out required

the highest exercise of his authority. He exacted a written pledge

from the civil servants of the Company that they would receive no

more presents from the native princes. To this there was considerable

objection, and some resigned; but he carried this through, nominally

at least. To sweeten the prohibition of civil servants engaging in

trade, he gave them a share in the enormous emoluments of the salt

monopoly--two hundred per cent. being laid on the introduction of salt,

one of the requisites of life to the natives, from the adjoining state

of Madras into that of Bengal.

With the military he had a far more violent contest. After the

battle of Plassey, Meer Jaffier had conferred on the officers of the

army what was called double batta, meaning an additional allowance

of pay. Clive had always told the officers that it was not likely

that the Company would continue this; and, now that the territories

of Jaffier were become virtually their own, he announced that this

must be discontinued. The Governor and Council issued the orders for

this abolition of the double batta; he received in reply nothing but

remonstrances. The officers, according to Burke's phrase, in his speech

of December 1st, 1783, "could not behold, without a virtuous emulation,

the moderate gains of the civil service." Clive was peremptory, and

found his orders openly set at defiance by nearly two hundred officers,

headed by no less a person than his second in command, Sir Robert

Fletcher. These gentlemen had privately entered into a bond of five

hundred pounds to resign on the enforcement of the order, and not

to resume their commissions unless the double batta was restored.

To support such as might be cashiered, a subscription was entered

into, to which the angry civilians of Calcutta are said to have added

sixteen thousand pounds. The conspirators flattered themselves that,

in a country like India, held wholly by the sword, Clive could not

dispense with their services for a single day. They were mistaken. On

receiving the news of this military strike, Clive immediately set off

for the camp at Monghyr. He was informed that two of the officers vowed

that if he came to enforce the order, they would shoot or stab him.

Undaunted by any such threats, although in failing health, and amid

drenching rains, he pursued his journey, and, on arriving, summoned

the officers of the army, and, treating the threats of assassination

as those of murderers, and not of Englishmen, he reasoned with them on

the unpatriotic nature of their conduct. His words produced the desired

effect on many; the privates showed no disposition to support their

officers in their demand, and the sepoys all shouted with enthusiasm

for Sabut Jung, their ideal of a hero. The younger officers, who had

been menaced with death if they did not support the conspiracy, now

begged to recall their resignation, and Clive allowed it. He ordered

Sir Robert Fletcher and all who stood out into arrest, and sent them

down the Ganges to take their trial at Calcutta. Many are said to have

departed with tears in their eyes. By this spirited conduct Clive

crushed this formidable resistance, and averted the shame which he

avowed not all the waters of the Ganges could wash out--that of a

successful mutiny.

Whilst showing this firmness towards others, Clive found it necessary

to maintain it in himself. In face of the orders of the Company which

he had been enforcing, that the British officials should receive

no more presents, the Rajah of Benares offered him two diamonds of

large size, and the Nabob-vizier, Sujah Dowlah, on the conclusion of

his treaty, a rich casket of jewels, and a large sum of money. Clive

declared that he could thus have added half a million to his fortune;

and our historians have been loud in his praises for his abstinence

on this occasion. Lord Mahon observes:--"All this time the conduct of

Clive was giving a lofty example of disregard of lucre. He did not

spare his personal resources, and was able, some years after, to boast

in the House of Commons that this his second Indian command had left

him poorer than it found him." Ill-health compelled him to return to

England in January, 1767.

[Illustration: THE GREAT MOGUL ENTERING THE ENGLISH CAMP. (_See p._

317.)]

Whilst Clive had been reducing our enemies in Bengal and Oude, a

more powerful antagonist than any whom we had yet encountered in

India was every day growing more formidable in Mysore, and combining

several of the petty chiefs of the different States of Madras as

his allies against us. He was now far more considerable than when he

had appeared against us as the ally of the French general, Lally, in

the neighbourhood of Pondicherry. Hyder Ali was a self-made man. He

was originally the grandson of a wandering fakir; then the captain

of banditti; then at the head of an army composed of freebooters;

continually growing in the number of his followers, and in the wealth

procured by plunder, he at length became Commander-in-Chief of the

Rajah of Mysore. Soon rising in his ambition, he seized the Rajah,

his master, pensioned him off with three lacs of rupees, and declared

himself the real Rajah. In 1761 he was become firmly established

on the throne of Mysore, but this distinction did not satisfy him.

He determined to be the founder of Mysore as a great kingdom, and

extended his power to near the banks of the Kistnah. There he was

met and repulsed by the Peishwa of the Mahrattas, who crossed the

Kistnah, defeated him repeatedly, seized some of his newly-acquired

territory, and levied on him thirty-two lacs of rupees. Hyder returned

to Seringapatam, which he had made his capital, and had strongly

fortified, and he thence conducted an expedition against Malabar, which

he conquered, and put the chiefs to death to make his hold of it the

more secure. It is unnecessary to go minutely into the history of the

next few years. Hyder organised an army of 100,000 men, officered by

Frenchmen, and sometimes in confederation with the Nizam of the Deccan,

sometimes in conjunction with the Mahrattas of the Western Ghauts,

waged perpetual war on the English. In 1769 Indian Stock fell sixty per

cent. The resources of the Company were fast becoming exhausted, when

Hyder Ali, by an artful feint, drew the English army, in the spring

of 1769, a hundred and forty miles to the south of Madras. Then, by a

rapid march, he suddenly appeared, with a body of five thousand horse,

on the heights of St. Thomas, overlooking Madras. The whole of the city

and vicinity, except the port of St. George itself, lay at his mercy.

The terrified Council, in all haste, offered most advantageous terms

of peace, which it was the very object of Hyder to accept, and that,

too, before the English commander, Colonel Smith, could arrive and

intercept his retreat. Hyder gladly consented to the terms, which were

those of mutual restitution, and of alliance and mutual defence: the

last, a condition which, with Hyder's disposition to aggrandisement,

was sure to bring the English into fresh trouble.

[Illustration: WARREN HASTINGS.]

This was immediately made evident. The treaty was concluded on the 4th

of April, 1769, and the first news was that Hyder had quarrelled with

the Mahrattas, and called on the Presidency of Madras to furnish the

stipulated aid. But the Presidency replied that he had himself sought

this war, and therefore it was not a defensive but an offensive war.

The Peishwa of the Mahrattas invaded Mysore, and drove Hyder to the

very walls of Seringapatam, dreadfully laying waste his territory.

Hyder then sent piteous appeals to his allies, the British, offering

large sums of money; but they still remained deaf. At another time,

they were solicited by the Mahratta chief to make an alliance with

him, but they determined to remain neutral, and left Hyder and the

Peishwa to fight out their quarrels. In 1771 the Mahrattas invaded the

Carnatic, but were soon driven out; and in 1772 the Mahrattas and Hyder

made peace through the mediation of the Nabob of the Carnatic, or of

Arcot, as he was more frequently called. Hyder had lost a considerable

portion of Mysore, and besides had to pay fifteen lacs of rupees, with

the promise of fifteen more. The refusal of the English to assist him

did not fail to render him more deeply hostile than ever to them.

During this period--from 1769 to 1772--Warren Hastings had been second

in the Council at Madras; but in the latter year he was promoted

to the head of the Council in Bengal. During this period, too, the

British had been brought into hostilities with the Rajah of Tanjore.

The history of these proceedings is amongst the very blackest of the

innumerable black proceedings of the East India Company. The Rajah of

Tanjore was in alliance with the Company. In 1762 they had guaranteed

to him the security of his throne; but now their great ally, Mohammed

Ali, the Nabob of the Carnatic, called to the English for help against

the Rajah. The conduct of honourable men would have been to offer

themselves as mediators, and so settle the business; but not by such

means was the whole of India to be won from the native princes. The

Rajah of the Carnatic offered to purchase the territory of Tanjore from

the British for a large sum. The latter, however, had guaranteed the

defence of these territories to the Rajah of Tanjore by express treaty.

No matter, they closed the bargain with the Rajah of the Carnatic;

they agreed to seize Tanjore, and make it over to Mohammed Ali. An

army assembled at Trichinopoly on the 12th of September, 1771, invaded

Tanjore, seized the Rajah and his family, and invested the whole of

Tanjore in the name of the Nabob of the Carnatic.

When these infamous doings were known in England, a feeling of horror

and indignation ran through the country. The East India Company was

compelled to send out Lord Pigot to Madras to do what Clive had so

vigorously done in Bengal--control and reverse the acts of the Council.

Pigot most honourably acquitted himself; liberated the outraged

Nabob of Tanjore and his family, and restored them. But Pigot had

not the same overawing name as Clive. The Council of Madras seized

him and imprisoned him, expelling every member of the Council that

had supported him. This most daring proceeding once more astonished

and aroused the public feeling of England. An order was sent out

to reinstate Lord Pigot, but, before it arrived, his grief and

mortification had killed him. Sir Thomas Rumbold, a most avaricious

man, was appointed to succeed him, and arrived in Madras in February,

1778, Major-General Hector Munro being Commander-in-Chief, and the army

of Hyder, one hundred thousand in number, already again menacing the

frontiers.

But we have far overshot the contemporary history of Bengal. The

Presidency thought it had greatly benefited by the reforms of Clive;

yet it had since been called upon to furnish large supplies of men and

money to support the unprincipled transactions at Madras, which we

have briefly detailed, and the India House, instead of paying the usual

dividends, was compelled to reduce them. Further, a terrible famine

devastated Bengal, and more than half the population are said to have

been swept away. This state of things compelled Parliament to turn its

attention to India. General Burgoyne, now active in the Opposition,

moved and carried, on the 13th of April, 1772, a resolution for the

appointment of a Select Committee of thirteen members to inquire into

Indian affairs; and Burgoyne, who was extremely hostile to Clive, was

appointed chairman. The committee went actively to work, and presented

two reports during the Session. After Parliament met again in November,

Lord North, who had conversed with Clive during the recess, called for

and carried a resolution for another and this time a secret committee.

As the Company was in still deeper difficulties, and came to Lord North

to borrow a million and a half, he lent them one million four hundred

thousand pounds, on condition that they should keep their dividends at

six per cent. until this debt was repaid, and afterwards at eight per

cent. He at the same time relieved them from the payment of the four

hundred thousand pounds per annum, imposed by Lord Chatham, for the

same period. This was done in February, 1773, and in April he brought

in a Bill at the suggestion of Clive, who represented the Court of

Proprietors at the India House as a regular bear-garden, on account of

men of small capital and smaller intelligence being enabled to vote.

By North's Bill it was provided that the Court of Directors should, in

future, instead of being annually elected, remain in office four years;

instead of five hundred pounds stock qualifying for a vote in the Court

of Proprietors, one thousand pounds should alone give a vote; three

thousand pounds, two votes; and six thousand pounds, three votes. The

Mayor's Court in Calcutta was restricted to petty cases of trade; and a

Supreme Court was established, to consist of a Chief Justice and three

puisne judges, appointed by the Crown. The Governor-General of Bengal

was made Governor-General of India. These nominations were to continue

for five years, and then to return to the Directors, but subject to the

approval of the Crown. Whilst the Bill was in progress, the members of

the new Council were named. Warren Hastings was appointed the first

Governor-General; and in his Council were Richard Barwell, who was

already out there, General Clavering, the Honourable Colonel Monson,

and Philip Francis. Another clause of Lord North's Bill remitted the

drawback on the Company's teas for export to America, an act little

thought of at the time, but pregnant with the loss of the Transatlantic

colonies. By these "regulating acts," too, as they were called, the

Governor-General, members of Council, and judges, were prohibited from

trading, and no person in the service of the king or Company was to

be allowed to receive presents from native princes, nabobs, or their

ministers or agents. Violent and rude, even, was the opposition raised

by the India House and all its partisans to these two Bills.

The passing of these Acts was marked by attacks on Lord Clive. Burgoyne

brought up a strong report from his Committee, and, on the 17th of

May, moved a resolution charging Clive with having, when in command of

the army in Bengal, received as presents two hundred and thirty-four

thousand pounds. This was carried; but he then followed it by another,

"That Lord Clive did, in so doing, abuse the power with which he was

entrusted, to the evil example of the servants of the public." As

it was well understood that Burgoyne's resolutions altogether went

to strip Clive of the whole of his property, a great stand was here

made. Clive was not friendless. He had his vast wealth to win over

to him some, as it inflamed the envy of others. He had taken care to

spend a large sum in purchasing small boroughs, and had six or seven

of his friends and kinsmen sitting for these places in Parliament.

He had need of all his friends. Throughout the whole of this inquiry

the most persistent and envenomed attacks were made upon him. He was

repeatedly questioned and cross-questioned, till he exclaimed, "I, your

humble servant, the Baron of Plassey, have been examined by the Select

Committee more like a sheep-stealer than a member of Parliament." Then

the House thought he had suffered enough, for nothing was clearer

than that justice required the country which was in possession of the

splendid empire he had won to acknowledge his services, whilst it

noted the means of this acquisition. Burgoyne's second resolution was

rejected, and another proposed by Wedderburn, the Solicitor-General,

adopted, "That Robert, Lord Clive, did, at the same time, render

great and meritorious services to this country." This terminated the

attack on this gifted though faulty man. His enemies made him pay the

full penalty of his wealth. They had struck him to the heart with

their poisoned javelins. From a boy he had been subject to fits of

hypochondriacal depression; as a boy, he had attempted his own life in

one of these paroxysms. They now came upon him with tenfold force, and

in a few months he died by his own hand (November 22, 1774).

From Clive, events cause us to pass at once to one accused of much

greater misdemeanours, and one whose administration terminated in

a more formal and extraordinary trial than that of Clive; a trial

made ever famous by the shining abilities and eloquence of Burke and

Sheridan, and the awful mysteries of iniquity, as practised by our

authorities in India, which were brought to the public knowledge by

them on this grand occasion. Hastings commenced his rule in Bengal

under circumstances which demanded rather a man of pre-eminent humanity

than of the character yet lying undeveloped in him. In 1770, under the

management of Mr. Cartier, a famine, as we have mentioned, broke out

in Bengal, so terrible that it is said to have swept away one-third of

the population of the state, and to have been attended by indescribable

horrors. The most revolting circumstance was, that the British were

charged with being the authors of it, by buying up all the rice in the

country, and refusing to sell it, except at the most exorbitant prices.

But the charge is baseless. Macaulay says, "These charges we believe to

have been utterly unfounded. That servants of the Company had ventured,

since Clive's departure, to deal in rice, is probable. That, if they

dealt in rice, they must have gained by the scarcity, is certain. But

there is no reason for thinking that they either produced or aggravated

the evil which physical causes sufficiently explain." Hastings promptly

introduced a change in the land-tax by means of which more revenue

was obtained with less oppression, and he also freed the country from

marauders.

Besides succeeding to the government of a country whose chief province

was thus exhausted, the finances of the Company were equally drained,

both in Calcutta and at home, and the Directors were continually crying

to Hastings for money, money, money! As one means of raising this

money, they sent him a secret order to break one of their most solemn

engagements with the native princes. When they bribed Meer Jaffier to

depose his master, by offering to set him in his seat, and received in

return the enormous sums mentioned for this elevation, they settled

on Meer Jaffier and his descendants an annual income of thirty-two

lacs of rupees, or three hundred and sixty thousand pounds. But Meer

Jaffier was now dead, and his eldest son died during the famine. The

second son was made Nabob, a weak youth in a weak government, and as

the Company saw that he could not help himself, they ordered Hastings

to reduce the income to one-half. This was easily done; but this was

not enough, disgraceful as it was. Mohammed Reza Khan, who had been

appointed by the Company the Nabob's Minister, on the ground that he

was not only a very able but a very honest man, they ordered to be

arrested on pretended pleas of maladministration. He and all his family

and partisans must be secured, but not in an open and abrupt way,

which might alarm the province; they were to be inveigled down from

Moorshedabad to Calcutta, on pretence of affairs of government, and

there detained. Nuncomar, the Hindoo, who had been displaced, in order

to set up Mohammed, who was a Mussulman, and who had been removed on

the ground of being one of the most consummate rogues in India, was to

be employed as evidence against Mohammed. Hastings fully carried out

the orders of the secret committee of the India House. He had Mohammed

seized in his bed, at midnight, by a battalion of sepoys; Shitab Roy,

the Minister of Bahar, who acted under Mohammed at Patna, was also

secured; and these two great officers and their chief agents were sent

down to Calcutta under guard, and there put into what Hastings called

"an easy confinement." In this confinement they lay many months, all

which time Nuncomar was in full activity preparing the charges against

them. Shitab Roy, like Mohammed, stood high in the estimation of his

countrymen of both faiths; he had fought on the British side with

signal bravery, and appears to have been a man of high honour and

feeling. But these things weighed for nothing with Hastings or his

masters in Leadenhall Street. He hoped to draw large sums of money from

these men; but he was disappointed. Though he himself arranged the

court that tried them, and brought up upwards of a hundred witnesses

against them, no malpractice whatever could be proved against them,

and they were acquitted. They were therefore honourably restored,

the reader will think. By no means. Such were not the intentions of

the Company or of Hastings. Whilst Mohammed and Shitab Roy had been

in prison, Hastings had been up at Moorshedabad, had abolished the

office of Minister in both Patna and Moorshedabad, removed all the

government business to Calcutta, cut down the income of the young

Nabob, Muharek-al-Dowla, to one half, according to his instructions,

and reduced the Nabob himself to a mere puppet. He had transferred the

whole government to Calcutta, with all the courts of justice, so that,

writes Hastings, "the authority of the Company is fixed in this country

without any possibility of competition, and beyond the power of any but

themselves to shake it."

The manner in which Hastings had executed the orders of the Directors

in this business showed that he was prepared to go all lengths in

maintaining their interests in India. He immediately proceeded to

give an equally striking proof of this. We have seen that when the

Mogul Shah Allum applied to the British to assist him in recovering

his territories, they promised to conduct him in triumph to Delhi,

and place him firmly on the grand throne of all India; but when, in

consequence of this engagement, he had made over to them by a public

grant, Bengal, Bahar, and Orissa, they found it inconvenient to fulfil

their contract, and made over to him Allahabad and Corah instead, with

an annual payment of twenty-six lacs of rupees--two hundred and sixty

thousand pounds. The payment of this large sum, too, was regarded by

the Company, now in the deepest debt, as unnecessary, and Hastings had

orders to reduce it. It appears that the money was at no time duly

paid, and had now been withheld altogether for more than two years. The

Mogul, thus disappointed in the promises of restoration by the English,

and now again in the payment of this stipulated tribute, turned to the

Mahrattas, and offered to make over the little provinces of Allahabad

and Corah, on condition that they restored him to the sovereignty of

Delhi. The Mahrattas gladly caught at this offer, and by the end of the

year 1771 they had borne the Mogul in triumph into his ancient capital

of Delhi. This was precisely such a case as the Directors were on the

watch for. In their letter to Bengal of the 11th of November, 1768,

they had said: "If the Emperor flings himself into the hands of the

Mahrattas, or any other Power, we are disengaged from him, and it may

open a fair opportunity of withholding the twenty-six lacs of rupees we

now pay him." The opportunity had now come, and was immediately seized

on by Hastings to rescind the payment of the money altogether, and he

prepared to annex the two provinces of Allahabad and Corah. These were

sold to the Nabob of Oude for fifty lacs of rupees. This bargain was

settled between the vizier and Hastings at Benares, in September, 1773.

[Illustration: BENARES. (_From a Photograph by Frith and Co._)]

But the Nabob of Oude held out new temptations of gain to Hastings. The

Rohillas, a tribe of Afghans, had, earlier in the century, descended

from their mountains and conquered the territory lying between the

Ganges and the mountains to the west of Oude. They had given it the

name of Rohilcund. These brave warriors would gladly have been allies

of the British, and applied to Sujah Dowlah to bring about such an

alliance. Dowlah made fair promises, but he had other views. He hoped,

by the assistance of the British, to conquer Rohilcund and add it to

Oude. He had no hope that his rabble of the plains could stand against

this brave mountain race, and he now artfully stated to Hastings that

the Mahrattas were at war with the Rohillas. If they conquered them,

they would next attack Oude, and, succeeding there, would descend the

Ganges and spread over all Bahar and Bengal. He therefore proposed

that the British should assist him to conquer Rohilcund for himself,

and add it to Oude. For this service he would pay all the expenses of

the campaign, the British army would obtain a rich booty, and at the

end he would pay the British Government besides the sum of forty lacs

of rupees. Hastings had no cause of quarrel with the Rohillas, but for

the proffered reward he at once acceded to the proposal. In April,

1774, an English brigade, under Colonel Champion, invaded Rohilcund,

and in a hard-fought field defeated the Rohillas. In the whole of

this campaign nothing could be more disgraceful in every way than the

conduct of the troops of Oude. They took care to keep behind during

the fighting, but to rush forward to the plunder. The Nabob and his

troops committed such horrors in plundering and massacreing not only

the Rohillas, but the native and peaceful Hindoos, that the British

officers and soldiers denounced the proceedings with horror. It was

now, however, in vain that Hastings called on the Nabob to restrain his

soldiers, for, if he did not plunder, how was he to pay the stipulated

forty lacs of rupees? and if he ruined and burnt out the natives, how

were they, Hastings asked, to pay any taxes to him as his new subjects?

All this was disgraceful enough, but this was not all. Shah Allum now

appeared upon the scene, and produced a contract between himself and

the Nabob, which had been made unknown to Hastings, by which the Nabob

of Oude stipulated that, on condition of the Mogul advancing against

the Rohillas from the south of Delhi, he should receive a large share

of the conquered territory and the plunder. The Nabob now refused to

fulfil the agreement, on the plea that the Mogul ought to have come and

fought, and Hastings sanctioned that view of the case, and returned to

Calcutta with his ill-gotten booty.

But Hastings had scarcely terminated these proceedings, when the new

members of Council, appointed under the Regulating Act, arrived. On the

19th of October, 1774, landed the three Councillors, Clavering, Monson,

and Francis; Barwell had been some time in India. The presence of the

three just arrived was eminently unwelcome to Hastings. He knew that

they came with no friendly disposition towards him, and that Philip

Francis, in particular, was most hostile. The letter of the Court of

Directors recommended unanimity of counsels, but nothing was further

from the views of the new members from Europe. As they were three,

and Hastings and Barwell only two, they constituted a majority, and

from the first moment commenced to undo almost everything that he had

done, and carried their object. They denounced, and certainly with

justice, the Rohilla war; they demanded that the whole correspondence

of Middleton, the agent sent to the court of Oude by Hastings, should

be laid before them. Hastings refused to produce much of it, as

entirely of a private and personal nature; and they asserted that this

was because these letters would not bear the light, and that the whole

of Hastings' connection with Sujah Dowlah was the result of mercenary

motives. In this they did the Governor-General injustice, for, though

he drew money sternly and by every means from the India chiefs and

people, it was rather for the Company than for himself. They ordered

the recall of Middleton from Oude, deaf to the protests of Hastings

that this was stamping his conduct with public odium, and weakening the

hands of government in the eyes of the natives. Still, Middleton was

recalled, and Mr. Bristow sent in his place. Hastings wrote home in the

utmost alarm both to the Directors and to Lord North, prognosticating

the greatest confusion and calamity from this state of anarchy; and

Sujah Dowlah, regarding the proceedings of the new members of Council

as directed against himself, and seeing in astonishment the authority

of Hastings apparently at an end, was so greatly terrified that he

sickened and died.

The Council now recalled the English troops from Rohilcund; and Bristow

demanded, in the name of the Council, from Asaph-ul-Dowlah, the young

Nabob, a full payment of all arrears; and announced that, Sujah Dowlah

being dead, the treaty with him was at an end. Under pressure of these

demands, Bristow, by instructions from the new regnant members of

the Council, compelled the young Nabob to enter into a fresh treaty

with them; and in this treaty they introduced a clause to the full as

infamous as anything which Hastings had done. In return for renewing

the possession of the provinces of Corah and Allahabad, they compelled

him to cede to them the territory of Cheyte Sing, the Rajah of Benares,

though this did not at all belong to the Nabob of Oude, and was,

moreover, guaranteed to Cheyte Sing by Hastings, in solemn treaty. The

revenue of Cheyte Sing, thus lawlessly taken possession of, amounted to

twenty-two millions of rupees; and the Nabob of Oude was also, on his

own account, bound to discharge all his father's debts and engagements

to the Company, and to raise greatly the pay to the Company's brigade.

Hastings utterly refused to sanction these proceedings; but the

Directors at home, who cared not how or whence money came, warmly

approved of the transactions.

At Calcutta, Francis, Clavering, and Monson were deeply engaged in

what appeared to them a certain plan for the ruin of Hastings. The

Maharajah Nuncomar, who styled himself the head of the Brahmins, came

forward and laid before them papers containing the most awful charges

against Hastings. These were that Hastings had encouraged him, at the

command of the Secret Committee, to produce charges against Mohammed

Rheza Khan and Shitab Roy, when they were in prison, in order to extort

money from them; and that Hastings had accepted a heavy bribe to allow

Mohammed to escape without punishment. Hastings broke up the Council,

declaring that he would not sit to be judged by his own Council. If

they had charges to prefer against him, they might form themselves

into a committee, and transmit such evidence as they received to

the Supreme Court of Justice at Calcutta, or to the Directors at

home. But the three declared themselves a majority, voted their own

competence to sit and try their own chief, and preferred another huge

charge introduced by Nuncomar--namely, that Hastings had appropriated

to himself two-thirds of the salary of the Governor of Hooghly, a

post formerly held by Nuncomar himself. They determined to introduce

Nuncomar to confront Hastings at his own Council board. Hastings

declared the Council not sitting; the three declared it sitting and

valid, and called in Nuncomar, who proceeded to detail his charges,

and ended by producing a letter from the Munny Begum, now Governor of

Oude, expressing the gratitude which she felt to the Governor-General

for her appointment as guardian of the Nabob, and that in token of this

gratitude she had presented him with two lacs of rupees. Immediately on

hearing that, Hastings declared the letter a forgery, and that he would

prove it so; and he was not long in procuring an absolute denial of

the letter from the Begum. Things being driven to this pass, Hastings

commenced an action against Nuncomar, Mr. Fowke, one of the most active

agents of the trio, and others, as guilty of a conspiracy against

him. This was supported by native witnesses, and the Supreme Court

of Justice, after a long and careful examination of the case, held

Nuncomar and Fowke to bail, and bound the Governor-General to prosecute.

But, on the 6th of May, a blow fell on Nuncomar from an unexpected

quarter. He was arrested and thrown into prison at the suit of a

merchant named Mohun Persaud. The charge was, that he had forged a

bond five years before. He had been brought to trial for this before

the Mayor's Court at Calcutta--the Supreme Court not then being in

existence. On this occasion, being in favour with Hastings, he had

procured his release; but now, the merchant seeing that Hastings'

favour was withdrawn, and that, therefore, he might have a better

chance against him, the charge was renewed. Hastings, on the trial,

declared before the Supreme Court that neither directly nor indirectly

had he promoted the prosecution. The opposition members were highly

incensed at this proceeding. Three days after Nuncomar's committal they

realised their threat of dismissing the Munny Begum, and appointed

Goordas, the son of Nuncomar, to her office. They sent encouraging

messages to Nuncomar in his prison, and made violent protests to

the judges against the prosecution. Their efforts were useless. The

trial came on in due course. One of the judges, Sir Robert Chambers,

had endeavoured to have Nuncomar tried on an earlier statute, which

included no capital punishment, for forgery was no capital crime by

the native laws. But Sir Elijah Impey and the other judges replied

that the new Act compelled them to try him on the capital plea, and

he had been, on this ground, refused bail. Nuncomar knew nothing of

our estimate of forgery, and he could not comprehend how a man of his

rank, and a Brahmin of high dignity, should be tried for his life on

such a charge. But he was found guilty, and condemned to be hanged.

Strong efforts were then made to have him respited till the judgment of

the Court of Directors could be taken on the question, but Impey and

the other judges declared that it could not be done unless they could

assign some sufficient reasons, and they contended that there were no

such reasons. Yet the new Acts expressly gave them this power, and,

what made it more desirable, was that no native of any rank had been

tried by the Supreme Court and the British law, and only one native

had ever been capitally convicted for forgery in any of our Indian

courts. Moreover, the indignity of hanging a high-caste Brahmin was so

outraging to the native feeling that it was deemed most impolitic to

perpetrate such an act. All was pleaded in vain; on the 5th of August,

1775, Nuncomar was brought out and publicly hanged, amid the terrified

shrieks and yells of the native population, who fled at the sight, and

many of them rushed into the sacred Ganges to purify them from the

pollution of ever witnessing such a scene. The death of Nuncomar put

an end to all hope of procuring any further native evidence against

Hastings. The natives were so terrified at this new kind of execution,

that nothing could convince them but that, in spite of the opposition

of his colleagues, Hastings was all powerful.