ing? Gobind Ram, the vizier's diplomatic minister at Calcutta. Suspicions perpetually arise in his mind, whether he is not cheated and imposed upon. He could never tell when he had Mr. Hastings fixed upon any point. He now finds him recommending Mr. Middleton, and then declaring that Mr. Middleton neglects the duty of his office, and gives him, Gobind Ram, information that is fraudulent, and directly contrary to the truth. He is let into various contradictory secrets, and becomes acquainted with innumerable frauds, falsehoods, and prevarications. He knew that the whole pretended government of Oude was from beginning to end a deception; that it was an imposture for the purpose of corruption and peculation. Such was the situation of the nabob's vakeel. The nabob himself was really at a loss to know who had and who had not the governor's confidence; whether he was acting in obedience to the orders of the court of directors, or whether their orders were not always to be disobeyed. He thus writes to Gobind Ram, who was exactly in the same uncertainty.

"As to the commands of Mr. Hastings, which you write on the subject of the distraction of the country, and the want of information from me, and his wishes that, as Mr. John Bristow has shown sincere wishes and attachment to Mr. Hastings, I should write for him to send Mr. John Bristow ; it would have been proper and necessary for you privately to have understood what were Mr. Hastings's real intentions. Whether the choice of sending Mr. John Bristow was his own desire, or whether it was in compliance with Mr. Macpherson's; that I might then have written conformably thereto; writings are now sent to you for both cases. Having privately understood the wishes of Mr. Hastings, deliver whichever of the writings he should order you, for I study Mr. Hastings's satisfaction; whoever is his friend is mine, and whoever is his enemy is mine; but in both these cases, my wishes are the same; that having consented to the paper of questions which Major Davy carried with him, and hav

ing given me the authority of the country, whomever he may afterwards appoint, I am satisfied; I am now brought to great distress by these gentlemen, who ruin me; in case of consent, I am contented with Majors Davy and Palmer. Hereafter, whatever may be Mr. Hastings's desire, it is best."

Here is a poor, miserable instrument, confessing himself to be such, ruined by Mr. Hastings's public agents, Mr. Middleton and Mr. Johnson; ruined by his private agents, Major Davy and Major Palmer; ruined equally by them all; and at last declaring in a tone of despair, "If you have a mind really to keep Major Davy and Major Palmer here, why I must consent to it. Do what you please with me; I am your creature; for God's sake, let me have a little rest."

Your lordships shall next hear what account Hyder Beg Khân, the vizier's prime minister, gives of the situation in which he and his master were placed.

Extract of a Letter from Hyder Beg Khân; received 21st April, 1785.

"I hope that such orders and commands as relate to the friendship between his highness and the company's governments and to your will, may be sent through Major Palmer, in your own private letters, or in your letters to the major, who is appointed from you at the presence of his highness, that, in obedience to your orders, he may properly explain your commands, and whatever affair may be settled, he may first secretly inform you of it; and afterwards his highness may, conformably thereto, write an answer, and I also may represent it. By this system, your pleasure will always be fully made known to his highness, and his highness and we will execute whatever may be your orders, without deviating a hair's breadth; and let not the representations of interested persons be approved of, because his highness makes no opposition to your will; and I, your servant, am ready in obedience and service, and I make no excuses."

Now, my lords, was there ever such a discovery made of the arcana of any public theatre? You see here behind the ostensible scenery all the crooked working of the machinery developed, and laid open to the world. You now see by what secret movement the master of the mechanism has conducted the great Indian opera, an opera of fraud, deceptions, and harlequin tricks. You have it all laid You have it all laid open before you. The ostensible scene is drawn aside; it has vanished from your sight. All the strutting signors, and all the soft signoras, are gone; and instead of a brilliant spectacle of descending chariots, gods, goddesses, sun, moon, and stars, you have nothing to gaze on but sticks, wire, ropes, and machinery. You find the appearance all false and fraudulent; and you see the whole trick at once. All this, my lords, we owe to Major Scott's trunk, which, by admitting us behind the scene, has enabled us to discover the real state of Mr. Hastings's government in India. And can your lordships believe, that all this mechanism of fraud, prevarication, and falsehood, could have been intended for any purpose but to forward that robbery, corruption, and peculation, by which Mr. Hastings has destroyed one of the finest countries upon earth! Is it necessary, after this, for me to tell you, that you are not to believe one word of the correspondence stated by him to have been received from India? This discovery goes to the whole matter of the whole government of the country. You have seen what that government was, and by and by you shall see the effects of it.

Your lordships have now seen this trunk of Mr. Scott's producing the effects of Aladdin's lamp; of which your lordships may read in books much more worthy of credit than Mr. Hastings's correspondence. I have given all the credit of this precious discovery to Mr. Scott's trunk; but, my lords, I find that I have to ask pardon for a mistake, in supposing the letter of Hyder Beg Khân to be a part of Mr. Hastings's correspondence. It comes from another quarter, not much less singular, and equally authentic and unimpeachable. But

though it is not from the trunk, it smells of the trunk; it smells of the leather. I was as proud of my imaginary discovery as Sancho Pancha was, that one of his ancestors had discovered a taste of iron in some wine; and another a taste of leather in the same wine; and that afterwards there was found in the cask a little key tied to a thong of leather, which had given to the wine a taste of both. Now, whether this letter tasted of the leather of the trunk, or of the iron of Mr. Macpherson, I confess, I was a little out in my suggestion and my taste. The letter in question was written by Hyder Beg Khân, after Mr. Hastings's departure, to Mr. Macpherson when he succeeded to the government. That gentleman thus got possession of a key to the trunk, and it appears to have been his intentions to follow the steps of his predecessor, to act exactly in the same manner, and in the same manner to make the nabob the instrument of his own ruin.

This letter was written by the nabob's minister to Sir John Macpherson, newly inaugurated into his government, and who might be supposed not to be acquainted with all the best of Mr. Hastings's secrets, nor to have had all the trunk correspondence put into his hands. However, here is a trunk extraordinary, and its contents are much in the manner of the other. The nabob's minister acquaints him with the whole secret of the system. It is plain that the nabob considered it as a system not to be altered; that there was to be nothing true, nothing above board, nothing open in the government of his affairs. When you thus see that there can be little doubt of the true nature of the government, I am sure, that hereafter, when we come to consider the effects of that government, it will clear up, and bring home to the prisoner at your bar, all we shall have to say upon this subject.

Mr. Hastings having thrown off completely the authority of the company, as you have seen;-having trampled upon those of their servants, who had manifested any symptom of independence, or who considered the orders of the directors as a rule of their conduct;-having brought every English

man under his yoke; and made them supple and fit instruments for all his designs; then gave it to be understood, that such alone were fit persons to be employed in important affairs of state. Consider, my lords, the effect of this upon the whole service. Not one man, that appears to pay any regard to the authority of the directors, is to expect that any regard will be paid to himself. So that this man not only rebels. himself in his own person against the authority of the company; but he makes all their servants join him in this very rebellion. Think, my lords, of this state of things; and I wish it never to pass from your minds, that I have called him the captain general of the whole host of actors in Indian iniquity, under whom that host was arrayed, disciplined, and paid. This language which I used was not, as fools have thought proper to call it, offensive and abusive; it is in a proper criminatory tone justified by the facts that I have stated to you; and in every step we take, it is justified more and more. I take it as a text, upon which I mean to preach; I take it as a text, which I wish to have in your lordships' memory from the beginning to the end of this proceeding. He is not only guilty of iniquity himself, but is at the head of a system of iniquity and rebellion; and will not suffer, with impunity, any one honest man to exist in India if he can help it. Every mark of obedience to the legal authority of the company is by him condemned; and if there is any virtue remaining in India, as I think there is, it is not his fault that it still exists there.

We have shown you the servile obedience of the natives of the country; we have shown you the miserable situation to which a great prince, at least a person who was the other day a great prince, was reduced by Mr. Hastings's system. We shall next show you that this prince, who, unfortunately for himself, became a dependant on the company, and thereby subjected to the will of an arbitrary government, is made by him the instrument of his own degradation, the instrument of his (the governor's) falsehoods; the instrument of