When the antient nobility, the great princes (for such I may call them) a nobility, perhaps, as antient as that of your lordships (and a more truly noble body never existed in that character;) my lords, when all the nobility, some of whom have borne the rank and port of princes, all the gentry, all the freeholders of the country, had their estates in that manner confiscated, that is, either given to themselves to hold on the footing of farmers, or totally confiscated; when such an act of tyranny was done, no doubt, some good was pretended. This confiscation was made by Mr. Hastings, and the lands let to these farmers for five years, upon an idea, which always accompanies his acts of oppression, the idea of monied merit. He adopted this mode of confiscating the estates, and letting them to farmers, for the avowed purpose of seeing how much it was possible to take out of them. Accordingly he set them up to this wild and wicked auction, as it would have been, if it had been a real one-corrupt and treacherous, as it was. He set these lands up for the purpose of making that discovery, and pretended, that the discovery would yield a most amazing increase of rent. And for some time it appeared so to do, till it came to the touchstone of experience; and then it was found, that there was a defalcation from these monstrous raised revenues, which were to cancel in the minds of the directors the wickedness of so atrocious, flagitious, and horrid an act of treachery. At the end of five years what do you think was the failure?—No less than 2,050,000l. Then a new source of corruption was opened, that is, how to deal with the balances for every man, who had engaged in these transactions, was a debtor to government, and the remission of that debt depended upon the discretion of the governour-general. Then the persons, who were to settle the composition of that immense debt, who were to see how much was recoverable, and how much not, were able to favour, or to exact to the last shilling; and there never existed a doubt, but that, not only upon the original cruel exaction, but upon the remission afterwards, immense gains were derived. This will account for the manner, in which those stupendous fortunes, which astonish the world, have been made. They 19

VOL. VII.

have been made-first, by a tyrannous exaction from the people, who were suffered to remain in possession of their own land as farmers, then by setting the rest to farmers at rents and under hopes, which could never be realized, and then getting money for the relaxation of their debts. But whatever excuse, and however wicked, there might have been for this wicked act, namely, that it carried upon the face of it some sort of appearance of publick good, that is to say, that sort of publick good, which Mr. Hastings so often professed, of ruining the country for the benefit of the company; yet, in fact, this business of balances is that nidus, in which have been nustled and bred and born all the corruptions of India ;--first, by making extravagant demands, and afterwards by making corrupt relaxations of them.

Besides this monstrous failure in consequence of a miserable exaction, by which more was attempted to be forced from the country than it was capable of yielding, and this by way of experiment, when your lordships come to inquire who the farmers-general of the revenue were, you would naturally expect to find them to be the men in the several countries, who had the most interest, the greatest wealth, the best knowledge of the revenue and resources of the country, in which they lived. These would be thought the natural proper farmers-general of each district. No such thing, my lords. They are found in the body of people, whom I have mentioned to your lordships. They were almost all let to Calcutta banyans. Calcutta banyans were the farmers of almost the whole. They sub-delegated to others, who sometimes had sub-delegates under them ad infinitum. The whole formed a system together through the succession of black tyrants scattered through the country, in which you at last find the European at the end, sometimes indeed not hid very deep, not above one between him and the farmer, namely, his banyan directly, or some other black person to represent him. But some have so managed the affair, that when you inquire who the farmer is— Was such a one farmer ?—No. Cantoo Baboo ?—-No. Another ?—No: at last you find three deep of fictitious farmers, and you find the European gentlemen, high in place

and authority, the real farmers of the settlement.

So that

the zemindars were dispossessed, the country racked and ruined for the benefit of an European, under the name of a farmer for you will easily judge whether these gentlemen had fallen so deeply in love with the banyans, and thought so highly of their merits and services, as to reward them with all the possessions of the great landed interest of the country. Your lordships are too grave, wise and discerning, to make it necessary for me to say more upon that subject. Tell me, that the banyans of English gentlemen, dependants on them at Calcutta, were the farmers throughout, and I believe I need not tell your lordships, for whose benefit they were farmers.

But there is one of these, who comes so nearly, indeed so precisely within this observation, that it is impossible for me to pass him by. Whoever has heard of Mr. Hastings's name, with any knowledge of Indian connexions, has heard of his banyan Cantoo Baboo. This man is well known in the records of the company, as his agent for receiving secret gifts, confiscations and presents. You would have imagined, that he would at least have kept him out of these farms, in order to give the measure a colour at least of disinterestedness, and to show, that this whole system of corruption and pecuniary oppression was carried on for the benefit of the company. The governour-general and council made an ostensible order, by which no collector, or person concerned in the revenue, should have any connexion with these farms. This order did not include the governour-general in the words of it, but more than included him in the spirit of it because his power to protect a farmer-general in the person of his own servant was infinitely greater than that of any subordinate person. Mr. Hastings, in breach of this order, gave farms to his own banyan. You find him the farmer of great, of vast and extensive farms.

Another regulation, that was made on that occasion, was, that no farmer should have, except in particular cases, which were marked, described, and accurately distinguished, a greater farm than what paid 10,000l. a year to government. Mr. Hastings, who had broken the first regulation by giving

any farm at all to his banyan, finding himself bolder, broke the second too, and, instead of 10,000l. gave him farms paying a revenue of 130,000l. a year to government. Men undoubtedly have been known to be under the dominion of their domestics: such things have happened to great men; they never have happened justifiably in my opinion. They have never happened excusably; but we are acquainted sufficiently with the weakness of human nature to know, that a domestick, who has served you in a near office long, and in your opinion faithfully, does become a kind of relation: it brings on a great affection and regard for his interest. Now was this the case with Mr. Hastings and Cantoo Baboo? Mr. Hastings was just arrived at his government, and Cantoo Baboo had been but a year in his service; so that he could not in that time have contracted any great degree of friendship for him. These people do not live in your house; the Hindoo servants never sleep in it; they cannot eat with your servants; they have no second table, in which they can be continually about you, to be domesticated with yourself, a part of your being, as people's servants are to a certain degree. These persons live all abroad; they come at stated hours upon matters of business, and nothing more. But if it had been otherwise, Mr. Hastings's connexion with Cantoo Baboo had been but of a year's standing: he had before served in that capacity Mr. Sykes, who recommended him to Mr. Hastings. Your lordships then are to judge, whether such outrageous violations of all the principles, by which Mr. Hastings pretended to be guided in the settlement of these farms, were for the benefit of this old, decayed, affectionate servant of one year's standing-your lordships will judge of that.

I have here spoken only of the beginning of a great notorious system of corruption; which branched out so many ways, and into such a variety of abuses, and has afflicted that kingdom with such horrible evils from that day to this, that I will venture to say it will make one of the greatest, weightiest, and most material parts of the charge, that is now before you; as I believe I need not tell your lordships, that an attempt to set up the whole landed interest of a king

dom to auction must be attended, not only in that act but every consequential act, with most grievous and terrible consequences.

My lords, I will now come to a scene of peculation of another kind; namely, a peculation by the direct sale of offices of justice; by the direct sale of the successions of families; by the sale of guardianships, and trusts, held most sacred among the people of India; by the sale of them, not as before to farmers, not as you might imagine to near relations of the families, but a sale of them to the unfaithful servants of those families, their own perfidious servants, who had ruined their estates, who, if any balances had accrued to the government, had been the cause of those debts. Those very servants were put in power over their estates, their persons and their families by Mr. Hastings for a shameful price. It will be proved to your lordships in the course of this business, that Mr. Hastings has done this in another sacred trust, the most sacred trust a man can have; that is, in the case of those vackiels (as they call them) agents, or attornies, who had been sent to assert and support the rights of their miserable masters before the council-general. It will be proved, that these vackiels were by Mr. Hastings, for a price to be paid for it, put in possession of the very power, situation, and estates of those masters, who sent them to Calcutta to defend them from wrong and violence. The selling offices of justice, the sale of succession in families, of guardianships and other sacred trusts, the selling masters to their servants, and principals to the attornies they employed to defend themselves, were all parts of the same system; and these were the horrid ways, in which he received bribes beyond any common rate.

When Mr. Hastings was appointed in the year 1773 to be governour-general of Bengal, together with Mr. Barwell, General Clavering, Colonel Monson, and Mr. Francis, the company, knowing the former corrupt state of their service (but the whole corrupt system of Mr. Hastings at that time not being known, or even suspected at home) did order them, in discharge of the spirit of the act of parliament, to make an inquiry into all manner of corruptions and malver