disturb the security of all persons possessing instruments already so ratified, yet the only conclusion left to Fyzoola Khân which did not involve some affront either to the private honor of the Company's servants or to the public honor of the Company itself; and that the suspicions which originated from the said idea in the breast of Fyzoola Khân to the prejudice of the Resident Middleton's authority did compel the Governor-General, Warren Hastings, to obviate the bad effects of his first motion for the guaranty by a second motion, namely, "That a letter be written to Fyzoola Khân from myself, confirming the obligations of the Company as guaranties to the treaty formed between him and the Vizier,-which will be equivalent in its effect, though not in form, to an engagement sent him with the Company's seal affixed to it.”

XII.* That, whether the guaranty aforesaid was or was not necessary, whether it created a new obligation or but more fully recognized an obligation previously existing, the Governor-General, Warren Hastings, by the said guaranty, did, in the most explicit manner, pledge and commit the public faith of the Company and the nation; and that by the subsequent letter of the said Hastings (which he at his own motion wrote, confirming to Fyzoola Khân the aforesaid guaranty) the said Hastings did again pledge and commit the public faith of the Company and the nation, in a manner (as the said Hastings himself remarked) "equivalent to an engagement with the Company's seal affixed to it," and more particularly binding the said Hastings personally to exact a due observance of the guarantied treaty, es

* Sic orig.

pecially to protect the Nabob Fyzoola Khân against any arbitrary construction or unwarranted requisition of the Vizier.

PART IV.

THANKS OF THE BOARD TO FYZOOLA KHÂN.

I. THAT, Soon after the completion of the guaranty, in the same year, 1778, intelligence was received in India of a war between England and France; that, on the first intimation thereof, the Nabob Fyzoola Khân, "being indirectly sounded," did show much "promptness to render the Company any assistance within the bounds of his finances and ability"; and that by the suggestion of the Resident, Middleton, hereinbefore named, he, the Nabob Fyzoola Khân, in a letter to the Governor-General and Council, did make a voluntary "offer to maintain two thousand cavalry (all he had) for our service," "though he was under no obligation to furnish the Company with a single man."

66

an

II. That the Nabob Fyzoola Khân did even ticipate the wishes of the board"; and that, "on an application made to him by Lieutenant-Colonel Muir," the Nabob Fyzoola Khân did, " without hesitation or delay," furnish him, the said Muir, with five hundred of his best cavalry.

That the said conduct of the Nabob Fyzoola Khân was communicated by the Company's servants both to each other and to their employers, with expressions of "pleasure" and "particular satisfaction," as an event "even surpassing their expectations"; that the Governor-General, Warren Hastings, was officially

requested to convey "the thanks of the board"; and that, not satisfied with the bare discharge of his duty under the said request, he, the said Hastings, did, on the 8th of January, 1779, write to Fyzoola, "that, in his own name," as well as "that of the board, he [the said Hastings] returned him the warmest thanks for this instance of his faithful attachment to the Company and the English nation."

IV. That by the strong expressions above recited the said Warren Hastings did deliberately and emphatically add his own particular confirmation to the general testimony of the Nabob Fyzoola Khan's meritorious fidelity, and of his consequent claim on the generosity, no less than the justice, of the British government.

PART V.

DEMAND OF FIVE THOUSAND HORSE.

I. THAT, notwithstanding his own private honor thus deeply engaged, notwithstanding the public justice and generosity of the Company and the nation thus solemnly committed, disregarding the plain import and positive terms of the guarantied treaty, the Governor-General, Warren Hastings aforesaid, in November, 1780, while a body of Fyzoola Khân's cavalry, voluntarily granted, were still serving under a British officer, did recommend to the Vizier "to require from Fyzoola Khân the quota of troops stipulated by treaty to be furnished by the latter for his [the Vizier's] service, being FIVE THOUSAND HORSE," though, as the Vizier did not march in person, he

* Sic orig.

was not, under any construction of the treaty, entitled by stipulation to more than "two or three thousand troops," horse and foot," according to the ability of Fyzoola Khân"; and that, whereas the said Warren Hastings would have been guilty of very criminal perfidy, if he had simply neglected to interfere as a guaranty against a demand thus plainly contrary to the faith of treaty, so he aggravated the guilt of his perfidy in the most atrocious degree by being himself the first mover and instigator of that injustice, which he was bound by so many ties on himself, the Company, and the nation, not only not to promote, but, by every exertion of authority, influence, and power, to control, to divert, or to resist.

II. That the answer of Fyzoola Khân to the Vizier did represent, with many expressions of deference, duty, and allegiance, that the whole force allowed him was but "five thousand men," and that "these consisted of two thousand horse and three thousand foot; which," he adds, "in consequence of our intimate connection, are equally yours and the Company's": though he does subsequently intimate, that "the three thousand foot are for the management of the concerns of his jaghire, and without them the collections can never be made in time."

That, on the communication of the said answer to the Governor-General, Warren Hastings, he, the said Hastings, (who, as the Council now consisted only of himself and Edward Wheler, Esquire, " united in his own person all the powers of government,") was not induced to relax from his unjust purpose, but did proceed with new violence to record, that "the Nabob Fyzoola Khân had evaded the perform

ance of his part of the treaty between the late Nabob Sujah ul Dowlah and him, to which the Honorable Company were guaranties, and upon which he was lately summoned to furnish the stipulated number of troops, which he is obliged to furnish on the condition by which he holds the jaghire granted to him."

That, by the vague and indefinite term of evasion, the said Warren Hastings did introduce a loose and arbitrary principle of interpreting formal engagements, which ought to be regarded, more especially by guaranties, in a sense the most literally scrupulous and precise.

That he charged with such evasion a moderate, humble, and submissive representation on a point which would have warranted a peremptory refusal and a positive remonstrance; and that in consequence of the said imputed evasion he indicated a disposition to attach such a forfeiture as in justice could only have followed from a gross breach of treaty,- though the said Hastings did not then pretend any actual infringement even of the least among the conditions to which, in the name of the Company, he, the said Hastings, was the executive guaranty.

III. That, however "the number of troops stipulated by treaty may have been understood," at the period of the original demand, "to be five thousand horse," yet the said Warren Hastings, at the time when he recorded the supposed evasion of Fyzoola Khân's answer to the said demand, could not be unacquainted with the express words of the stipulation, as a letter of the Vizier, inserted in the same Consultation, refers the Governor-General to inclosed copies "of all engagements entered into by the late Vizier