Note 220 — FOOTNOTES: CHAPTER 12 CHAP. XIII.

"The question is," Mr. Vansittart observes, in a letter to Clive, dated the 25th of February, 1763, "whether the salt, beetle-nut, and tobacco trade shall be carried on with the Company's dustuck, or pay duties to the country government, and go with their dustuck. I am of the latter opinion, and assured the Nabob I would not grant dustucks for these articles, but that myself and any other English gentlemen who had a mind to trade in them, should pay the government's duties and take out their dustuck. This, and some rules I proposed for restraining the overgrown power of the English gomastahs employed in carrying on this trade, and giving the officers of the government their due authority, were disapproved by the rest of the Council; and it was resolved to call down the members from the subordinates to make the necessary regulations upon these points at a full board. * * * * Where the abuses will end I know not; for where the Nabob's officers have the power and the courage to oppose and prevent the unlawful attempts of our gomastahs, they are not contented with that, but, in their turn, oppress and injure in a most extravagant and insufferable manner, so that it is a difficult matter to keep a proper balance; and I shall be obliged to you if you will take an opportunity of giving Mr. Sulivan your sentiments on the subject."

A very different view of this subject is taken by Major Carnac. In a letter to Clive, dated the 26th of February, 1763, he observes: "Mr. Vansittart's interview with the Nabob, instead of removing our grievances, has occasioned their being exceedingly multiplied and carried beyond sufferance. He, in conjunction with Mr. Hastings, without consulting the rest of the Board, established a set of regulations, whereby a duty of 9 per cent. is laid upon all articles of inland trade without exception; and the disputes of our gomastahs and others in our employ are subjected to the decisions of the Nabob's officers. These concessions are so evidently shameful and disadvantageous to us, that it is not to be conceived they could ever have been submitted to, except by persons who were bought into them; and, indeed, it is confidently asserted, and generally believed, that Mr. Vansittart got seven lacs by his visit to Mongyr. The members of the Council, then at Calcutta, passed a severe minute of censure upon the President's procedure, and summoned the absent members, in order to devise a speedy and effectual remedy for the complaints received from every quarter. They have been some time assembled, and have absolutely forbid the regulations being complied with, and have issued out orders to repel by force any insults that shall in future be offered, or obstructions to our trade. It is, indeed, high time," he adds, "to overset the ruinous system which Mr. Vansittart has so industriously endeavoured to establish: by a strange contradiction, he deposes one Nabob under pretence of mal-administration, and then asserts the successor to be independent, and master of his own actions, and uses all possible means to render him so, and to increase his power. We have so sensibly felt the ill use made thereof by Cossim Ali Khan, that the man must be wilfully blind who does not see the necessity of immediately checking his career, and the consequences that must result from his being suffered to run on." From these observations, it may safely be concluded, that the gallant Major was a better soldier than statesman.