FOOTNOTES:

CHAP. XVIII.

While Lord Clive was every day more and more desirous of disengaging himself from the vexatious and unsatisfactory annoyances of Leadenhall Street politics, yet unwilling to forsake altogether the means which they afforded him of promoting the interest of his friends, and of influencing beneficially the government of our Indian empire, as to the fate of which it was impossible that he could be indifferent, the progress of events drew him once more conspicuously forward on the stage of public life, and desperate attempts were made to ruin at once his fortune and his reputation. It was his fate to suffer, not for his vices or errors, but for his virtues. His upright and honourable discharge of his painful duties, during his second government of Bengal, was at the root of all the persecutions which he afterwards endured. The men whom he made his enemies, by a firm yet temperate exercise of authority, resolved, if they could not justify their own conduct, to embitter, to the utmost of their power, the feelings of the statesman who had disturbed them in the career of unlawful gain. They had attempted to injure him in the courts at the India House. The changes in public affairs now enabled them to point an attack against him on a larger theatre, in the British Parliament.

We have seen that the rumours of the boundless wealth of India, the extent of the provinces conquered, and the amount of the revenue acquired, had raised the question to whom those conquests belonged,—to the trading company that had made them, or to the country and sovereign under whose auspices they were made? and that, to prevent the decision of this question, for which neither party was perfectly prepared, a compromise had been entered into between Government and the Directors, in 1767, and afterwards renewed. But disasters and mismanagement in India and at home had, in the course of a few years, reduced the Company's affairs to such distress that, far from being able to pay the sum stipulated, it became very problematical if they would be able to discharge their ordinary debts. The Directors were willing to throw the blame on their servants abroad, whom they charged for acting contrary to their orders; while they, on their part, defended themselves as they best could from the imputations cast upon them. Reports of oppression in India were widely circulated; and the private fortunes rapidly accumulated, that were every day brought home from that country (fortunes large in themselves and exaggerated by report), were held by many sufficiently to prove the truth of the charges.

The British Ministry, at that moment, contained no man of extraordinary talent, and its members were averse to any extensive views of civil polity: besides, they had their hands too full of American affairs, and of internecine quarrels, which ran very high, to leave them any wish to launch into the wide ocean of Indian concerns, of which, in common with all the rest of the nation, they were profoundly ignorant. At the same time, the progress of events made it necessary that something should be attempted. So early as May, 1771, the Ministers, who were aware that from no individual could so much and so sound information and advice be received as from Lord Clive, had shown a desire to confer with him. As he had always been a steady supporter of the politics of Mr. Grenville, who had long been in opposition, he was not then in habits of personal communication with any of the leading members of the Government. To obviate this difficulty recourse was had to Mr. Wedderburn, the Solicitor-General and Lord Clive's personal friend, who wrote him a letter[168], in which he observes, "There are no public news in town. We had a little mobbing last night[169], but not to any great excess. My neighbour, the Speaker, had his windows mauled exceedingly; but, by great good fortune, the gentlemen were so busy with his that they left mine untouched.

"Lord Rochford[170], a few days ago, desired that I would ask your Lordship if you would allow him to talk over Indian affairs with you. He says that it is his duty to bestow more attention than has hitherto been employed upon an object of the utmost consequence to the nation, and that he wishes to improve or to form his ideas from your conversation. I told him it was uncertain when you would return to town; but I was persuaded, your zeal for the public service would incline you to assist Government with your advice, whenever that subject was taken into serious consideration. I believe the answer was such as your Lordship would have wished me to make; and I must do him the justice to say, he held a very proper language upon the subject of India, and seemed to feel the importance of it."

Lord Clive, in his answer[171], observes, "I am happy to find Lord Rochford thinks so justly of the importance of our possessions in the East Indies; and yet in these times of (discord) and confusion, much, I fear, cannot be expected from his laudable endeavours to benefit the public by securing and improving our acquisitions in those parts. When I returned to England in the year 1767, my thoughts were much taken up with the flattering prospect of assisting Government to complete a work which I had only begun; and I intimated as much to the King in a private audience which I was honoured with soon after my arrival; but a tedious and severe illness prevented me from carrying my ideas into execution, and afforded me leisure for reflection. The result was, that I soon perceived that unless a settled administration, possessed of both resolution and power adequate to the object, undertook thoroughly to engage Parliament in the business, no material advantage could be obtained for the nation by any light I could give. After my recovery, I had many conversations with Mr. Grenville upon the subject, who, to the last, was of the same way of thinking. Mr. Strachey has, with the materials I have furnished him, undertaken that task; but I think he cannot complete the work in less than eighteen months. You are acquainted with my design of going to the Spa, and spending the next winter in Italy. I can only be in London a few days at the latter end of July. If that time should be convenient to Lord Rochford, and he will signify his pleasure by a few lines, I shall be ready to pay my respects to his Lordship, and give him all the verbal information in my power."

A severe return of ill health seems to have prevented Lord Clive from visiting the Spa, and, probably, from meeting Lord Rochford. But the continuation of unfavourable reports from India, and the approaching meeting of Parliament, made the Ministers more desirous than ever of some communication of opinions with him. The Solicitor-General accordingly wrote his Lordship the following letter:—

"My dear Lord,

"I have been confined to the house since my arrival in town, by a cold, till this morning, that I was obliged to go to Lord North's. As soon as the business which brought me to him was finished, he began upon the subject of the East Indies; to which, he said, the attention of Administration was now very seriously turned. He seemed to feel strongly the necessity of taking some steps immediately for the preservation of so important an object, and the difficulty of forming any proper measure for that purpose. From the tenor of the conversation it appeared to me that no idea had as yet presented itself that could be the foundation of any plan; and he expressed the strongest wish to receive that instruction upon the subject which your Lordship alone can give him. I took it upon me to say that your Lordship had never given any Administration reason to think that you would decline doing that service to the public, but that you had never been called upon; nor had it ever appeared to be an object of real attention to Government. He seemed very desirous that I should acquaint you how much it was now become the object of their most earnest attention, and that it would give him the utmost satisfaction to be able to form his own ideas upon yours. I did not undertake the commission with so much frankness as I should have done, if it had been only to go from Downing Street to Berkeley Square; and this evening I received the enclosed letter, which I was desired to convey to your Lordship.

"From Lord North's I went to Lord Rochford, who took up the same subject, and, as his manner is, with more eagerness than the other. He desired me to tell your Lordship, that he had employed himself in forming a Précis of the Indian affairs, which he wished to communicate to you; that he was convinced you thought alike with him as to the evils that now subsist, and that you knew, much better than he could, what were the proper remedies for them.

"I have related to you, as shortly as I could, the purport of two pretty long conversations, to which I can add very little of my own observation, having scarcely seen any body till this morning; except that I understand a great many plans are forming by different people upon this subject, which, it is generally supposed, must, in some manner, be taken up this winter. I heard of no specific proposition that had been mentioned to Government, in either of my conversations, except the old one of a Triennial Direction, which, to be sure, by itself, will not mend the matter very much. It is now certain, what you always supposed, that the Duc de Choiseuil had determined[172] to begin his attack in the East Indies, and the blow would have been struck at Bengal.

"It might seem odd if I omitted to say to your Lordship, upon the former part of my letter, that I am very much persuaded, both the ministers I have seen, and particularly the last, will pursue any plan you point out. I have had other conversations with him formerly, upon the general state of Indian affairs, and his ideas seem to coincide very much with yours. Lord North seems to be quite open upon the subject, and as he has no prejudice to bias him, I should form the same conclusion with regard to him.

"Lincoln's Inn Fields, 29th Oct. 1771."

On the 14th of November Mr. Wedderburn writes to Lord Clive: "I delivered your Lordship's letter to L.N., who seemed to be extremely happy by the manner in which you received his application. From the inquiries which he made about your engagements in the country, I imagine he is very desirous of seeing you in town. But that matter rests more properly with him, and I only said I was very sure you would be very ill pleased to be brought up to no purpose. The other Lord is in the country this week, but returns on Monday next. I should conjecture that his ideas are more forward upon the affairs of the East than your correspondent's. I am told that the Directors have compromised the affair of the tea-duties with the Treasury; but they have not done me the honour to acquaint me upon what terms, though in the outset of the business, I had some share in bringing about an agreement for the Company. There seems to be a good deal of ill-humour at present against the Directors, which they may feel the effects of, if the alarm at the present state of affairs in India is not quieted soon."

The party then in power among the Directors was hostile to Lord Clive, who for several years, chiefly by the weight of his personal influence, had excluded them from office. Mr. Sulivan, who was their leader, and some others, bore him the most rancorous personal animosity. It is not improbable that they had heard of the communication thus opened between Lord Clive and the Ministers, and that considering it as pregnant with consequences prejudicial to their own interests, they resolved to take some decided step to palsy the effects of his authority in the discussions that were approaching. Perhaps the slight paid to Mr. Wedderburn, and alluded to in the foregoing extract, may be traced to his intimacy with Lord Clive, or even to his supposed agency in bringing about a meeting with the Ministers.

However that may be, just a fortnight before the meeting of Parliament, Lord Clive, without having had any previous communication made to him on the part of the Directors, received a dry official letter[173] from the Company's Secretary, informing him that the Court of Directors had lately received several papers containing charges respecting the management of the Company's affairs in Bengal, wherein his Lordship was made a party; enclosing copies of them, and acquainting his Lordship, that if he had any observations to make, the Court of Directors would be glad to receive them as expeditiously as might be convenient for his Lordship.

Lord Clive, on perusing these charges, which were anonymous, at once perceived the purpose for which they were thus seasonably made and communicated. In his answer, which he addressed to the Court of Directors, he remarks,—"You have not been pleased to inform me from whom you received these papers, to what end they were laid before you, what resolution you have come to concerning them, nor for what purpose you expect my observations upon them.

"I shall, however, observe to you, that upon the public records of the Company, where the whole of my conduct is stated, you may find a sufficient confutation of the charges which you have transmitted to me; and I cannot but suppose, that if any part of my conduct had been injurious to the service, contradictory to my engagements with the Company, or even mysterious to you, four years and a half since my arrival in England would not have elapsed before your duty would have impelled you to call me to account."

The charges were those which he afterwards enumerated and repelled in his speech in the House of Commons on the 30th of March following.

The resolution of Ministers to call the public attention to Indian affairs was sufficiently indicated in the Speech from the Throne[174], in which the affairs of the East India Company were plainly alluded to. "The concerns of this country," his Majesty was made to say, "are so various and extensive, as to require the most vigilant and active attention; and some of them, as well from remoteness of place as from other circumstances, are so peculiarly liable to abuses and exposed to danger, that the interposition of the Legislature for their protection may become necessary. If in any such instances, either for supplying defects or remedying abuses, you shall find it requisite to provide any new laws, you may depend upon my ready concurrence in whatever may best contribute to the attainment of these salutary ends." Mr. Vane, who seconded the Address in the House of Commons, insisted that the malversation of the East India Company's servants called loudly for interposition; that new laws and regulations were become necessary; that at present the Company had not sufficient powers over their servants to enforce obedience to their orders, or to prevent them from accumulating enormous fortunes at the expense of their masters; and that their exorbitances in other respects might, in their consequences, occasion the entire loss of those distant dominions to Great Britain. The subject was not, however, immediately taken up by any Member, and some time passed without any further reference to that part of his Majesty's Speech.

But it was not dropped. On the 30th March, Mr. Sulivan, who was then Deputy Chairman of the Court of Directors, moved for leave to bring in a bill "for the better regulation of the affairs of the East India Company, and of their servants in India, and for the due administration of justice in Bengal." He said that the object of the bill was to restrain the Governor and Council from all trade; and to establish a proper mode of administering justice, by extending the authority of the Court of Justice at Calcutta over all Bengal. It was alleged by those who supported the motion, that the bad state of our affairs in India was owing to the little power which the Court of Directors had to punish their servants, either for disobedience of orders, or for malpractices in the country; that the power of trading that had been granted to the Governors, when we had mere factories on the sea-coast, was no longer suitable to their duties, now that they were called upon to govern our wide and important dominions; that their interests and duties had become inconsistent; and that the system for the administration of public justice in Bengal was quite insufficient for its objects: and, in the course of the debates, many reflections were cast out, and charges made or insinuated, against former Governors of the country. On the other hand, it was contended that inquiry should precede legislation; that the House was not in possession of facts to guide it aright; that inquiry would probably show that the evils were too deep-seated to be remedied by the proposed bill; and, especially, that the Court of Directors, and the General Courts of Proprietors, were themselves much to blame for many of the evils complained of; that the sending out a few persons, learned in the laws of England, as judges, to such a country, was quite inadequate to the end in view; above all, as it was not yet determined by what laws the inhabitants were to be governed.[175]

Many of the most important changes in the bill had long before been suggested by Lord Clive to the Company. But he disapproved of others of its details, and still more of the arguments by which it was supported. He had long been an object of attack and hostility to those by whom the bill was introduced. The late communication from the Court of Directors left him no doubts of their feelings; and, as he saw himself not obscurely aimed at, both in the motion and in the speeches in support of it, he took occasion to enter into a long justification of his conduct from the charges that had been recently brought against him. These charges were known to the public; and he wished to take the most public and solemn mode of answering them.

"It is with great diffidence," said he, "that I attempt to speak to this House; but I find myself so particularly called upon, that I must make the attempt, though I should expose myself in so doing. With what confidence can I venture to give my sentiments upon a subject of such national consequence, who myself stand charged with having been the cause of the present melancholy situation of the Company's affairs in Bengal? This House can have no reliance on my opinion, whilst such an impression remains unremoved. The House will, therefore, give me leave to remove this impression, and to endeavour to restore myself to that favourable opinion which, I flatter myself, they entertained of my conduct before these charges were exhibited against me. Nor do I wish to lay my conduct before the members of this House only; I speak, likewise, to my country in general, upon whom I put myself, not only without reluctance, but with alacrity."

After mentioning the critical and dangerous situation of the Company's affairs, when in 1764 he was called upon, by a General Court, to leave his family and the enjoyment of wealth and ease, to take upon himself the management of their affairs in a distant and unhealthy climate (an undertaking in which he engaged from a point of honour, and from a principle of gratitude), he observes, that on his arrival in Bengal he found his powers disputed by the Council; that in the discharge of his difficult duty three paths lay before him: the first, to take the government as he found it, and carry it on upon the same principles; by which he might have returned to England with an immense fortune, but condemned by justice and honour: the second, to have given up the commonwealth, and to have left Bengal without an effort to save it. "The third path," says he, "was intricate. Dangers and difficulties were on every side. But I resolved to pursue it. In short, I was determined to do my duty to the public, although I should incur the odium of the whole settlement. The welfare of the Company required a vigorous exertion, and I took the resolution of cleansing the Augean stable.

"It was this conduct," he exclaims, with truth and boldness, "which has occasioned the public papers to teem with scurrility and abuse against me, ever since my return to England. It was that conduct which occasioned these charges. It was that conduct which enables me now to lay my hand upon my heart, and most solemnly to declare to this House, to the gallery, and to the whole world at large, that I never, in a single instance, lost sight of what I thought the honour and true interest of my country and the Company; that I was never guilty of any acts of violence or oppression, unless the bringing offenders to justice can be deemed so; that as to extortion, such an idea never entered into my mind; that I did not suffer those under me to commit acts of violence, oppression, or extortion; that my influence was never employed for the advantage of any man, contrary to the strictest principles of honour and justice; and that, so far from reaping any benefit myself from the expedition, I returned to England many thousand pounds out of pocket,—a fact of which this House will presently be convinced."

He then entered into a detail of the charges themselves, and of the strange way in which they had been communicated to him by the Directors. The charges, it appears, were four. The first was, a monopoly of cotton. "Trade," says he, "was not my profession. My line has been military and political. I owe all I have in the world to my having been at the head of an army; and as to cotton, I know no more about it than the Pope of Rome."

The second charge was for a monopoly of diamonds. He observes, that at that period there were only two ways by which a servant of the Company could, with propriety, remit his fortune to England; by bills on the Company, or by diamonds: that, in consequence of his own successful endeavours, the Company's treasury was so rich, that it did not receive money for such bills: that he, therefore, sent an agent into a distant and independent country to purchase diamonds, that he might be able to remit the amount of his jaghire. "These diamonds," says he, "were not sent home clandestinely. I caused them to be registered; I paid the duties upon them; and these remittances, upon the whole, turned out 3 per cent. worse than bills of exchange upon the Company. This is all I know of a monopoly of diamonds."

The third charge was, frauds in the exchange, and in the gold coinage. This, he said, was a subject very much out of his sphere, as he was totally unacquainted with the proportion of alloy and the mixture of metals. That the Select Committee was apprehensive of the country being drained of silver, and, knowing that there was much gold in different quarters, hoped to make it circulate as coin. "Hence the establishment of the gold currency," he continues. "Whether it answered our purpose or not, I cannot say, as I did not remain in Bengal long enough to experience the effect of it; but this I know, that the assay and mint-master, by whose judgment we were guided, was a very able and a very honest man, and has, I understand, given a full and satisfactory explanation of his plan to the Court of Directors. With regard to myself, I shall only assert, that I did not receive a farthing advantage from it, and that I never sent a single rupee or gold mohur to be coined in my life.

"The fourth charge has this extraordinary title, 'A monopoly of salt, betle-nut, and tobacco, and other commodities, which occasioned the late famine.' How a monopoly of salt, betle-nut, and tobacco, in the years 1765 and 1766 could occasion a want of rain and scarcity of rice in the year 1770, is past my comprehension. I confess I cannot answer that part of this article; and as to the other commodities, as they have not been specified, I cannot say any thing to them." He then entered into an explanation regarding the monopoly of salt, its origin, objects, and effects, and defended his conduct and that of the Select Committee in every circumstance, ascribing the opposition which their measures met with to ignorance, prejudice, and mistaken views. He contended that, in the circumstances of the country, it was the only fund left for adequately paying the higher servants; that it was faithfully and judiciously applied to that purpose; and that it was attended with no injury or increase of taxation to the people, who, by the plan of the society, were to receive it at as moderate a rate as they had ever done in former times. Finally, he showed that he had strictly conformed to a resolution made before leaving England,—not to return in any degree enriched by his expedition to India; and for that purpose had exhibited the state of his whole receipts as Governor, including his share in the Society of Trade, as well as his expenditure; by which it appeared, that of the proceeds one portion was divided among Mr. Maskelyne, Mr. Strachey, and Mr. Ingham, three gentlemen who had accompanied him to India, the two latter his private secretary and family surgeon; and all the residue applied in part payment of his necessary expenses as Governor; and that, so far from returning home with any pecuniary benefits, he had really incurred a loss of 5,816l. 16s. 9d.

As insinuations had been used regarding his conduct in acquiring the property which he had devoted to establish a fund for relief of the Company's disabled officers and soldiers, and their widows,—a subject which, he remarks, he would have been ashamed to touch on, as carrying with it an appearance of vanity, were not his honour and reputation so much at stake,—he proceeded to show, that, by the opinions of the first lawyers in England, and, among others, of the Speaker of the House, his acceptance of the legacy of Meer Jaffier in no respect interfered with any of his covenants or engagements; that the amount was his own sole and indisputable property; and that the Court of Directors acknowledged, confirmed, and acted upon that right: in short, that the donation which he had made for improving the Company's military service, so far from being an object of blame, was a free gift of upwards of 70,000l. out of his private purse.

Having thus triumphantly concluded his defence against the charges that referred more immediately to himself, he expressed a fear of encroaching on the patience of the House, in what he had to say on the important business more immediately before them; but was loudly called upon to go on. He then took a view of the general accusations brought against the Company's servants; accusations in which the Court of Directors had loudly joined. The justice of many of these he did not deny, but argued that the offences arose in general less from the characters of the individuals, to which they had been ascribed, than from the unfortunate circumstances of their situation, which exposed them to temptations that it was nearly impossible for human nature to resist: that a change of system was the remedy, and that that must proceed from the Court of Directors and the Government: that in the richest country in the world, where the power of the English had become absolute, where no inferior approached his superior but with a present in his hand, where there was not an officer commanding his Majesty's fleet, nor an officer commanding his Majesty's army, nor a Governor, nor a member of Council, nor any other person, civil or military, in such a station as to have connection with the country Government, who had not received presents, it was not to be expected that the inferior officers should be more scrupulous. The abuses to which, in a country containing fifteen millions of inhabitants, a revenue of 4,000,000l., and trade in proportion, such a practice gave rise, he described in the liveliest terms; as well as the artifices by which the wily native gradually draws on the inexperienced and unthinking youth, on his first arrival in the country, till he gets him in his power: and to the natives, protected by such men, he ascribes the acts of violence and oppression that had been committed; not to the masters, who were for the most part ignorant of them. He reminded the House that as to the conduct of these young men, on whom the Directors were desirous of shifting the blame, neither their parents nor the Directors themselves were guiltless. "The advantages arising from the Company's service," said he, "are now very generally known, and the great object of every man is to get his son appointed a writer to Bengal, which is usually at the age of sixteen. His parents and relations represent to him how certain he is of making a fortune; that my Lord Such-a-one and my Lord Such-a-one acquired so much money in such a time, and Mr. Such-a-one and Mr. Such-a-one so much in such a time. Thus are their principles corrupted at their very setting out; and, as they generally go a good many together, they inflame one another's expectations to such a degree, in the course of the voyage, that they fix upon a period for their return, before their arrival." After describing the career of luxury and extravagance into which they are seduced by their artful banyan[176], who takes advantage of the influence he acquires to commit acts of violence and oppression, he adds, "Hence Sir, arises the clamour against the English gentlemen in India. But look at them in a retired situation, when returned to England, when they are no longer nabobs and sovereigns of the East: see if there be any thing tyrannical in their dispositions towards their inferiors; see if they are not good and humane masters. Are they not charitable? Are they not benevolent? Are they not generous? Are they not hospitable? If they are, thus far, not contemptible members of society, and if in all their dealings between man and man their conduct is strictly honourable, ... may we not conclude, that if they have erred, it has been because they were men placed in situations subject to little or no control?...

"But if the servants of the Company are to be loaded with the demerit of every misfortune in India, let them also have the merit they are entitled to. The Court of Directors, surely, will not claim the merit of those advantages which the nation and the Company are at present in possession of. The officers of the navy and army have had great share in the execution; but the Company's servants were the Cabinet Council who planned every thing, and to them also may be ascribed some part of the merit of our great acquisitions."

After having shown that the system was more to blame than the men, that much of the defect of regulation and control which rendered abuses inevitable in India was owing to the very persons who were loudest in their complaints, he next turned the attention of the House to the state of India itself; a country which, he affirmed, yielded a clear produce to the public and to individuals of between two and three millions sterling per annum. He asked what could be substituted for this, were it lost; and pointed to the dangers it actually ran, during a recent difference with the French Court. But it was certain, that our affairs in Bengal were in a very deplorable condition. This he ascribed to mismanagement. The public trade he showed, from official returns, to have more than doubled since the acquisition of the dewannee; while the inland trade, upon which the happiness and prosperity of the people must chiefly depend, had, by a change of system, and under pretence of freedom of trade, been thrown into total confusion, as the Company's servants and their agents had in reality taken it into their own hands, and, by trading not only as merchants but as sovereigns, had taken the bread out of the mouth of thousands of native merchants, whom they reduced to beggary. By official returns he proved that, since the acquisition of the dewannee, the revenues had suffered but a very inconsiderable decrease; while in every year since he left Bengal there had been a rapid increase in the military and civil charges, which threatened to consume the whole of the collections, and leave no surplus whatever. "Here," says he truly, "lies the danger. The evil is not so much in the revenues falling short, as in the expenses increasing. The best means of raising the revenues is to reduce the civil and military charges.... It is not the simple pay of officers and men upon the civil and military establishment which occasions our enormous expense, but the contingent bills of contractors, commissaries, engineers, &c., out of which, I am sure, great savings might be made.... Every man now, who is permitted to make a bill, makes a fortune. These intolerable expenses have alarmed the Directors, and persuaded them to come to Parliament for assistance. And, if I mistake not, they will soon go to the Administration and tell them they cannot pay the 400,000l., and that they must lower the dividends to the Proprietors."

The distressed state of the Company's affairs he attributed to four causes:—a relaxation of Government in his successors; great neglect on the part of his Majesty's Administration; notorious misconduct on the part of the Directors; and the violent and outrageous proceedings of General Courts, including contested elections.

While he bestowed the highest and most merited praise on Mr. Verelst's honour, worth, and disinterestedness, he asserts that the too great tenderness of his disposition had made him govern with too lenient a hand; that he himself, by his farewell letter to the Select Committee, had done all in his power to guard him against this error, and to prompt him to vigorous measures. But he adds, that had his successor kept the tightest rein, he could not have done much service to the Company, as neither he nor any man could have long guarded against the mischiefs occasioned by the Directors themselves, when they took away the powers of the Select Committee.

Nor was the Administration itself free from blame. When the Company had acquired an empire more extensive than any kingdom in Europe, France and Russia excepted, with 4,000,000l. of gross revenue, and trade in proportion, it might have been expected that such acquisitions would have invited the most serious attention of Ministers, and that some plan would have been devised, in concert with the Court of Directors, adequate to the occasion. Did they take it into consideration? "No, they did not."—"They thought of nothing but the present time, regardless of the future; they said, 'Let us get what we can to-day; let to-morrow take care for itself:' they thought of nothing but the immediate division of the loaves and fishes: nay, so anxious were they to lay their hands upon some immediate advantage, that they actually went so far as to influence a parcel of temporary proprietors to bully the Directors into their terms. It was their duty, Sir, to have called upon the Directors for a plan; and if a plan in consequence had not been laid before them, it would then have become their duty, with the aid and assistance of Parliament, to have formed one themselves. If Administration had done their duty, we should not now have had a speech from the throne intimating the necessity of Parliamentary interposition, to save our possessions in India from impending ruin."

He next proceeded to animadvert on the misconduct of the Directors, who after having, in the highest terms, applauded the conduct of the Select Committee, who had extricated their affairs from anarchy and confusion, and raised them to a degree of prosperity never before enjoyed nor anticipated, had counteracted the beneficial effects of their exertions by dropping the prosecutions against those gentlemen whose conduct the Committee had censured: that from that instant they destroyed their own power; their servants abroad looked upon all covenants as so many sheets of blank paper; and then began that relaxation of Government so much complained of, and so much to be dreaded. That this step they followed up by destroying the powers of the Committee, by dividing them between the Committee and Council. The natural consequence was an uninterrupted series of disputes, to the detriment of the service. That not content with this, the Court restored almost every civil and military transgressor who had been dismissed. "And now," continued his Lordship, "as a condemnation of their own conduct, and a tacit confession of their own weakness, they come to Parliament with a bill of regulations, in which is inserted a clause to put such practices as much as possible out of their power for the future."

He lastly censured the violent proceedings of General Courts, as concurring with the acts of the Directors, in removing all dread of responsibility from their servants abroad. He argued, that the whole of these evils were aggravated by the system of annual elections; that one half of the year was employed by the Directors in freeing themselves from the obligations contracted by their last election; and the second half wasted in incurring new obligations, and securing their election for the next year, by daily sacrifices of some interest of the Company. The orders sent out had, in consequence of the unsettled state of the Direction, been so fluctuating, that the servants (who say the truth have generally understood the interest of the Company much better than the Directors,) in many instances followed their own opinion, in opposition to theirs.

He concluded a speech of singular power and intelligence by observing, that it was not his intention to trouble the House, at that time, with the remedies for these evils. He chose rather to defer them till the bill came into the House.[177]

He was followed by Governor Johnstone, who opposed the bill on the reasonable ground that an examination of facts should precede legislation, and that it was necessary to hear evidence before forming any conclusion on subjects so important. He entered into an examination of the defence which Lord Clive had just made of his conduct. In regard to the two first charges, he acknowledged that they originated in the clumsy manner in which business was done at the India House; that the first was meant to be confined to particular members of the Council; and that the second was not meant as a charge, but as illustrating another point. He contended, however, in vehement terms, that in regard to the fourth charge, that of the Salt Company, his Lordship had violated his duty, and disobeyed the strong and repeated orders of the Court of Directors, and that the monopoly had been attended with the most injurious consequences to the country; that as to the proportion of the profits which came to him as Governor, it was no excuse for receiving them to allege, that they had been distributed among his friends and dependants. In regard to the gold coinage, he urged that it was not enough that Lord Clive had derived no benefit from it (though indeed, as Governor, he had received a per centage on the coinage); that it was a duty of his station to become acquainted with principles so important to the prosperity of those he governed; that his receipt of the per centage of one and an eighth on the revenues, in lieu of the advantages resulting from his share in the Society of Trade, however sanctioned by the Directors, was illegal. He next attacked the legacy of Meer Jaffier, the basis of the celebrated bounty, and declared his opinion that the foundation of the large establishments and increased expenditure which, since Lord Clive left India, had brought the Company's affairs to the verge of ruin, had been laid during his government, and under his advice. Nearly the whole of the speech was an attack on Lord Clive, on the same subjects, and conveyed in the same violent language to which he had already so often given vent during the contests in the Court of Proprietors.[178]

Leave was given to introduce the bill.

Nearly three months had elapsed since the allusion to India in the Royal Speech, and Ministers, during that time, had shown no disposition to take the matter into their own hands, as such a reference seemed to promise. They were not prepared for a measure of such importance, embarrassed, as they were, with other nearer business. By the allusions in the speech, they, perhaps, wished to show that they had not lost sight of a subject which occupied so much of the public attention; but, with nothing to propose, were willing to let it lie over till it received its first impulse from some other quarter. This impulse it very soon did receive.

On the day of bringing in Mr. Sulivan's bill[179], Colonel Burgoyne made a motion, that a Select Committee be appointed to inquire into the nature, state, and condition of the East India Company, and of the British affairs in the East Indies. Burgoyne was a man not without talent, of showy parts, bold, vain, well-meaning, a political adventurer. He was not connected with the Ministry, but thought the opportunity a favourable one to bring himself into notice, by taking the lead in a question of great national consequence. In his speech introducing the motion, he represented, with much judgment, the inconsistency of giving a vote on the bill which was that day to be presented, without first examining the state of the country to which it referred; and that no facts were before the House to enable it to come to a sound judgment: he professed perfect impartiality and independence of all parties, and disavowed any hostility to the Company or its servants: he disclaimed all wish to throw the Company's affairs into the hands of the Crown; but argued that facts sufficiently notorious had occurred to justify and demand an inquiry into the rights of the Company, and the mode in which they had been exercised, especially as the fate of fifteen millions of people was involved in the question. It was objected to his motion, that the proceedings of a Select Committee being private, there was little responsibility on its members; that such a Committee would virtually be really a Government nomination; that no plan was yet before the House, and that, therefore, the inquiries of such a Committee must necessarily be vague and indefinite, such as the House could not limit or control. The motion, was, however, carried without a division; and the members, thirty-one in number, appointed by ballot, with directions, as the session was far spent, to sit during the summer. Mr. Sulivan's bill was dropped after the second reading.

When the Committee met, Colonel Burgoyne, who had proposed it, was chosen Chairman. It was expected that he would have proposed a plan; but having none to offer, Governor Johnstone, who was a member, and who saw all the advantages of attack which such a Committee afforded him, addressed the Committee, and submitted to them one which, from different motives, was agreed to by all. By some (says Mr. Strachey, himself a member of the Committee) it was readily adopted, because they saw that it tended to an inquiry into the conduct of individuals who had amassed great wealth in India, and particularly of Lord Clive, whose high reputation, as well as riches, had rendered him the most exalted object of envy. By Lord Clive himself, who was also a member of the Committee, the plan was readily adopted, because it was not fitting for him to oppose an inquiry into a conduct that had been so long the subject of ill-grounded invective. By the few personal friends of his Lordship it was readily adopted, because they were convinced that his character would receive additional lustre from the scrutiny, and that the attack levelled at his fame would tend only to establish his reputation in the minds of all mankind. Others acquiesced in it, because some plan was necessary, and it was the only one proposed.

It was not long before the hostile feelings of several members of the Committee to Lord Clive became manifest. The order originally proposed was soon departed from, and the inquiry pointedly turned against him, with many symptoms of personal animosity. The first and second reports,—the former containing examinations of witnesses, regarding the circumstances attending the revolutions of 1757 and 1760, the presents then given, and the grant of Lord Clive's jaghire,—the latter relating to the grievances connected with the inland trade in the time of Mr. Verelst,—were hurried on, and presented on the 26th of May following, just before the rising of the session, and printed in the Journals of the House.

Governor Johnstone took a leading part in their proceedings, and his views gave a particular turn to their labours, and that by no means favourable to Lord Clive. His plan seemed to be to show, that it had long been the custom to receive presents in India; that large presents had been received by Lord Clive, at the revolution in 1757, and by Mr. Vansittart and others in that of 1760; and that, therefore, the sums received by his brother, Mr. John Johnstone, on the accession of the young prince in 1765, stood on equally good grounds. The argument was, in one respect, at least, defective; for while, in the first instances, there existed no prohibition against receiving presents, in the last case, the Council had lying before them, covenants with the Company expressly restraining them from the receipt of presents, which covenants they had put aside, to avail themselves of the opportunity afforded by their own wrong, of enriching themselves by illicit advantages.

The publication of these examinations, of course, increased the ferment, which had begun to prevail on the subject of Indian affairs, and they were much talked of and discussed during the recess of Parliament that followed. Things had long been retrograding in India. So far back as May, 1769, the disastrous news from Madras, of Hyder's success, had produced a fall of 60 per cent. in the price of India stock. This the Directors had treated as an evil speedily to be removed. But that event was closely followed by news of a famine in Bengal in the following year; while trade declined, difficulties of every kind increased, and the debt of Calcutta was rapidly rising. Still, however, the Directors went on, in hopes of a favourable change, and from year to year, while their means diminished, the rate of dividend was increased; till, in 1770, it had reached 12 per cent. The extent of the bills from Bengal had excited alarm even then; but in the face of them, the Directors, at the first quarterly court in 1771, communicated their opinion, that the dividend should be raised a quarter per cent. for the ensuing half year; thus completing the 12½ per cent., the highest annual dividend that by the act was allowed to be drawn in the most prosperous circumstances. Their return to power they had owed to the assistance of the party which demanded a rise of dividend, and they were resolved to retain its support by a perseverance in their favourite object. Lord Clive had opposed the whole course of conduct of the Directors, their contract with Government, and the system which they pursued, both at home and abroad; though with little other effect than that of drawing on himself their active hostility. The inquiries in Parliament, however, had weakened the power of the Directors. The state of the Company's affairs could not now be permanently concealed. They found difficulties thickening around them. They were divided among themselves. Their expenses abroad threatened, not only to swallow up all the revenue of the country, but to burden them in both countries with an intolerable load of debt. By their recent engagements with Government they had given ministers a right to interfere in their concerns, and, in fact, placed themselves in their power. They contrived, however, to procrastinate, and to avoid any crisis, until the Parliament had risen.

A few days after the session was concluded[180], a grand installation of the Knights of the Bath took place[181], when Lord Clive was installed as a knight of the order, having been appointed several years before. In September the same year, upon the death of the Earl of Powis, lord-lieutenant of the county of Salop, he considered himself, from the extent of his property in the county, and the importance of his public services, as entitled to succeed him in the office. At the same time he felt some difficulty, being resolved that, situated as matters were, he would ask nothing of Ministers that could subject him to the appearance of courting their favour. Some of his friends advised him at once to ask a private audience of His Majesty, and to explain his claims without intervention. But this his good sense forbade; for Ministers, if they had not encouraged, had at least shown no disapprobation of the personal manner in which the proceedings of the Select Committee had been directed; and he justly considered it as dangerous to run the risk of making his Sovereign and the Ministers, who, at this period, had gained a decided ascendency over all the different parties in the country, his declared enemies. "I cannot be of your opinion," says he, writing on this subject to his friend Mr. Strachey[182], "because I think that things are not yet ripe for an open rupture. Until my conduct in Parliament is decided upon, I do not desire the King and his Ministers to be my declared enemies. In such a situation I should certainly not meet with much applause from the House for my conduct in the East Indies; and I wish at least that the members of the House, when they come to decide, may have no other motive for an unfavourable decision but envy; that, indeed, is too strongly implanted in the human breast to be removed." It soon appeared, however, that Lord Rochford had mentioned his name to his Majesty, who received it favourably; and a friend writes him that he believes that Lord North had really formed no plan on the subject (as Lord Clive seems to have apprehended), and would be very happy to have an opportunity of offering him the lieutenancy. "If it appears," says his friend, "that success is clear, you will only have to take the steps which the decorums of bestowing favours require; princes and ladies never are supposed to offer, but to grant, their favours, and expect to be asked what they have determined to give." Lord Clive, in conclusion, writes to Mr. Strachey; "I expect W. here in a day or two; and if he brings me a favourable account, I shall lose no time in going to town and demanding a private audience, that I may explain myself fully to his Majesty. I will not receive the lieutenancy through the channel of a minister." In this resolution, the result of a natural feeling of resentment, he probably relaxed; and his nomination of course took place, at least formally, on the recommendation of Lord North. Writing, on the 9th of October, to Mr. Strachey, he says, "Dear Strachey, I have the pleasure to inform you that I kissed the King's hand to-day, upon being appointed Lieutenant of the county of Salop. Afterwards I had a private audience, when I pushed the matter ably and well, to that degree as I could perceive the King was very much affected. The answer was favourable, but not determined; but I think it would be imprudent to treat more on the subject in a letter, and must therefore defer farther explanation until I have the pleasure of seeing you. The King talked upon Indian affairs for near half an hour; and I had an opportunity of mentioning your services and abilities."

He had also an interview with Lord North; and that amiable man and good-natured minister seems to have succeeded in appeasing, to a certain degree, his irritated feelings. "Lord North," says he[183], "when I saw him, seemed industriously to avoid entering upon the subject of India affairs; and I do verily believe, from sheer indolence of temper, he wishes to leave every thing to Providence and the Directors; and that he means nothing more by the meeting of Parliament[184], than to enable the Company to find money to discharge the demands that are at present made upon them. However, it behoves me to be prepared for every thing; for which purpose, you will perhaps say, I have been building castles in the air. Enclosed I send you a sketch of my ideas, which, I flatter myself, might be carried into execution by an able, steady, and upright minister. I don't wish to take you from your other business unnecessarily, but I wish you would take this sketch in hand, and methodise it. I would have you dwell fully and strongly upon the present situation of our affairs in India, and show, beyond a possibility of refutation, the approaching ruin of our possessions in the East, if vigorous measures be not speedily pursued. Your own experience and knowledge, added to my sentiments, expressed both in my speech and in the political paper laid before Lord North, will enable you to make a great progress in this matter; and upon my arrival in town what is wanting may be supplied. I will not patiently stand by, and see a great empire, acquired by great abilities, perseverance, and resolution, lost by ignorance and indolence. If Administration should think proper to see our affairs abroad in the same light as I do, 'tis well. If not, I shall have done my duty. Quem Deus vult perdere, prius dementat, may with a vengeance be applied to the Court of Directors appointing M(onckton) and five of their own body Supervisors. Private letters from India give a most dreadful account of the luxury, dissipation, and extravagance of Bengal."

It should seem that the plan here mentioned was afterwards prepared and presented to Lord North. It is dated the 24th of November, two days before the opening of Parliament. It embraces the whole system of Indian Government at home and abroad, and must have been a valuable contribution[185] at a moment when Parliament was called, for the express purpose of considering the state of the Company's concerns.

In December, the same year, he was appointed Lord Lieutenant of Montgomeryshire.

Meanwhile, the Parliament had hardly risen for the summer, when the difficulties in the Company's affairs which have been alluded to, became too great to be concealed. Though the Directors had long suffered inconvenience from the want of funds, the first unsurmountable difficulty in the means of discharging the demands on them was said to be observed by their cashier in the beginning of July, 1772. This he communicated to Mr. Sulivan; a Committee of Treasury was called, and there was laid before them an estimate of the probable receipts and payments for the months of July, August, September, and October, when it appeared that they could command only 954,200l., to meet demands amounting to 2,247,200l., leaving a deficiency of 1,293,000l. On the 15th of July it was resolved to apply to the Bank for a loan of 400,000l. for two months, which was granted; and, on the 29th of July, a further loan of 300,000l. was asked, but only 200,000l. received. At a Committee of Treasury, held on the 11th of August 1772, the Chairman and Deputy Chairman acquainted the Members, that they had waited on Lord North to present to his Lordship the state of the Company's affairs, and had represented that the sum of near 1,000,000l. sterling would be necessary to be borrowed to carry on the circulation of the Company's affairs, and that of this million about 500,000l. would be left undischarged in the month of March following, when the whole produce of the September sale would probably be received.[186] The first Lord of the Treasury is said to have received their proposals with dryness and reserve, and referred them to Parliament for satisfaction. They had once more recourse to the plan of appointing supervisors, with full powers for the regulation of their affairs abroad; and after various delays, six gentlemen[187] were named, who agreed to accept the difficult and invidious office.

Ministers, in these circumstances, and when called upon to sanction a loan of such an amount, could not avoid taking a direct share in the affairs of the Company. The Parliament was called before the holidays, for the express purpose of adopting some efficient measures to recover their affairs from the confusion into which they had fallen. His Majesty, in his speech from the throne, on the 26th of November, observed, "When I received information of the difficulties in which the Company appears to be involved, I determined to give you an early opportunity of informing yourselves fully of the true state of their affairs, and of making such provisions for the common benefit and security of all the various interests concerned as you shall find best adapted to the exigencies of the case."

The necessity of some remedy was sufficiently plain; but there was a deficiency of knowledge and of facts. The Minister now clearly perceived, from the line of inquiry into which the Select Committee had deviated, and the temper of some of the members, that their labours, whatever other effects they might have, were not likely to afford such information as would enable Parliament, in the present exigency, to regulate or even to understand the Company's affairs. Lord North, the same day on which the Address was voted, after adverting to the distressed situation of the Company, a distress which he ascribed chiefly to the complicated union of civil and political power with their commercial affairs, expressed his conviction that, embarrassed as they were for the moment, they were still in full health, and, with a temporary assistance, fully able to meet and discharge all their engagements; that, by the measure which he had to propose, their secret and confidential transactions would be known but to a few, so that no unfair advantage could be taken. He concluded by moving that, for the better ascertaining the real condition of the Company's affairs, a Committee of Secresy be appointed to inquire into the state of the East India Company; and for that purpose to inspect the books and accounts of the said Company, and to report to the House what they find material therein, in respect to the debts, credits, and effects of the Company; as also to the management and present situation of the Company's affairs, together with their observations thereupon. It was also referred to them to report their opinion of the steps taken by the Company of sending out Supervisors.

In the debate that ensued, Colonel Burgoyne thought it necessary to vindicate the late Committee from the aspersions which he imagined had been thrown on it by insinuations that the present embarrassed state of the Company's affairs was in any degree to be attributed to the mode of inquiry that it had adopted: he expatiated largely on what the Committee had done, and with much warmth affirmed, from his own knowledge, that their inquiries would disclose such a scene of iniquity, rapine, and injustice, such unheard-of cruelties, such violations of every rule of morality, religion, and good government, as were never before discovered; that in the whole investigation he could not find a sound spot whereon to lay his finger, it being all one mass of the most unheard-of villanies, and the most notorious corruption. That, if the proposed Committee was intended to supersede former inquiry, he could look upon it in no other light than a design to protect the guilty, and serve the purpose of stockjobbing. Lord North said, that he did not mean to impede the revival of the Select Committee. His motion was agreed to, and a Committee of thirteen appointed. The Select Committee of last year was also continued.

In a few days the new appointed Secret Committee, in consequence of the reference made to them, gave in a Special Report, recommending that a Bill should be brought in to restrain the Company, for a limited time, from sending out Supervisors. The rapidity with which this recommendation was produced, drew from Mr. Burke the observation, that "Ministers, finding that the Select Committee of last year, a lawful wife publicly avowed, was barren, and had produced nothing, had taken a neat little snug one, which they called a Secret Committee, and that this was her first-born. Indeed," added he, "from the singular expedition of this extraordinary delivery, I am apt to think she was pregnant before wedlock." The Bill, when introduced, was violently opposed, as oppressive and unconstitutional; and supported on the grounds of the mixed nature of the Company, which was not merely a trading corporation, but a political body, an union of the merchant and magistrate; and that the appointment of Supervisors was really an interference with the Parliament, which was busily engaged in investigating the abuses, that the commission professed to be intended to correct. The East India Company were heard against it by Counsel. Mr. Burke opposed the Bill with his usual exuberance of reason and wit: he said, that the arguments of the Counsel must have left conviction on the mind of every gentleman who retained the least regard to national faith. He ridiculed the inefficiency of the two Committees then sitting. "One (the Select Committee) has been so slow in their motions, that the Company have given up, long since, all hopes of redress from them; and the other, (the Secret) has gone on altogether so rapidly, that they do not know where they will stop. Like the fly of a jack, the latter has gone, hey-go-mad! the other, like the ponderous lead at the other end; and in that manner, Sir, have roasted the East India Company." He charged the Minister with supineness, who, though himself the cause of the ruin of the Company, had done nothing, but came to the House to ask them to do what was his business. That, in 1767, an inquiry into the affairs of the Company was set on foot; that Parliament sat day after day for forty-one days, and broke up without doing any thing at all. "It was near about that period," he continued, "that a discovery was made that the India Company had obtained an acquisition of great wealth. It seems, Sir, that a lady of great fortune in India, who had been ungenerously dealt with by her stewards, was unlucky enough to engage the attention of Parliament, who, perhaps envious of the booty being divided without their having any share, paid their addresses to the lady, but whether to her person or fortune you must determine; for, Sir, they were very eager to embrace her; they pretended to rescue her from the rapacity of her stewards, yet, as soon as they touched the very good fortune of 400,000l. per annum, they left the lady to destruction. In this manner, Sir, the last Parliament acted; and, after pretending to redress the grievances of the Company, got up, after forty-one days' painful and laborious sitting, without coming to any conclusion at all. What has the Select Committee of this Parliament been, but a mock inquiry?" Sir William Meredith, who was a Member of that Committee, retorted Mr. Burke's comparison not unhappily. "He compares the two Committees," said he, "to a jack; the Secret one is like the flier of a jack, the other like the weight. I agree with him in the simile, but draw a very different conclusion. Sir, between the heavy ponderous weight at one end, and the quick motion of the flier, the dish is prepared, and rendered fit for digestion." In the course of the debate, Lord Clive observed, "I will trespass upon the indulgence of the House but a few moments. I am sorry, Sir, to find the India Company contending with Parliament, because, whenever their rights to territorial possessions are examined into, they will be disputed, and the Crown become the actual possessor of them. No man, Sir, has been more liberally rewarded by the Company than I have been; and though the learned sages of the law have very ably argued the cause of their clients, yet, Sir, I feel myself influenced by motives which they cannot feel, gratitude and interest; and Sir, if ever I should be forgetful of the one, which God forbid, the other would teach me to attend to the affairs of the Company. Sir, I consider the interests of the nation and the Company as inseparable; and, with respect to the Supervisors, I was and continue to be against it; but at the same time, I consider this Bill as an exertion, indeed, of parliamentary authority, yet extremely necessary; and I could wish that the Company had met this House half way, instead of petitioning, and quarrelling with the mouth that is to feed them. With respect to the gentlemen nominated for the supervision, they are themselves the best judges, whether their abilities and integrity are equal to the important service in which they were to engage. Had they, Sir, known the East Indies as well as I do, they would shudder at the bare idea of such a perplexing and difficult service. The most rigid integrity, with the greatest disinterestedness,—the greatest abilities with resolution and perseverance,—must be united in the man or men who undertake to reform the accumulating evils which exist in Bengal, and which threaten to involve the nation and the Company in one common ruin." The Bill was carried by a large majority, and finally passed both Houses.

It would seem as if the Court of Directors had resolved, that whenever their affairs came before Parliament, they should, as far as depended on them, contrive to find Lord Clive employment in his private concerns. When the bill of last session was to be proposed, certain heavy charges had been brought up against him, and hung out as a terror. When the present session was about to open, and much attention expected to be paid to Indian affairs, Lord Clive, on the 4th November, received an intimation from the Court of Directors, that they had taken the opinions of counsel relative to the loss sustained by the Company from the payment of the balances due to the renters of salt-pans in Bengal, out of their treasury; the commission received by him upon the revenues of Bengal, after his departure thence; and the interest due on sums paid for duties on salt, betle-nut, and tobacco; and were advised that he, and the rest of the gentlemen concerned in the payment of these balances, were liable to make good the same; that they were accountable for interest on the duties on salt, &c., and that his Lordship was not entitled to the commission on the revenues; and therefore calling upon him to make good those demands, but expressing an earnest wish for an amicable adjustment, to save the expense and disagreeable circumstances of a suit in equity. After many delays in procuring even a statement of the amount of the demands thus intended to be made on him, his Lordship agreed to refer the whole to arbitrators, as they desired, and named on his side Mr. Madocks, an eminent counsel; when the Directors insisted that the referees should be merchant arbitrators; Lord Clive, with every appearance of reason, contended that the differences between them consisted of questions of law and government; and that, had they been commercial, a lawyer was not an improper arbitrator: in short, that they were receding from their own proposal; which gave reason to suspect that what they had in view was, not a decision, but a lawsuit. His Lordship judged correctly, for the Directors ordered a suit to be instituted.[188]

Early in the year 1773, the Court of Directors, seeing the Company's concerns more and more burthened on every side, and having no means of answering the demands upon them, were compelled to apply to Government for a loan of 1,500,000l., for four years. This measure placed them, if possible, more completely than ever in the hands of the Ministry; and the Parliament, for the next four months, was entirely occupied with a series of motions, reports, and petitions, connected with their affairs. The debates of that period, which are very important, belong rather to the history of the East India Company and of the times, than to the Memoirs of Lord Clive. In the line of his politics being decidedly opposed to the measures of the Directors, which he considered as fatal to the prosperity of the Company, and being of opinion that their territorial acquisitions must be held as being acquired for the State, he generally voted with the Minister, but without joining his party.

It was in the course of this important session that a desperate blow was aimed at Lord Clive's honour and fortune. India affairs, though not in general very popular, or much attended to, engaged, at that time, a large share of the public attention. Violent discussions were going on in the Court of Proprietors, and in the Court of Directors, which were not only at war with each other, but divided within themselves: the East India Company complained loudly of the Ministry, which did not fail to recriminate; two Parliamentary Committees (the Select Committee, and the Committee of Secresy,) were sitting at the same time on the Company's affairs, and often occupied with nearly the same questions; petitions from the Company, the City of London, and the Proprietors, were daily presented to Parliament on Indian affairs; the events of the preceding fifteen years were reviewed, and brought before the public, by men influenced by every sentiment of public good and personal animosity; and many were violently agitated by all the passions that the love of gain, the fear of ruin, ambition, honour, public spirit, or private malevolence, can put in motion.

When, in this general turmoil, the acts of almost every man who had filled any conspicuous situation in India were passed in review, and commented on with all the virulence of party spirit, it is not to be imagined that one who had acted so eminent a part in the events of the East, and who had taken so active a share in those at home, as Lord Clive had done, should escape without reproach. No man, from his situation, had made more enemies; and they were not only powerful and rich, but able and persevering. The combined force of so many passions in angry commotion, and seeking for vent in one direction or another, seemed all at once to be turned against him. It appeared as if he were singled out as the political scape-goat of Indian criminality, to bear the crimes of others as well as his own faults.

The first attack came from the Select Committee, which had directed its attention much more to inquiries into particular historical facts, and charges of a personal nature, than to those general views which could enable Parliament, situated as it was, and pressed by the exigencies and clamours of a sinking Company, to legislate speedily, and with proper information. Lord Clive, in a letter of the 25th March, 1773, to General Wedderburn (the brother of the Solicitor-General), who then commanded at Bombay, and who, in the November following, fell at the siege of Broach, universally beloved and lamented, gives his opinion of the situation of affairs, and of the proceedings of the Committees, as they appeared to him, while things were still going on and unconcluded. "I know not what to say," he observes, "in my defence, for having thus long neglected to answer your several letters, so full in themselves of matter and of the situation of affairs, both at Bombay and upon the Continent. The real truth is, that the Parliamentary appointment of a Select Committee to inquire into the state, nature, and condition of the Company's affairs, and which hitherto hath been chiefly an inquiry into the conduct of your very humble servant, took up so much of my time and attention that I could not bring myself to think upon any other subject. This session the inquiry has been resumed by another Committee, called the Secret Committee, with much more serious attention, and with much greater abilities; so that I think a remedy may at last be applied to the many increasing evils in every part of India, if Government will stand forth, and do what they ought to do upon the occasion. No man is more capable than your brother of communicating to you what is at present in agitation, and what are most likely to be the consequences. For my part, I have ever been of opinion that all reformation abroad, until a thorough reformation takes place at home, can only be temporary, and must in the end prove futile. If we cannot have an able, honest, and independent Court of Directors at home, and a Governor and Council-General abroad of the same stamp, there is no salvation for the Company, and we shall at last be drove to the dreadful alternative of either seeing the whole of our possessions fall into the hands of Government, or of our inveterate enemies the French; and if the Proprietors have not virtue enough among them to make a proper choice, Parliament must do it for them; and I hope the choice will be such as may do honour to their country, and real service to the Company."

After the appointment of the Secret Committee, the attendance of the members of the Select Committee began to relax. Some became tired of the business, and others stayed away, disliking the personal and inquisitorial turn latterly given to their proceedings. Nearly a year, accordingly, intervenes between the dates of their second and third reports. It seems that Colonel Burgoyne, Governor Johnstone, Mr. Ongley, and Mr. Strachey, continued regular in their attendance; but it was with much difficulty, even during the sitting of Parliament, that seven members could be collected, without which the Committee could not sit. Still, however, the Chairman persevered; and various reports, several of them containing matter of great importance, were finally prepared.

The Secret Committee had been chiefly named by the Ministry. It had in its number several men of business, who, not being prompted by any personal resentments, and desirous of avoiding the reproaches thrown upon the first Committee, proceeded to scrutinise the actual state of the Company's concerns, so as to afford to the House data, so much required for coming to a conclusion regarding the real condition and solvency of the Company, and the general management of its affairs at home and abroad. The Minister was anxious, from the labours of the two, to be able to discover some principles for the guidance of the Company's affairs, and to enable the Government to satisfy the country. The questions had become very complicated, and numerous individuals were implicated. The Attorney-General, Thurlow, undertook to peruse the papers during the Easter holidays, and to lay before the Minister the propositions that might result from them. A consultation, to which were called the chief ministerial members who had taken an active part in India affairs, was afterwards held at the Minister's house. The Solicitor-General, Wedderburn, who was known to be Lord Clive's personal friend, was not invited. The proposition made by the Attorney-General, after considering the papers, is said to have been, that Parliament should confiscate to the public all the sums acquired by English public servants in the East Indies, under the denomination of presents from the Indian Princes, as having been obtained by the military force of this country, and, therefore, belonging to the State. This sweeping proposition, which confounded different times and circumstances, startled the meeting. Some of them observed, that no distinction was made between presents received before and after they were prohibited; that some had been received as the reward of signal meritorious services, and enjoyed for a long series of years, without any claim having been made upon them either by the State or the Company; and that, even as to those for whom such favourable distinctions could not be made, to deprive them, to their ruin, of property that had been long and quietly enjoyed, would be considered as harsh and revolting. The surly lawyer declared that, upon mature consideration, he had not been able to form any other proposition, and the consultation broke up.[189] It seems, however, to have been on this proposition, that Colonel Burgoyne grounded his subsequent motion.

It is obvious that committees constituted like the two in question, however industrious, and however impartial, must, from their composition, be liable to occasional errors; and before proceeding farther, it may be remarked that, in the course of their proceedings, several such did accordingly occur. The India House, from which their principal materials were to be derived, was under an influence most hostile to Lord Clive and his interests; and official men best know how easy it is to give a particular turn or colour even to official documents or accounts. Lord North, in his speech of March 23, 1773, remarked, that persons concerned in keeping the Company's accounts were such expert arithmeticians, that they were acquainted with the twofold manner of ciphering; in consequence of which it was apparent that there was such a thing as a twofold method of stating accounts. And Mr. Sulivan himself[190], in the same debate, acknowledged that the statement made by the Secret and Select Committees, of the state of the Company's affairs, was in several respects erroneous. One of the most glaring errors of fact is to be found in the Third Report of the Select Committee, where Lord Clive is represented as having got his jaghire at the period of the revolution in favour of Meer Jaffier[191], though in reality it was not granted for two years afterwards; a very important difference. Another instance may be given. The Secret Committee, in one of their Reports, stated that Lord Clive and his Council had paid away a large sum of money to individuals, under the head of Donation-money, in direct contradiction to an express order of the Court of Directors issued long before. On the publication of this statement, Lord Clive at once showed that it was erroneous; and that the order had been sent by the Falmouth, which was wrecked, and the packet lost; and that a duplicate did not reach Bengal till a considerable time after the payment had been made. These facts it accidentally happened that he was able to prove from the records of the India House. But assertions, even where unfounded, do not always admit of being disproved so satisfactorily, or even at all.

From this and some other articles misreported in a similar way, the partiality of the Secret Committee seemed liable to suspicion. From this imputation they were, however, exculpated by Mr. Jenkinson, afterwards Lord Liverpool, a member of the Committee, who informed the House, that, as the Committee had found it impossible themselves to search for facts among the vast mass of papers at the India House, they had been under the necessity of confiding in the diligence and accuracy of the clerks in the several departments; and that, for the matter then in debate, they had trusted to Mr. Samuel Wilks, the examiner of India correspondence, who appeared to them to be a man of extreme caution and industry.

The error in question was one that might have escaped Mr. Wilks quite unintentionally; but it is to be feared that all the errors or misrepresentations were not of the same description: and the circumstances to be stated, may prove what unseen yet formidable difficulties Lord Clive and all who were opposed to the Directors had to contend with, where the effect of a passing, incorrect assertion contained in a single line, was often not to be destroyed, if at all, by long and painful representations of the real circumstances.

On the 3d of May, when Lord North moved for leave to bring in his Bill for the better management of the East India Company, Lord Clive solicited the indulgence of the House, while he explained a few facts which had been partially stated in the Reports of the Select Committee. While he defended his own character, he did not spare Lord North nor the Court of Directors. He complained in particular of the mean and dishonest artifices which had been resorted to by some of the Directors to blast his honest fame, and that through the agency of the Committee then sitting. That one gentleman, a member of that House, who had long been the principal manager of the affairs of the East India Company[192], had on the seventh day of November last, in a private conversation with Mr. Hoole, the Auditor-General, told him that he wished for his assistance in a matter that would be particularly serviceable, and desired that he would draw up a complete state of the civil and military charges of Bengal, and likewise the revenues from the time of Lord Clive's arrival in Bengal in 1765; and directed him to refer to all the letters, plans, or regulations of Lord Clive, noting how far the charges, revenues, &c. agreed with them; to trace out the causes of any increase or decrease; to draw up the whole historically and progressively, making all the accounts his own; and, as Mr. Sulivan expressed himself, to mark the man; concluding that he wished to show that all the distresses of the Company arose from him. Lord Clive reminded the House with what caution materials drawn up in such a spirit, and issuing from such a source, were to be received; and how easily, by the effect of so powerful an engine, any man's reputation could be destroyed.

Mr. Sulivan rose in his own vindication, and acknowledged the circumstance to be true; but said, that as Lord Clive had taken occasion in the House, last session, to impute the distresses of the Company to the Directors, he thought he, as a Director, was justified in endeavouring to turn the tables, and lay the blame upon his Lordship, which he had been in hopes of doing fairly, with the assistance of Mr. Hoole. He then expatiated upon the enmity which had long been maintained against him by Lord Clive; and to show that it had not been reciprocal, he would now, he said, divulge a circumstance highly injurious to the noble Lord's honour, and which he had industriously concealed from the Secret Committee: this was the suppression of sixteen months' correspondence which had passed during his first government of Bengal, and which, though repeatedly called for by the Directors, had never been produced: that it was believed that the letters so suppressed might set the business of the jaghire in a different light from any in which it had yet appeared. Lord Clive, immediately rising, stated the facts. The correspondence with Indian Princes is always carried on by the Governor only; and translations are kept in books transmitted to the Directors from time to time. Some portion of it, written in the year 1759, by some accident had been neglected to be sent home. In 1763, when Lord Clive filed a bill against the Company for recovering his jaghire, the Directors (suspecting that the missing letters might contain something of importance, and had therefore been withheld) called on him to produce them, as it was presumed that he had retained copies for himself of his correspondence. In answer, he acquainted the Court that he had delivered the sections in question to Mr. Campbell, a Scotch author, in the year 1760, in order to prepare a memorial concerning the Dutch affairs to be laid before Mr. Pitt, then Secretary of State: that since then he had not seen them, though he had in vain made every inquiry after them; but that, from his own knowledge, he could affirm they did not contain any thing that could affect the matter in dispute between him and the Company.

To this statement Mr. Sulivan, of course, might give only such credit as he was disposed; but, as it happened, some account of the debate having appeared in the public newspapers, Dr. Campbell wrote to inform Lord Clive that he had found the sections mentioned by Mr. Sulivan, and was ready to deliver them to his Lordship's order. They were accordingly recovered next day, and immediately sent to the Court of Directors, and were found not to have the smallest reference to the jaghire.

But though Lord Clive had it in his power to meet and answer thus speedily these reflections upon his character, it is very evident that this good fortune was partly owing to accident; and that, in many similar instances, the most honourable and the most cautious of men might have found it altogether impossible to explain, at the moment, or at all, charges thus brought against them, at the distance of many years, when the minute circumstances had dropped from their memory, when documents had been mislaid or lost, or witnesses had fallen under the stroke of death. Several persons, whose acts were alluded to in the various reports, complained bitterly of this, as well as that the injury was not known till it had become in some measure irreparable by publication.

At length the storm which had so long been gathering against Lord Clive in the Select Committee, burst upon his head. The Committee had taken a historical view of the whole incidents, military and political, that had occurred in Bengal for seventeen years before; and Lord Clive and most of the chief agents who had been engaged in them had been repeatedly examined. Colonel Burgoyne, who, on the 8th and 21st of April, had brought up the Third and Fourth Reports of the Committee, called the attention of the House to them on the 10th of May[193], and, after alluding to the disagreeable situation in which he was placed, declared that the Reports contained an account of crimes shocking to human nature; that all the disasters that had befallen the Company and their affairs in the East could be traced back to the dethronement of Suraj-u-Dowlah, and the establishment of Meer Jaffier; a revolution, he said, effected by the blackest perfidy. He dwelt upon the circumstances of that event, in which Lord Clive took the leading part; the fictitious treaty by which Omichund was induced to desert his master; the forging, as he alleged, of Admiral Watson's name to that treaty, when the Admiral himself refused to subscribe it; the subsequent agreement with Meer Jaffier, and the immense sums received by the Select Committee of Calcutta, and others of the principal agents, under the name of presents or donations, but which, being, as he asserted, extorted by the influence of military force, did, like all acquisitions by treaty with foreign powers, of right belong to the State. He also attacked the proceedings of General Caillaud and others; and after expatiating on the enormities which the Reports had brought to light, he concluded by moving the following resolutions:—"1. That all acquisitions made under the influence of a military force, or by treaty with foreign Princes, do of right belong to the State. 2. That to appropriate acquisitions so made to the private emolument of persons entrusted with any civil or military power of the State, is illegal. 3. That very great sums of money and other valuable property have been acquired in Bengal, from Princes and others of that country, by persons entrusted with the military and civil powers of the State, by means of such powers, which sums of money and valuable property have been appropriated to the private use of such persons."

Colonel Burgoyne intimated to the House that, if these resolutions met with their approbation, he would not stop there, but would follow them up with vigour; and that his object was to compel such as had acquired sums of money in the way alluded to, to make full and complete restitution to the public.

The motion was seconded by Sir William Meredith; who said that there were only two possible ways to bring about a reformation in the East Indies,—the one by law, the other by example. That as to law, he could not comprehend how it was practicable to enforce laws made at such a distance: that the constitution of the present government of Bengal was defined to be a union of the sovereign and merchant; and that Mr. Vansittart explained what was the law by which these merchant-sovereigns exercised their supreme power: their rule of selling was to take as much as they pleased, while the rule by which they bought was to pay as little as they pleased. That the evils complained of were to be corrected not by law only, but by example; and deplored the stain brought upon the British name by the transactions which the Reports before the House disclosed.

Mr. Wedderburn answered, at considerable length, the principal assertions of the speakers that preceded him; and showed the incompetency of the evidence on which some of the facts rested, and the erroneous and unjust conclusions that had been drawn from others, so far as concerned Lord Clive. As to the forgery of Admiral Watson's name to the treaty with Omichund (he continued), it would be needless to analyse it, because the noble Lord has declared that, had it been necessary, he himself readily would have done it, and certainly done right in politics, to take that or any other means to destroy in an enemy so great a tyrant. He concluded by saying, that the resolutions before the House were founded in envy and illiberal principles; they were narrow, pointed at individuals, and neglecting future reformation, which ought to be the grand object of the inquiry; and above all, that there was in the Reports an indecision and defect of evidence that must render every thing done on their authority arbitrary and illegal. Mr. Attorney-General Thurlow defended the resolutions, and answered Mr. Wedderburn's speech.

In the course of the debate Lord Clive rose, and defended himself with great dignity and force. He pointed out the mistakes in matters of fact in the Reports, and in the speeches founded on them. He took a review of his own public life and services, and especially of that part of them that had been brought into question. He claimed the rewards and the honours bestowed on him as justly his due; lamented the abuse that had been made of the public press, and the mode resorted to of slandering the character of all orders of men without distinction: that for his part, he had been called villain, scoundrel, thief, murderer, assassin, &c.; but that he need not complain, as even Majesty itself had not escaped this implacable fury. What he regretted was the cause of virtue and public spirit, which must inevitably suffer, if this abuse was permitted to go unpunished; since the greatest inducement to men of superior talent to stand forth and distinguish themselves in their country's cause, was the hope of fair fame and just applause. Having explained the circumstances of the revolution, so far as he was concerned, and defended the legality of all the presents he had received, both in point of law and of justice, and alluded to the honours he had received for the very acts now questioned, he concluded by saying, "If the record of my services at the India House, if the defence I have twice made in this House, and if the approbation I have already met with, is not an answer to the attack that has been made upon me, I certainly can make none."

The two first resolutions passed without a division; and the third was also carried, though after some opposition.

Encouraged by this success, Colonel Burgoyne, on the 17th of May, prepared to bring home these general propositions to the individuals concerned; and, in the first place, pointed his charges against Lord Clive. He began by making some remarks on the invidious situation in which he was placed by the conscientious discharge of his duty. "The task of a public accuser was never a pleasing, but was sometimes a necessary one. Envy and malignity were the vices of little minds, and he disclaimed them. The House, in its movements, had only followed the cry of the public. Instances of rapacity and injustice had occurred in our Eastern possessions, that were known to all the world; an inordinate desire of wealth had had full play, and had led to transactions which had stigmatised those immediately concerned in them, and affected even the British name. That it was the duty of the House, as guardians of the nation's honour, to apply a remedy; and as the vice had been general, so must the punishment. It was a case in which no partial or limited censure would suffice to remove the evil, or to wipe off the stain from the country. The whole system on which the agents in the various revolutions had been remunerated, or rather had remunerated themselves, was most exceptionable and illegal. The first principle that he would lay down was, that it was impossible that any civil or military servant, in treating with a foreign Prince or State, could lawfully bargain for, or acquire, property for himself. This principle had uniformly been departed from in all the transactions which had been laid before the House. It would be necessary to point out who the persons were who had so acquired property, and the particular circumstances under which it had been acquired. Death had removed some of these persons, and their case would therefore be a matter of future consideration. That it was proper to consider the state of India at the time when the money was received. A mighty change had just taken place in that country, and in the Company's affairs. In the year 1757, when the English ascendancy was established, the Company was raised, as by the power of magic, from the situation of merchants to that of sovereign Princes, and, in their delirium, they at once forgot their charters; while their servants, become ministers, and rulers of the Governors of provinces and Princes, looked with contempt on the slow returns of trade and merchandise, since they saw before them a shorter and surer way to opulence. What was the consequence? The power thus placed in their hands was not tenderly employed. Revolution followed revolution; and, at each successive change, the treasures of the Prince were lavished to glut the rapacity of the agents by whom it was effected. At last, when the whole treasures of the Princes were exhausted, they did not stop short, but took possession of the country itself, at the same time that they retained the name of the puppet whom they set up, only to confound all ideas of right and justice. In the revolution of 1757, effected by Lord Clive, great stress had been laid on its necessity; but every succeeding revolution had been sustained on the same ground,—a ground that never would be wanting. It appeared that, by the treaty with Sujah-u-Dowlah, the Company were confirmed in all the privileges they had formerly enjoyed; the Company had their factories restored; and to individuals who had suffered, a compensation was made. Surely, in such circumstances, the Nabob had a right to expect to be able to preserve a state of neutrality among the different nations who had factories in his dominions; yet, on the breaking out of the war with France, it was thought proper to violate the treaty just concluded, by attacking Chandernagore. The Select Committee were not unanimous on this point. Becher was for neutrality, Drake had no opinion at all. The violent counsels of Clive prevailed. It was argued, that having gone so far we must go farther; that having established ourselves by force, we had made the Nabob our enemy, and that in consequence he must always be ready to join our enemies; and some circumstances of his conduct, said to indicate a hostile feeling, were pointed out. But, in fact, when we broke with him, and hurled him from his high eminence, Suraj-u-Dowlah had been guilty of no overt act of hostility; all that was alleged, were various suspicions that he meant to break the treaty." He detailed the circumstances attending the deposition of Meer Jaffier; the various sums received by Lord Clive, amounting to 2,080,000 rupees, or 234,000l. sterling; and contended that they were received contrary to justice and right.