juftice, ever ready to relieve the oppreffed and punish the oppreffor. As to the charges themfelves, excepting in fome few points, the facts which they contained had been admitted by Mr. Haftings at their bar, in what he had called his defence, but which he had couched and delivered rather in the ftyle of their mafter than that of the perfon they were accuf ing of high crimes and mifdemeanors. He read a paffage from Mr. Haftings's defence, against the charge relative to the affairs at Benares, and dwelt on it as an exprefs avowal of a fyftem of defpotifm and arbitrary power which Mr. Haftings declared he had uniformly made the rule of his conduct; It was repugnant to any principles of government that he had ever heard of, and most especially where the conftitution of the fuperintending government was free. Mischiefs must neceffarily arife from fubordinate Directors of provinces exercifing arbitrary and defpotic authority; and highly reproachable indeed was Mr. Haftings's rapacity after money: it was one of the prominent features of his government: and although he had told the Houfe when at the bar, that he went out to India with his education but half finished, it was plain he had completed it in Bengal upon the true Indian fyftem. Nor was his unlawful taking of money fingly a crime in his mind, but Mr. Haftings having always contrived to make the India Company a party in his rapacious proceedings, was a very great aggravation of it, inafmuch as it caft an odium on the national character, by making a.private vice appear to be afcribable to a public feeling.

With refpect to the circumflances immediately precedent to the commencement of the Rohilla war, during its conduct and progrefs, and fubfequent to its conclufion, he felt it neceflary to obferve, that had Mr. Haftings fo conducted his government, as to leave a country which he found rich and fertile, increafed in its cultivation and produce; had he left its venerable nobles in poffeffion of their ancient honours and fortunes; its merchants in the purfuit of an improved and advantageous commerce, productive of a ftill more enlarged return of wealth and ufury upon their capital; employed its hufbandmen in carrying their victorious ploughfhares into defarts and woods, and warring against that deftruction, folitude and famine, which warred against mankind, he would in that cafe have faid to the Governor General, " I inquire "not into your particular conduct; I am fatisfied with the "refult; I want not to know whether you made two or "three or five hundred thousand pounds; keep what you "have got; you have made a numerous people rich and happy; you have increased the commerce of the country; enlarged its means of wealth, and improved its revenues;

"in fo doing, you have reflected honour and glory on the "character of the British nation."

Juft fuch a People had the Rohillas been previous to their extermination But alas! they were now banished, and their country no longer that luxuriant garden which every fpot of it had been before the Rohilla war. He gave a history of the origin and life of Sujah Dowlah and Coffim Ally Khan, and entered into an ample statement of the affair of Nundcomar, and of all the facts contained in the charge; remark, ing, that Sir Robert Barker had been offered 500,000l., and the remiffion of an annuity of 250,000l, due from the Company before Mr. Haftings came out, only for employing the British brigade in the conqueft of a small part of the Rohilla belonging to Haffez Kamet: and that Mr. Haftings had undertaken to extirpate the whole nation or tribe for 400,000l.

Mr. Burke now moved, "To have the refolutions of "May, 1782, which brands and ftigmatizes Mr. Haftings's "conduct, read."

The Mafier of the Rolls defired to know to what purpose The Mater the right honourable gentleman wifhed to have the refolution of the Rolls read?

Mr. Burke anfwered, that his motive for wifhing to have Mr. Burke, the refolution read was, in order to clear himself from the imputation of having rafhly and fingly meddled with the subject, by fhewing that the House had, in very strong terms, already reprobated Mr. Haftings's conduct in regard to the Rohilla war.

The refolution having been read, Mr. Burke rofe again, and gave his motion to Mr. St. John, who read it to the Houfe.

Mr. Wilbraham remarked, that for the fake of Mr. Haft- Mr. Wilbraings's honour, he hoped the Houfe would fuffer the charges ham. to go to the House of Lords; for there, and there only, Mr. Haftings could have what he faid at the bar he was fo anxious for, a full acquittal. Wonderful and transcendent were the conciliatory talents of Mr. Haftings, who had found means to conciliate Sir Elijah Impey after a public quarrel; he had alfo found means to conciliate the honourable gentleman, who at this time with fo much ability appeared as his agent in that Houfe, and he had befide conciliated a right honourable and learned gentleman, who originally moved the refolution which they had just heard read, The honourable Governor would (he had no doubt) make an ample difplay of his conciliatory talents in the House of Lords. An improper interpretation had been put on Sir Robert Barker's having figned the treaty with the Robillas; but

furely

Mr. Nicholls.

furely fuch an atteftation could not fairly be conftrued into a guarranteeing of the treaty on the part of Sir Robert Barker.

Mr. Nicholls faid that the Rohillas were originally adventurers and a warlike people, but were neither the cultivators of the foil, nor the collectors of the revenue. They croffed the Ganges, and took poffeffion of Rohilcund about the year 1741, and held the offices of power ever fince, till the period of their expulfion in 1775. Mr. Nicholls juftified eve ry step taken by Mr. Haftings, and infifted upon it, that Sir Robert Barker's atteftation was with a view to guarrantee the treaty. He ridiculed the idea that Sir Robert Barker only guarranteed the treaty on the part of the Rohillas, declaring that no man ever heard of a guarrantee on one fide only. Sujah ul Doula (he reminded the Houfe) had been our ally, and our interefts being neceffarily involved in his, when it appeared to be his determination to make war on the Rohillas, we were obliged in a manner to join him; but the making the Rohillas crofs the Ganges was not an extirpation any more than fending the Auftrian army out of Auftria would be an extirpation of the whole Auftrian nation. He went through the hiftory of the fale of the provinces of Corah and Illahabad, and justified the demanding of the five additional lacks of rupees, when the Vizier defired to fufpend the war he had meditated against the Rohillas. He alfo juftified that part of the charge relative to Mr. Haftings's conduct in regard to his fecret manner of conducting the treaty of Banares, and fummed up his fpeech, by declaring that he would give his negative against the question. Mr. Powys. Mr. Powys declared that he did not afcribe the ftrange nature of the queftion to any improper intention on the part of his right honourable friend, who had with fuch wonderful ability expatiated upon it; but he had imagined that the Committee would not have been expected to do more than vote fome general refolution, fuch as, that the charge contained matter of a criminal nature, or. words to fomething like that effect. To explain what he meant more fully, it might be neceffary to remark, that the prefent motion enumerated almost every fact alledged in the charge as criminal. To that extent he was not prepared to go. Several of the facts did not appear to him to have been proved, or, if proved, were not criminal; others, on the contrary, did appear to be criminal, and he was ready to vote them. If the right honourable gentleman would withdraw his motion and put it generally, as he had hinted, he would vote for it; if the prefent motion were to ftand, he must go through its detail, and feparate what he thought criminal, and was prepared to vote, from that concerning which he entertained a different opinion.

Mr.

Mr. Burke begged leave to inform his honourable friend Mr. Burke. why he had drawn the motion in its prefent fhape. The right honourable gentleman oppofite him, for whose situation and abilities he entertained great respect, had defired that the motion might be propofed, as nearly as poffible, in the form in which he fhould be of opinion it might go to the Houfe of Lords. Being therefore well aware that the House of Lords would expect the articles fent up as grounds of an impeachment, to contain a fpecific ftatement of facts and periods of time and place, he had drawn his motion accordingly; but he was not wedded to its form. If in addition to the honourable gentleman's opinion (which alone had great weight with him) he fhould find it to be the opinion of the Houfe, he had no objection to retire for a minute or two, and draw up a fhort general motion of the nature pointed out, and which, but for the reafon he had ftated, would certainly have been the form in which he fhould have introduced it.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer joining in opinion with Mr. Powys, and likewife Mr. Wilberforce, thofe gentlemen, as well as Mr. Fox, fuggefted different forms of motions, fo as to meet the general idea; whereupon Mr. Burke withdrew his first motion, and that moved by Mr. Powys was taken as the fubject of the fucceeding debate.

Mr. Powys declared, that the part of the charge which Mr. Powys. related to an imputation of cruel treatment to the prifoners had not been proved or brought home to Mr. Haftings. He ftated what facts he thought had been proved, and especially that of extirpating the Rohillas. He contended, that forcing the Rohillas to cross the Ganges was no more the extirpation of a nation than obliging the Auftrian army to quit Auftria would be extirpating the Auftrian nation. He afked what the honourable and learned gentleman would think if the militia of England were compelled to quit the island of Great Britain? He read fome extracts from Mr. Haftings's own letters, and declared, that, upon the whole, he faw no ground to impute either perfonal or vindictive motives to Mr. Haftings; and therefore, though he fhould vote for the motion, he begged to be understood as by no means pledging himfelf to vote for the other charges, or to vote for carrying up articles of impeachment to the Houfe of Lords, merely on the fingle ground of the prefent refolution. He also alluded to the circumftance of Mr. Haftings having been appointed three feveral times by the fame Adminiftration after the affair of the Rohilla war, and faid, it was undoubtedly a circumstance in his favour: but what muft the Houfe think of the conduct of that Adminiftration, who could not but know of all the criminal facts ftated in the charge of that day, and yet continued to employ him?

Mr. Mon

fague.

Ld. North.

Mr. Montague obferved, that the recovery of the forty lacks of rupees due from the Rohillas to Sujah ul Dowlah, was the only apparent and oftenfible reafon for commencing the war upon that people; but it was evident there had been fome other reafon which ought to be known and stated..

Lord North obferved that he felt it highly requifite to explain a matter perfonal to himself, and alluded to by an honourable gentleman (Mr. Powys). His Lordship then gave a circumftantial account of his conduct while at the head of Administration, relative to the appointment of Mr. Haftings, three feveral times. When the bill appointing a new conftitution for the Eaft India Company, and abridging part of the powers before enjoyed by the Directors, (for to this length the bills undoubtedly went) being what was generally deemed a ftrong parliamentary measure, juftified by the neceffity of the times) was before the Houfe, he moved to nominate Mr. Haftings for five years Prefident at Calcutta, and after that time the power of nominating their chief fervants in India was to revert to the Court of Directors, and be by them enjoyed as before. By the fame bill General Clavering, Mr. Monfon, and Mr. Francis, had been appointed (and a better Council, or one on whom too much praise could not be bestowed, had never been fent out) and at that time the news of the Rohilla war, and all its circumstances, had not reached England. Soon after the arrival of the new Council in India, they fent home complaints against the Governor General on the fubject of the Rohilla war, ftating fuch facts as had then come to their knowledge. As foon as he was apprifed of thofe facts, he thought Mr. Haftings's conduct highly cenfurable, and he fent to the Court of Directors (with whom the power of appointing new fervants fubject to the control of his Majefty's Minifters, lay) and defired them to make every poffible exertion for the recall or difimiffion of Mr. Haftings. The Court of Directors condemned Mr. Haflings's conduct as much as he did: à Court was called, and his difmiffion refolved on. That vote of the Directors, however, was rendered abortive by the Court of Proprietors, among whom Mr. Haftings had fo many friends, that they fent back the vote of the Court of Directors, and kept Mr. Haftings in his fituation. No other means for removing him, therefore, could have been reforted to, but his bringing in a new bill to alter again the conftitution of the Eaft-India Company. That as their conftitution had been fo lately fettled) he did not think it advifable,, becaufe, if any alteration had been made, he muft ftill farther have encroached on the powers of the Court of Directors. At a fublequent period, two gentlemen (Mr. Grant and Mr. Lauchlan Macleane) came over from India, and made it appear to the

Court