by Edmund Burke
A month had been allowed by proclamation for the submission of all persons who had been in rebellion, which submission was to entitle them to indemnity. But, my Lords, he endeavored to break the public faith with these women, by inciting the soldiers to make no capitulation with them, and thus depriving them of the benefit of the proclamation, by preventing their voluntary surrender.
[Mr. Burke here read the proclamation.]
From the date of this proclamation it appears that the surrender of the fort was clearly within the time given to those who had been guilty of the most atrocious acts of rebellion to repair to their homes and enjoy an indemnity. These women had never quitted their homes, nor had they been charged with rebellion, and yet they were cruelly excluded from the general indemnity; and after the army had taken unconditional possession of the fort, they were turned out of it, and ordered to the quarters of the commanding officer, Major Popham. This officer had received from Mr. Hastings a power to rob them, a power to plunder them, a power to distribute the plunder, but no power to give them any allowance, nor any authority even to receive them.
In this disgraceful affair the soldiers showed a generosity which Mr. Hastings neither showed nor would have suffered, if he could have prevented it. They agreed amongst themselves to give to these women three lacs of rupees, and some trifle more; and the rest was divided as a prey among the army. The sum found in the fort was about 238,000l., not the smallest part of which was in any way proved to be Cheyt Sing’s property, or the property of any person but the unfortunate women who were found in the possession of it.
The plunder of the fort being thus given to the soldiers, what does Mr. Hastings next do? He is astonished and stupefied to find so much unprofitable violence, so much tyranny, and so little pecuniary advantage, — so much bloodshed, without any profit to the Company. He therefore breaks his faith with the soldiers; declares, that, having no right to the money, they must refund it to the Company; and on their refusal, he instituted a suit against them. With respect to the three lacs of rupees, or 30,000l., which was to be given to these women, have we a scrap of paper to prove its payment? is there a single receipt or voucher to verify their having received one sixpence of it? I am rather inclined to think that they did receive it, or some part of it; but I don’t know a greater crime in public officers than to have no kind of vouchers for the disposal of any large sums of money which pass through their hands: but this, my Lords, is the great vice of Mr. Hastings’s government.
I have briefly taken notice of the claim which Mr. Hastings thought proper to make, on the part of the Company, to the treasure found in the fort of Bidjegur, after he had instigated the army to claim it as the right of the captors. Your Lordships will not be at a loss to account for this strange and barefaced inconsistency. This excellent Governor foresaw that he would have a bad account of this business to give to the contractors in Leadenhall Street, who consider laws, religion, morality, and the principles of state policy of empires as mere questions of profit and loss. Finding that he had dismal accounts to give of great sums expended without any returns, he had recourse to the only expedient that was left him. He had broken his faith with the ladies in the fort, by not suffering his officers to grant them that indemnity which his proclamation offered. Then, finding that the soldiers had taken him at his word, and appropriated the treasure to their own use, he next broke his faith with them. A constant breach of faith is a maxim with him. He claims the treasure for the Company, and institutes a suit before Sir Elijah Impey, who gives the money to the Company, and not to the soldiers. The soldiers appeal; and since the beginning of this trial, I believe even very lately, it has been decided by the Council that the letter of Mr. Hastings was not, as Sir Elijah Impey pretended, a mere private letter, because it had “Dear Sir,” in it, but a public order, authorizing the soldiers to divide the money among themselves.
Thus 200,000l. was distributed among the soldiers; 400,000l. was taken away by Cheyt Sing, to be pillaged by all the Company’s enemies through whose countries he passed; and so ended one of the great sources from which this great financier intended to supply the exigencies of the Company, and recruit their exhausted finances.
By this proceeding, my Lords, the national honor is disgraced, all the rules of justice are violated, and every sanction, human and divine, trampled upon. We have, on one side, a country ruined, a noble family destroyed, a rebellion raised by outrage and quelled by bloodshed, the national faith pledged to indemnity, and that indemnity faithlessly withheld from helpless, defenceless women; while the other side of the picture is equally unfavorable. The East India Company have had their treasure wasted, their credit weakened, their honor polluted, and their troops employed against their own subjects, when their services were required against foreign enemies.
My Lords, it only remains for me, at this time, to make a few observations upon some proceedings of the prisoner respecting the revenue of Benares. I must first state to your Lordships that in the year 1780 he made a demand upon that country, which, by his own account, if it had been complied with, would only have left 23,000l. a year for the maintenance of the Rajah and his family. I wish to have this account read, for the purpose of verifying the observations which I shall have to make to your Lordships.
[Here the account was read.]
I must now observe to your Lordships, that Mr. Markham and Mr. Hastings have stated the Rajah’s net revenue at forty-six lacs: but the accounts before you state it at forty lacs only. Mr. Hastings had himself declared that he did not think the country could safely yield more, and that any attempt to extract more would be ruinous.
Your Lordships will observe that the first of these estimates is unaccompanied with any document whatever, and that it is contradicted by the papers of receipt and the articles of account, from all of which it appears that the country never yielded more than forty lacs during the time that Mr. Hastings had it in his possession; and you may be sure he squeezed as much out of it as he could. He had his own Residents, — first Mr. Markham, then Mr. Fowke, then Mr. Grant; they all went up with a design to make the most of it. They endeavored to do so; but they never could screw it up to more than forty lacs by all the violent means which they employed. The ordinary subsidy, as paid at Calcutta by the Rajah, amounted to twenty-two lacs; and it is therefore clearly proved by this paper, that Mr. Hastings’s demand of fifty lacs (500,000l.), joined to the subsidies, was more than the whole revenue which the country could yield. What hoarded treasure the Rajah possessed, and which Mr. Hastings says he carried off with him, does not appear. That it was any considerable sum is more than Mr. Hastings knows, more than can be proved, more than is probable. He had not, in his precipitate flight, any means, I think, of carrying away a great sum. It further appears from these accounts, that, after the payment of the subsidy, there would only have been left 18,000l. a year for the support of the Rajah’s family and establishments.
Your Lordships have now a standard, not a visionary one, but a standard verified by accurate calculation and authentic accounts. You may now fairly estimate the avarice and rapacity of this man, who describes countries to be enormously rich in order that he may be justified in pillaging them. But however insatiable the prisoner’s avarice may be, he has other objects in view, other passions rankling in his heart, besides the lust of money. He was not ignorant, and we have proved it by his own confession, that his pretended expectation of benefit to the Company could not be realized; but he well knew that by enforcing his demands he should utterly and effectually ruin a man whom he mortally hated and abhorred, — a man who could not, by any sacrifices offered to the avarice, avert the cruelty of his implacable enemy. As long as truth remains, as long as figures stand, as long as two and two are four, as long as there is mathematical and arithmetical demonstration, so long shall his cruelty, rage, ravage, and oppression remain evident to an astonished posterity.
I shall undertake, my Lords, when this court meets again, to develop the consequences of this wicked
proceeding. I shall then show you that that part of the Rajah’s family which he left behind him, and which Mr. Hastings pretended to take under his protection, was also ruined, undone, and destroyed; and that the once beautiful country of Benares, which he has had the impudence to represent as being still in a prosperous condition, was left by him in such a state as would move pity in any tyrant in the world except the one who now stands before you.
SPEECH IN GENERAL REPLY. THIRD DAY: TUESDAY, JUNE 3, 1794.
My Lords, — We are called, with an awful voice, to come forth and make good our charge against the prisoner at your bar; but as a long time has elapsed since your Lordships heard that charge, I shall take the liberty of requesting my worthy fellow Manager near me to read that part to your Lordships which I am just now going to observe upon, that you may be the better able to apply my observations to the letter of the charge.
[Mr. Wyndham reads.]
“That the said Warren Hastings, having, as aforesaid, expelled the said Cheyt Sing from his dominions, did, of his own usurped authority, and without any communication with or any approbation given by the other members of the Council, nominate and appoint Rajah Mehip Narrain to the government of the provinces of Benares, and did appoint his father, Durbege Sing, as administrator of his authority, and did give to the British Resident, William Markham, a controlling authority over both; and did farther abrogate and set aside all treaties and agreements which subsisted between the state of Benares and the British nation; and did arbitrarily and tyrannically, of his mere authority, raise the tribute to the sum of four hundred thousand pounds sterling, or thereabouts; did further wantonly and illegally impose certain oppressive duties upon goods and merchandise, to the great injury of trade and ruin of the provinces; and did farther dispose of, as his own, the property within the said provinces, by granting the same, or parts, thereof, in pensions to such persons as he thought fit.
“That the said Warren Hastings did, some time in the year 1782, enter into a clandestine correspondence with William Markham, Esquire, the then Resident at Benares, which said Markham had been by him, the said Warren Hastings, obtruded into the said office, contrary to the positive orders of the Court of Directors; and, in consequence of the representations of the said Markham, did, under pretence that the new excessive rent or tribute was in arrear, and that the affairs of the provinces were likely to fall into confusion, authorize and impower him, by his own private authority, to remove the said Durbege Sing from his office and deprive him of his estate.
“That the said Durbege Sing was, by the private orders and authorities given by the said Warren Hastings, and in consequence of the representations aforesaid, violently thrown into prison, and cruelly confined therein, under pretence of the non-payment of the arrears of the tribute aforesaid.
“That the widow of Bulwant Sing, and the Rajah Mehip Narrain, did pointedly accuse the said Markham of being the sole cause of any delay in the payment of the tribute aforesaid, and did offer to prove the innocence of the said Durbege Sing, and also to prove that the faults ascribed to him were solely the faults of the said Markham; yet the said Warren Hastings did pay no regard whatever to the said representations, nor make any inquiry into the truth of the same, but did accuse the said widow of Bulwant Sing and the Rajah aforesaid of gross presumption for the same; and, listening to the representations of the person accused, (viz., the Resident Markham,) did continue to confine the said Durbege Sing in prison, and did invest the Resident Markham with authority to bestow his office upon whomsoever he pleased.
“That the said Markham did bestow the said office of administrator of the provinces of Benares upon a certain person named Jagher Deo Seo, who, in order to gratify the arbitrary demands of the said Warren Hastings, was obliged greatly to distress and harass the unfortunate inhabitants of the said provinces.
“That the said Warren Hastings did, some time in the year 1784, remove the said Jagher Deo Seo from the said office, under pretence of certain irregularities and oppressions; which irregularities and oppressions are solely imputable to him, the said Warren Hastings.
“That the consequences of all these violent changes and arbitrary acts were the total ruin and desolation of the country, and the flight of the inhabitants: the said Warren Hastings having found every place abandoned at his approach, even by the officers of the very government which he established, and seeing nothing but traces of devastation in every village, the provinces in effect without a government, the administration misconducted, the people oppressed, trade discouraged, and the revenue in danger of a rapid decline.
“All which destruction, devastation, oppression, and ruin are solely imputable to the abovementioned and other arbitrary, illegal, unjust, and tyrannical acts of him, the said Warren Hastings, who, by all and every one of the same, was and is guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors.”
[Mr. Burke proceeded.]
My Lords, you have heard the charge; and you are now going to see the prisoner at your bar in a new point of view. I will now endeavor to display him in his character of a legislator in a foreign land, not augmenting the territory, honor, and power of Great Britain, and bringing the acquisition under the dominion of law and liberty, but desolating a flourishing country, that to all intents and purposes was our own, — a country which we had conquered from freedom, from tranquillity, order, and prosperity, and submitted, through him, to arbitrary power, misrule, anarchy, and ruin. We now see the object of his corrupt vengeance utterly destroyed, his family driven from their home, his people butchered, his wife and all the females of his family robbed and dishonored in their persons, and the effects which husband and parents had laid up in store for the subsistence of their families, all the savings of provident economy, distributed amongst a rapacious soldiery. His malice is victorious. He has well avenged, in the destruction of this unfortunate family, the Rajah’s intended visit to General Clavering; he has well avenged the suspected discovery of his bribe to Mr. Francis.
“Thou hast it now, King, Cawdor, Glamis, all!”
Let us see, my Lords, what use he makes of this power, — how he justifies the bounty of Fortune, bestowing on him this strange and anomalous conquest. Anomalous I call it, my Lords, because it was the result of no plan in the cabinet, no operation in the field. No act or direction proceeded from him, the responsible chief, except the merciless orders, and the grant to the soldiery. He lay skulking and trembling in the fort of Chunar, while the British soldiery entitled themselves to the plunder which he held out to them. Nevertheless, my Lords, he conquers; the country is his own; he treats it as his own. Let us, therefore, see how this successor of Tamerlane, this emulator of Genghis Khân, governs a country conquered by the talents and courage of others, without assistance, guide, direction, or counsel given by himself.
My Lords, I will introduce his first act to your Lordships’ notice in the words of the charge.
“The said Warren Hastings did, some time in the year 1782, enter into a clandestine correspondence with William Markham, Esquire, the then Resident at Benares; which said Markham had been by him, the said Warren Hastings, obtruded into the said office, contrary to the positive orders of the Court of Directors.”
This unjustifiable obtrusion, this illegal appointment, shows you at the very outset that he defies the laws of his country, — most positively and pointedly defies them. In attempting to give a reason for this defiance, he has chosen to tell a branch of the legislature from which originated the act which wisely and prudently ordered him to pay implicit obedience to the Court of Directors, that he removed Mr. Fowke from Benares, contrary to the orders of the Court, on political grounds; because, says he, “I thought it necessary the Resident there should be a man of my own nomination and confidence. I avow the principle, and think no government can subsist without it. The punishment of the Rajah made no part of my design in Mr. Fowke’s removal or Mr. Markham’s appointment, nor was his punishment an object of my contemplation at the time I removed Mr. Fowke to appoint Mr.
Markham: an appointment of my own choice, and a signal to notify the restoration of my own authority; as I had before removed Mr. Fowke and appointed Mr. Graham for the same purpose.”
Here, my Lords, he does not even pretend that he had any view whatever, in this appointment of Mr. Markham, but to defy the laws of his country. “I must,” says he, “have a man of my own nomination, because it is a signal to notify the restoration of my own authority, as I had before removed Mr. Fowke for the same purpose.”
I must beg your Lordships to keep in mind that the greater part of the observations with which I shall trouble you have a reference to the principles upon which this man acts; and I beseech you to remember always that you have before you a question and an issue of law; I beseech you to consider what it is that you are disposing of, — that you are not merely disposing of this man and his cause, but that you are disposing of the laws of your country.
You, my Lords, have made, and we have made, an act of Parliament in which the Council at Calcutta is vested with a special power, distinctly limited and defined. He says, “My authority is absolute. I defy the orders of the Court of Directors, because it is necessary for me to show that I can disregard them, as a signal of my own authority.” He supposes his authority gone while he obeys the laws; but, says he, “the moment I got rid of the bonds and barriers of the laws,” (as if there had been some act of violence and usurpation that had deprived him of his rightful powers,) “I was restored to my own authority.” What is this authority to which he is restored? Not an authority vested in him by the East India Company; not an authority sanctioned by the laws of this kingdom. It is neither of these, but the authority of Warren Hastings; an inherent divine right, I suppose, which he has thought proper to claim as belonging to himself; something independent of the laws, something independent of the Court of Directors, something independent of his brethren of the Council. It is “my own authority.”
