misconduct impaired her vitals, and, as an elegant commentator upon the orations of Cicero observed, “prevaricatione testimonii," by prevarication of testimony, the inroads of corruption destroyed the political frame, and then were all things at stake. But even then, a man of the first family and connections and rank in the state, was brought to punishment. Verres, the governor of Sicily, was accused by Cicero for the mal-administration of the province committed to his care. The connections of the accused were some of the most splendid and opulent of Rome; among these were the Hortensii, and even the Metellii. It was not a party for or against government, it was the government itself which adopted the prosecution, and no less than one hundred and fifty days were granted to the accuser to collect the materials for his accusation, and that from a province so near as Sicily is to Italy; and the justice of the Roman senate allowed not only time for digesting the matter of the accusation, but also opened, without reserve, all the cabinets containing the documents for which the accuser called. Could it now be said that the cause of justice was in liberal hands, if documents which the accuser demanded were to be witheld? The business had reference to a country in a remote situation, from whence proofs had come in abundance; and the suppression of them was no argument against the veracity of the charge. The period had not long elapsed, since a certain right honourable gentleman, the Cicero of the age (Mr. Dundas), obtained the most ample intelligence of those miseries which prevailed in the East Indies. The right honourable gentleman brought forth a bill of pains and penalties against one of those characters whom the House considered as an object within its reach. How far he pursued the point, the world had seen; and yet the difficulties he had to encounter in the pursuit of his object, were totally removed by the concurrent disposition of every party with whom docun ents were deposited, necessary to accomplish his views. The right honourable gentleman had a willing administration, a body of India directors disposed to his purpose; and the

conclusion of the business was in the remembrance of every

one.

Mr. Burke added, that for his own part, he only called for what the hand of power had no excuse for detaining. If the papers for which he asked, were necessary to his purpose, the detaining them was unfair; and those who detained them must either plead design, or ignorance of their purport; but whether to the purport or not, a refusal was unjustifiable; and if those who refused them were ignorant of their contents, they were guilty of neglect. Yet if, after all, the desolation of a province under a British government, a province which extended 53,000 square miles, the internal wealth of which was, according to every calculation, equal to eighteen millions sterling, at a period before it experienced those calamities which had rendered it an object fit to be abandoned; if the desolation and ruin of that province, with the oppression and destruction of its nobility, were not sufficient inducements with the House to grant him the papers for which he moved, and if no other ground would be esteemed sufficient but that of specifying his charges, although he knew that he was acting inconsistently with the established orders and practice of the House to comply with such a desire, yet for the sake of removing those objections calculated to impede the business he had undertaken, he would wave all that attachment to regularity, because it was his inclination to comply with the wishes of those who opposed him, in order to substantiate the truth as soon as possible.

Major Scott agreed with Mr. Burke, that the papers were necessary to be produced; and Mr. Pitt, after many professions of the most unbiassed impartiality, concurred with them; remarking at the same time, that it would be but fair and candid in the right honourable mover, to give the House some specific information of the subject matter of his charges, and to state the grounds and reasons for the production of such papers as he might think it necessary to call for in support of them.

Mr. Burke begged to assure the House, that should they call upon him to specify any of the charges, he would com

ply: he thought himself in possession of such a volume of evidence, as would enforce conviction before the tribunal to which he intended to refer it; such evidence as neither influence nor connexion could withstand, nor corruption awe; nay, such as would cause the justice of this cantry to exert itself. Amidst a multitude of other enormities, it would appear, that the country of Oude had been desolated; the ladies of the royal family plundered; the nobility stripped of their property; armed soldiers quartered on the inhabitants to extort their property; and that many other crimes too deeply marked by violent barbarity, had been perpetrated, with the sanction, and under the direction of Mr. Hastings.

The motion was agreed to.

March 3.

Mr. BURKE begged leave to submit to the most serious attention of the House, the subject of motions which had been made for papers relative to particular transactions in the East Indies. Upon this occasion, he considered it as . his duty earnestly to repeat, that these motions were unavoidably requisite for the acquisition of papers which belonged to the whole body of charges, and without which it would prove impossible to go fully and fairly into the investigation of this important matter; he trusted, therefore, that no objection would arise against their being granted. He should make three motions, all, in a great measure, connected with each other. They went to the treaty of peace with the Mahrattas, and were for the purpose of bringing into evidence the proofs requisite to establish the charges against Mr. Hastings in that particular transaction. His first motion was, "That there be laid before this House, copies or duplicates of all papers relative to the last peace with the Mahrattas, or any demand made by the Mahrattas, concerning the cession or restoration of any

territorics now in the possession of the Company, or its allies, or of the payment of any chout (or fourth part of the revenues), or of any sum in lieu thereof, or concerning any payment of money, or loan, to any of the said Mahrattas 'e or paid since the 1st of January, 1779."

Mr. Dundas remarked, that as the contents of the papers moved for, must, if rendered public, occasion that matter to transpire which ought, from motives of policy, to remain a secret to all the powers of the East Indies, he was determined steadily to oppose so dangerous a proposition. He should take the liberty to aver, that the late peace in India had never become the object of complaint, but merited the applause of every man. The benefits arising from it were great. It had proved, in fact, the salvation of the British empire in Asia. That peace had broken one of the most powerful confederacies ever formed against our possessions there; and had it not been concluded in the manner in which Mr. Hastings so happily effected it, our power in that part of the world must certainly have experienced a total dissolution. It would be, he said, extremely improper to make public the plans by which this happy event was effected, seeing that they would lead to a discovery of the means by which the different powers were rendered jealous of each other, and of the intrigues by which the rajahs were induced to dissolve their league against the British empire.

Mr. BURKE contended, that the objections of the right honourable gentleman went not only to the first motion, but strongly and directly to the other two; and he was the more surprised at this opposition, when he contrasted his conduct in 1782 with his proceedings in 1786. The amazing change of opinion on the same subject carried to the mind a kind of astonishment, that, in so short a time, so great a difference of sentiment could have been effected. As to the arguments used by the right honourable gentleman, they went to this that the papers could not be granted, because they would prove how and in what manner the different powers in India had been sacrificed to each other. These were not indeed the exact words, but they constituted the meaning to the full extent. Thus extraor

dinary was the cause assigned for endeavouring to prevent the papers from appearing on the table of the House! But if the reasoning of the right honourable gentleman had any force, it struck down his strange position, that the papers ought not to be produced at all. If the right honourable gentleman meant to do Mr. Hastings a service in refusing to let these papers be laid on the table, he should have begun with establishing that there was no guilt in the transactions; that our allies were not betrayed; and that our engagements had all been fulfilled with the princes who had so strongly charged us with breaking them. It happened rather unfortunately for the right honourable gentleman, that his own words were the strongest testimony against his arguments.

It had been urged on a former day, that if the object of the present inquiry was to seek after crimes, the papers could not be granted; but that if a direct charge was made, there would not be any objection. That specific charge was now brought forward: it was committed in detail to writing; and if the right honourable gentleman wished to hear it, it should be read to him. Indeed, great part of it must be in the right honourable gentleman's recollection, if he turned to the report of that committee in which he once was so active a member. The matter was of too serious a nature to be dropped. It should be brought forward, if there was a possibility of obtaining justice in parliament. Indeed, the present objection to the motion for necessary papers carried with it an ill omen, and portended, that, in all matters of state, it would be impossible to bring high delinquents to an impartial trial, when ministers put a negative upon the evidence that was necessary to that purpose. As to the excuse which the right honourable gentleman made of the Mahratta peace being so salutary and so honourable, he denied the justice of the assertion, and declared that it was the direct contrary. It was to prove this, and to bring the charge directly home to Mr. Hastings, that the present motion was made. The charge was of a political nature: the crimes were political;.