of Fyzoola Khân's answer to the said demand, could not be unacquainted with the express words of the stipulation, as a letter of the vizier, inserted in the same consultation, refers the governor-general to enclosed copies "of all engagements entered into by the late vizier and by himself (the reigning vizier) with Fyzoola Khân;" and that the treaty itself therefore was at the very moment before the said Warren Hastings; which treaty (as the said Hastings observed with respect to another treaty, in the case of another person) "most assuredly does not contain a syllable Observations to justify his conduct; but by the unexampled on Mr. Bris latitude, which he assumes in his constructions,

tow's defence.

he may, if he pleases, extort this or any other meaning from any part of it."

IV.

That the vizier himself appears by no means to have been persuaded of his own right to five thousand horse under the treaty; since in his correspondence on the subject he (the vizier) no where mentions the treaty as the ground of his demand, except where he is recapitulating to the governorgeneral, Warren Hastings, the substance of his (the said Hastings's) own letters; on the contrary, the vizier hints his apprehensions lest Fyzoola Khân should appeal to the treaty against the demand, as a breach thereof, in which case he (the vizier) informs the said Hastings of the projected reply: "Should Fyzoola Khân (says the vizier) mention anything of the tenor of the treaty, the first breach of it has been committed by him, in keeping up more men than allowed of by the treaty: I have accordingly sent a person to settle hat point also. In case he should mention to me anything respecting the treaty, I will then reproach him with having tept up too many troops, and will oblige him to send the ive thousand horse;" thereby clearly intimating, that as a emonstrance against the demand, as a breach of treaty, ould only be answered by charging a prior breach of treaty, n Fyzoola Khân, so, by annulling the whole treaty, to reuce the question to a mere question of force, and thus oblige Fyzoola Khân to send the five thousand horse: "for continues the vizier) if, when the Company's affairs, on hich my honour depends require it, Fyzoola Khân will not

lend his assistance, what USE is there to continue the country to him?"

That the vizier actually did make his application to Fyzoola Khân for the 5000 horse, not as for an aid, to which he had a just claim, but as for something over and above the obligations of the treaty, something "that would give increase to their friendship, and satisfaction to the nabob governour," (meaning the said Hastings,) whose directions he represents as the motive "of his call for the 5000 horse to be employed" not in his (the vizier's) but in the "Company's service."

And, that the aforesaid Warren Hastings did therefore, in recording the answer of Fyzoola Khân as an evasion of treaty, act in notorious contradiction not only to that, which ought to have been the fair construction of the said treaty, but to that, which he the said Hastings must have known to be the vizier's own interpretation of the same, disposed as the vizier was "to reproach Fyzoola Khân with breach of treaty," and to "send up persons who should settle points with him."

V.

That the said Warren Hastings, not thinking himself justined, on the mere plea of an evasion, to push forward his proceedings to that extremity, which he seems already to have made his scope and object, and seeking some better colour for his unjust and violent purposes, did further move, that commissioners should be sent from the vizier and the Company to Fyzoola Khân, to insist on a clause of a treaty, which nowhere appears, being essentially different from the treaty of Lall-Dang, though not in the part on which the requisition is founded: and the said Hastings did then, in a style unusually imperative, proceed as follows:

"Demand immediate delivery of 3000 cavalry; and if he should evade, or refuse compliance, that the deputies shall deliver him a formal protest against him for breach of treaty, and return, making this report to the vizier, which Mr. Middleton is to transmit to the board."

VI.

That the said motion of the governor-general Hastings was ordered accordingly, the council, as already has been

herein related, consisting but of two members, and the said Hastings consequently "uniting in his own person all the powers of government."

VII.

That, when the said Hastings ordered the said demand for 3000 cavalry, he the said Hastings well knew, that a compliance therewith, on the part of the Nabob Fyzoola Khân, was utterly impossible; for he, the said Hastings, had at the very moment before him a letter of Fyzoola Khân, stating, that he, Fyzoola Khân, had "but two thousand cavalry" altogether; which letter is entered on the records of the Company, in the same consultation, immediately preceding the governor-general's minute. That the said Hastings therefore knew, that the only possible consequence of the aforesaid demand necessarily and inevitably must be a protest for a breach of treaty; and the court of directors did not hesitate to declare, that the said demand "carried the appearance of a determination to create a pretext for depriving him (Fyzoola Khân) of his jaghire entirely, or to leave him at the mercy of the vizier."

VIII.

That Richard Johnson, Esquire, assistant resident at Oude, was, agreeably to the afore-mentioned order of council, deputed commissioner from Mr. Middleton and the vizier to Fyzoola Khân; but that he did early give the most indecent proofs of glaring partiality, to the prejudice of the said Fyzoola Khân; for that the very next day (as it seems) after his arrival, he the said Johnson, from opinions imbibed in his journey, did state himself to be "unwilling to draw any favourable or flattering inferences relatively to the object of his mission;" and did studiously seek to find new breaches of treaty; and without any form of regular inquiry whatever, from a single glance of his eye in passing, did take upon himself to pronounce "the Rohilla soldiers, in the district of Rampore alone, to be not less than 20,000,” and the grant of course to be forfeited. And that such a gross and palpable display of a predetermination to discover guilt did argue in the said Johnson a knowledge, a strong presumption or a belief, that such representations would be agreeable

to the secret wishes and views of the said Hastings, under whose orders he the said Johnson acted, and to whom all his reports were to be referred.

IX.

That the said Richard Johnson did soon after proceed to the immediate object of his mission, "which (the said Johnson relates) was short to a degree.' The demand was made, and " a flat refusal" given; the question was repeated with like effect. The said Johnson, in presence of proper witnesses, then drew up his protest, "together with a memorandum of a palliative offer made by the Nabob Fyzoola Khân," and inserted in the protest:

"That he would in compliance with the demand, and in conformity to the treaty, which specified no definitive number of cavalry or infantry, only expressing troops, furnish 3000 men; viz. he would, in addition to the 1000 cavalry already granted, give 1000 more, when and wheresoever required, and 1000 foot ;" together with one year's pay in advance, and funds for the regular payment of them in future.

And this (the said Richard Johnson observes) "I put down at his (the Nabob Fyzoola Khân's) particular desire, but otherwise useless, as my orders (which orders do not appear) were not to receive any palliation, but a negative or affirmative; though such palliation, as it is called by the said Johnson, might be, as it was, in the strictest conformity to the treaty.

X.

That in the said offer the Nabob Fyzoola Khân, instead of palliating, did at once admit the extreme right of the vizier, under the treaty, by agreeing to furnish 3000 men, when he (Fyzoola Khân) would have been justified in pleading his inability to send more than two thousand. That such inability would not (as appears) have been a false and evasive plea, but perfectly true and valid; as the three thousand foot maintained by Fyzoola Khân were for the purposes of his internal government, for which the whole three thousand must have been demonstrably necessary; and that the Nabob Fyzoola Khân, by declining to avail himself of a plea so fair, so well founded, and so consonant to the indulgence expressly acknowledged in the treaty, and

by thus meeting the specific demand of the vizier as fully as, according to his own military establishment, he could, did for the said offer deserve rather the thanks of the said vizier and the Company, than the protest, which the aforesaid Johnson, under the orders of Warren Hastings, did deliver.

XI.

That the report of the said protest, as well as the former letter of the said Johnson, were by the resident Middleton transmitted to the board, together with a letter from the vizier, founded on the said report and letter of the said Johnson, and proposing in consequence "to resume the grant, and to leave Fyzoola Khân to join his other faithless brethren, who were sent across the Ganges."

66

That the said papers were read in council on the 4th of June, 1781, when the governor-general, Warren Hastings, did move and carry a vote to suspend a final resolution on the same; and the said Hastings did not express any disapprobation of the proceedings of the said Johnson; neither did the said Hastings assign any reason for his motion of suspension, which passed without debate. That in truth the said Hastings had then projected a journey up the country to meet the vizier, for the settlement of articles relative to the regulation of Oude and its dependencies, among which was included the jaghire of Fyzoola Khân; and the said Hastings, for the aforesaid purposes, did on the 3rd of July, by his own casting vote, grant to himself, and did prevail on his colleague, Edward Wheler, Esquire, to grant a certain illegal delegation of the whole powers of the governor-gener al and council; and on the seventh of the same month did proceed on his way to join the vizier at the place called Chunar on the borders of Benares; and that the aforesaid vote of suspending a final resolution on the transactions with Fyzoola Khân was therefore in substance and effect a reference thereof by the said Hastings, from himself in council with his colleague Wheler, to himself in conference and negotiation with the vizier, who from the first demand of the 5000 horse had taken every occasion of showing his inclination to dispossess Fyzoola Khân, and who before the said demand (in a letter, which does not appear, but which the vizier himself votes as antecedent to the said demand) had