tings in the Mahratta treaty, which professed to be for the relief of the Carnatic,—though he was not a party to the former treaty with Hyder, also relative to the Carnatic,—though it was not certain, if the treaty were once opened, and that even Tippoo should then consent to that Nabob's being a party, whether he, the said Nabob, would agree to the clauses of the same, and consequently whether the said treaty, once opened, could afterwards be concluded: an uncertainty of which he, the said Hastings, should have learned to be aware, having already once been disappointed by the said Nabob's refusing to accede to a treaty which he, the said Warren Hastings, made for him with the Dutch, about a year before.
That the said Warren Hastings,—having broken a solemn and honorable treaty of peace by an unjust and unprovoked war,—having neglected to conclude that war when he might have done it without loss of honor to the nation,—having plotted and contrived, as far as depended on him, to engage the India Company in another war as soon as the former should be concluded,—and having at last put an end to a most unjust war against the Mahrattas by a most ignominious peace with them, in which he sacrificed objects essential to the interests, and submitted to conditions utterly incompatible with the honor of this nation, and with his own declared sense of the dishonorable nature of those conditions,—and having endeavored to open anew the treaty concluded with Tippoo Sultan through the means of the Presidency of Fort St. George, upon principles of justice and honor, and which established peace in India, and thereby exposing the British possessions there to the renewal of the dangers and calamities of war,—has by these
several acts been guilty of sundry high crimes and misdemeanors.
XXI.—CORRESPONDENCE.
That, by an act of the 13th year of his present Majesty, intituled, "An act for establishing certain regulations for the better management of the affairs of the East India Company, as well in India as in Europe, the Governor-General and Council are required and directed to pay due obedience to all such orders as they shall receive from the Court of Directors of the said United Company, and to correspond from time to time, and constantly and diligently transmit to the said Court an exact particular of all advices or intelligence and of all transactions and matters whatsoever that shall come to their knowledge, relating to the government, commerce, revenues, or interest of the said United Company."
That, in consequence of the above-recited act, the Court of Directors, in their general instructions of the 29th March, 1774, to the Governor-General and Council, did direct, "that the correspondence with the princes or country powers in India should be carried on through the Governor-General only; but that all letters to be sent by him should be first approved in Council; and that he should lay before the Council, at their next meeting, all letters received by him in the course of such correspondence, for their information."
And the Governor-General and Council were therein further ordered, "that, in transacting the business of their department, they should enter with the utmost perspicuity and exactness all their proceedings
whatsoever, and all dissents, if such should at any time be made by any member of their board, together with all letters sent or received in the course of their correspondence; and that broken sets of such proceedings, to the latest period possible, be transmitted to them [the Court of Directors], a complete set at the end of every year, and a duplicate by the next conveyance."
That, in defiance of the said orders, and in breach of the above-recited act of Parliament, the said Warren Hastings has, in sundry instances, concealed from his Council the correspondence carried on between him and the princes or country powers in India, and neglected to communicate the advices and intelligence he from time to time received from the British Residents at the different courts in India to the other members of the government, and, without their knowledge, counsel, or participation, has dispatched orders on matters of the utmost consequence to the interests of the Company.