IV. That, "regarding the sacred sincerity and friendship of the English, whose goodness and celebrity is everywhere known, who dispossess no one," the Nabob Fyzoola Khân made early overtures for peace to Colonel Alexander Champion, commander-in-chief of the Company's forces in Bengal: that he did propose to the said Colonel Alexander Champion, in three letters, received on the 14th, 24th, and 27th of May, to put himself under the protection either of the Company, or of the Vizier, through the mediation and with the guaranty of the Company; and that he did offer, "whatever was conferred upon him, to pay as much without damage or deficiency as any other person would agree to do": stating, at the same time, his condition and pretensions hereinbefore recited as facts "evident as the sun"; and appealing, in a forcible and awful manner, to the generosity and magnanimity of this nation, "by whose means he hoped in God that he should receive justice"; and as "the person who designed the war was no more," as "in that he was himself guiltless," and as "he had never acted in such a manner as for the Vizier to have taken hatred to his heart against him, that he might be reinstated in his ancient possessions, the country of Ins father."
V. That on the last of the three dates above men
tioned, that is to say, on the 27th of May, the Nabob Fyzoola Khân did also send to the commander-in-chief a vakeel, or ambassador, who was authorized on the part of him, the Nabob Fyzoola Khân, his master, to make a specific offer of three propositions; and that by one of the said propositions "an annual increase of near 400,000l. would have accrued to the revenues of our ally, and the immediate acquisition of above 300,000l. to the Company, for their influence in effecting an accommodation perfectly consistent with their engagements to the Vizier," and strictly consonant to the demands of justice.
VI. That, so great was the confidence of the Nabob Fyzoola Khân in the just, humane, and liberal feelings of Englishmen, as to "lull him into an inactivity" of the most essential detriment to his interests: since, "in the hopes which he entertained from the interposition of our government," he declined the invitation of the Mogul to join the arms of his Majesty and the Mahrattas, "refused any connection with the Seiks," and did even neglect to take the obvious precaution of crossing the Ganges, as he had originally intended, while the river was yet fordable,—a movement that would have enabled him certainly to baffle all pursuit, and probably "to keep the Vizier in a state of disquietude for the remainder of his life."
VII. That the commander-in-chief, Colonel Alexander Champion aforesaid, "thought nothing could be more honorable to this nation than the support of so exalted a character; and whilst it could be
done on terms so advantageous, supposed it very unlikely that the vakeel's proposition should be received with indifference"; that he did accordingly refer it to the administration through Warren Hastings, Esquire, then Governor of Fort William and President of Bengal; and he did at the same time inclose to the said Warren Hastings a letter from the Nabob Fyzoola Khân to the said Hastings,—which letter does not appear, but must be supposed to have been of the same tenor with those before cited to the commander-in-chief,—of which also copies were sent to the said Hastings by the commander-in-chief; and he, the commander-in-chief aforesaid, after urging to the said Hastings sundry good and cogent arguments of policy and prudence in favor of the Nabob Fyzoola Khân, did conclude by "wishing for nothing so much as for the adoption of some measure that might strike all the powers of the East with admiration of our justice, in contrast to the conduct of the Vizier."
VIII. That, in answer to such laudable wish of the said commander-in-chief, the President, Warren Hastings, preferring his own prohibited plans of extended dominion to the mild, equitable, and wise policy inculcated in the standing orders of his superiors, and now enforced by the recommendation of the commander-in-chief, did instruct and "desire" him, the said commander-in-chief, "instead of soliciting the Vizier to relinquish his conquest to Fyzoola Khân, to discourage it as much as was in his power"; although the said Hastings did not once express, or even intimate, any doubt whatever of the Nabob Fyzoola Khân's innocence as to the
origin of the war, or of his hereditary right to the territories which he claimed, but to the said pleas of the Nabob Fyzoola Khân, as well as to the arguments both of policy and justice advanced by the commander-in-chief, he, the said Hastings, did solely oppose certain speculative objects of imagined expediency, summing up his decided rejection of the proposals made by the Nabob Fyzoola Khân in the following remarkable words. "With respect to Fyzoola Khân, he appears not to merit our consideration. The petty sovereign of a country estimated at six or eight lacs ought not for a moment to prove an impediment to any of our measures, or to affect the consistency of our conduct."
IX. That, in the aforesaid violent and arbitrary position, the said Warren Hastings did avow it to be a public principle of his government, that no right, however manifest, and no innocence, however unimpeached, could entitle the weak to our protection against others, or save them from our own active endeavors for their oppression, and even extirpation, should they interfere with our notions of political expediency; and that such a principle is highly derogatory to the justice and honor of the English name, and fundamentally injurious to our interests, inasmuch as it hath an immediate tendency to excite distrust, jealousy, fear, and hatred against us among all the subordinate potentates of Hindostan.
X. That, in prosecution of the said despotic principle, the President, Warren Hastings aforesaid, did persist to obstruct, as far as in him lay, every