"Mr. Francis has acknowledged that he apprehended in general that it contained some charge against me. If the charge was false, it was a libel. It might have been false for anything that Mr. Francis could know to the contrary, since he was unacquainted with the contents of it. In this instance, therefore, he incurred the hazard of presenting a libel to the board: this was not a duty belonging to his office as a councillor of this state. I must further inform the board that I have been long since acquainted with Nundcomar's intentions of making this attack upon me. Happily, Nundcomar, among whose talents for intrigue that of secrecy is not the first, has been ever too ready to make the first publication of his own intentions. I was shown a paper containing many accusations against me, which I was told was carried by Nundcomar to Colonel Monson, and that he himself was employed for some hours in private with Colonel Monson, explaining the nature of those charges.
"I mention only what I was told; but as the rest of the report which was made to me corresponds exactly with what has happened since, I hope I shall stand acquitted to my superiors and to the world in having given so much credit to it as to bring the circumstance upon record. I cannot recollect the precise time in which this is said to have happened, but I believe it was either before or at the time of the dispatch of the 'Bute' and 'Pacific.' The charge has since undergone some alteration; but of the copy of the paper which was delivered to me, containing the original charge, I caused a translation to be made; when, suspecting the renewal of the subject in this day's consultation, I brought it with me, and I desire it may be recorded, that, when our superiors, or the world, if the world is to be made the judge of my conduct, shall be possessed of these materials, they may, by comparing the supposed original and amended list of accusations preferred against me by Nundcomar, judge how far I am justified in the credit which I give to the reports above mentioned. I do not mean to infer from what I have said that it makes any alteration in the nature of the charges, whether they were delivered immediately from my ostensible accusers, or whether they came to the board through the channel of patronage; but it is sufficient to authorize the conviction which I feel in my own mind, that those gentlemen are parties in the accusations of which they assert the right of being the judges.
"From the first commencement of this administration, every means have been tried both to deprive me of the legal authority with which I have been trusted, and to proclaim the annihilation of it to the world; but no instance has yet appeared of this in so extraordinary a degree as in the question now before the board. The chief of the administration, your superior, Gentlemen, appointed by the legislature itself, shall I sit at this board to be arraigned in the presence of a wretch whom you all know to be one of the basest of mankind? I believe I need not mention his name; but it is Nundcomar. Shall I sit here to hear men collected from the dregs of the people give evidence, at his dictating, against my character and conduct? I will not. You may, if you please, form yourselves into a committee for the investigation of these matters in any manner which you may think proper; but I will repeat, that I will not meet Nundcomar at the board, nor suffer Nundcomar to be examined at the board; nor have you a right to it, nor can it answer any other purpose than that of vilifying and insulting me to insist upon it.
"I am sorry to have found it necessary to deliver my sentiments on a subject of so important a nature in an unpremeditated minute, drawn from me at the board, which I should have wished to have had leisure and retirement to have enabled me to express myself with that degree of caution and exactness which the subject requires. I have said nothing but what I believe and am morally certain I shall stand justified for in the eyes of my superiors and the eyes of the world; but I reserve to myself the liberty of adding my further sentiments in such a manner and form as I shall hereafter judge necessary."
My Lords, you see here the picture of Nundcomar drawn by Mr. Hastings himself; you see the hurry, the passion, the precipitation, the confusion, into which Mr. Hastings is thrown by the perplexity of detected guilt; you see, my Lords, that, instead of defending himself, he rails at his accuser in the most indecent language, calling him a wretch whom they all knew to be the basest of mankind,—that he rails at the Council, by attributing their conduct to the worst of motives,—that he rails at everybody, and declares the accusation to be a libel: in short, you see plainly that the man's head is turned. You see there is not a word he says upon this occasion which has common sense in it; you see one great leading principle in it,—that he does not once attempt to deny the charge. He attempts to vilify the witness, he attempts to vilify those he supposes to be his accusers, he attempts to vilify the Council; he lags upon the accusation, he mixes it with other accusations, which had nothing to do with it, and out of the whole he collects a resolution—to do what? To meet his adversary and defy him? No,—that he will not suffer him to appear before him: he says, "I will not sit at this board in the character of a criminal, nor do I acknowledge the board to be my judges."
He was not called upon to acknowledge them to be his judges. Both he and they were called upon to inquire into all corruptions without exception. It was his duty not merely [not?] to traverse and oppose them while inquiring into acts of corruption, but he was bound to take an active part in it,—that if they had a mind to let such a thing sleep upon their records, it was his duty to have brought forward the inquiry. They were not his judges, they were not his accusers; they were his fellow-laborers in the inquiry ordered by the Court of Directors, their masters, and by which inquiry he might be purged of that corruption with which he stood charged.
He says, "Nundcomar is a wretch whom you all know to be the basest of mankind." I believe they did not know the man to be a wretch, or the basest of mankind; but if he was a wretch, and if he was the basest of mankind, if he was guilty of all the crimes with which we charge Mr. Hastings, (not one of which was ever proved against him,)—if any of your Lordships were to have the misfortune to be before this tribunal, before any inquest of the House of Commons, or any other inquest of this nation, would you not say that it was the greatest possible advantage to you that the man who accused you was a miscreant, the vilest and basest of mankind, by the confession of all the world? Do mankind really, then, think that to be accused by men of honor, of weight, of character, upon probable charges, is an advantage to them, and that to be accused by the basest of mankind is a disadvantage? No: give me, if ever I am to have accusers, miscreants, as he calls him,—wretches, the basest and vilest of mankind. "The board," says he, "are my accusers." If they were, it was their duty; but they were not his accusers, but were inquiring into matters which it was equally his duty to inquire into. He would not suffer Nundcomar to be produced; he would not suffer Nundcomar to be examined; he rather suffered such an accusation to stand against his name and character than permit it to be inquired into. Do I want any other presumption of his guilt, upon such an occasion, than such conduct as this?
This man, whom he calls a wretch, the basest and vilest of mankind, was undoubtedly, by himself, in the records of the Company, declared to be one of the first men of that country, everything that a subject could be, a person illustrious for his birth, sacred with regard to his caste, opulent in fortune, eminent in situation, who had filled the very first offices in that country; and that he was, added to all this, a man of most acknowledged talents, and of such a superiority as made the whole people of Bengal appear to be an inferior race of beings compared to him,—a man whose outward appearance and demeanor used to cause reverence and awe, and who at that time was near seventy years of age, which, without any other title, generally demands respect from mankind. And yet this man he calls the basest of mankind, a name which no man is entitled to call another till he has proved something to justify him in so doing; and notwithstanding his opulence, his high rank, station, and birth, he despises him, and will not suffer him to be heard as an accuser before him. I will venture to say that Mr. Hastings, in so doing, whether elevated by philosophy or inflated by pride, is not like the rest of mankind. We do know, that, in all accusations, a great part of their weight and authority comes from the character, the situation, the name, the description, the office, the dignity of the persons who bring them; mankind are so made, we cannot resist this prejudice; and it has weight, and ever will have primâ facie weight, in all the tribunals in the world. If, therefore, Rajah Nundcomar was a man who (it is not degrading to your Lordships to say) was equal in rank, according to the idea of his country, to any peer in this House, as sacred as a bishop, of as much gravity and authority as a judge, and who was prime-minister in the country in which he lived, with what face can Mr. Hastings call this man a wretch, and say that he will not suffer him to be brought before him? If, indeed, joined with such circumstances, the accuser be a person of bad morals, then, I admit, those bad morals take away from their weight; but for a proof of that you must have some other grounds than the charges and the railing of the culprit against him.
I might say that his passion is a proof of his guilt; and there is an action which is more odious than the crimes he attempts to cover,—for he has murdered this man by the hands of Sir Elijah Impey; and if his counsel should be unwise enough to endeavor to detract from the credit of this man by the pretended punishment to which he was brought, we will open that dreadful scene to your Lordships, and you will see that it does not detract from his credit, but brings an eternal stain and dishonor upon the justice of Great Britain: I say nothing further of it. As he stood there, as he gave that evidence that day, the evidence was to be received; it stands good, and is a record against Mr. Hastings,—with this addition, that he would not suffer it to be examined. He railed at his colleagues. He says, if the charge was false, they were guilty of a libel. No: it might have been the effect of conspiracy, it might be punished in another way; but if it was false, it was no libel. And all this is done to discountenance inquiry, to bring odium upon his colleagues for doing their duty, and to prevent that inquiry which could alone clear his character.
Mr. Hastings had himself forgotten the character which he had given of Nundcomar; but he says that his colleagues were perfectly well acquainted with him, and knew that he was a wretch, the basest of mankind. But before I read to you the character which Mr. Hastings gave of him, when he recommended him to the Presidency, (to succeed Mahomed Reza Khân,) I am to let your Lordships understand fully the purpose for which Mr. Hastings gave it. Upon that occasion, all the Council, whom he stated to lie under suspicion of being bought by Mahomed Reza Khân, all those persons with one voice cried out against Nundcomar; and as Mr. Hastings was known to be of the faction the most opposite to Nundcomar, they charged him with direct inconsistency in raising Nundcomar to that exalted trust,—a charge which Mr. Hastings could not repel any other way than by defending Nundcomar. The weight of their objections chiefly lay to Nundcomar's political character; his moral character was not discussed in that proceeding. Mr. Hastings says,—