[276] This means the Court of Delhi. No jaghire, or other grant, was deemed complete in form till sanctioned by the command of the Emperor.
[277] House of Commons Reports, vol. iii. p. 154.
[278] 9th August, 1759.
[279] In a letter to Mr. Amyatt, Chief of Patna, Clive objects, on the ground of having as yet no jaghire, to pay the enormous sum demanded as a fee for the patent of nobility sent him from Delhi; but he desires Mr. Amyatt to give the royal agent, Shitabroy, the nazeranna (or offering) customary from omrahs of similar rank. In the evidence of Clive, given before the Committee of the House of Commons, we find the following testimony on the subject:—
"That the first letter he (Clive) ever wrote about a jaghire was, to the best of his remembrance, on the 31st of January, 1759, to Jugget Seit, informing him that the Nabob had made him an omrah, without a jaghire. In answer to which he replied, that the Nabob never granted jaghires in Bengal; that Orissa was too poor, but that he might have one in Bahar; and he declared, upon his honour, that he never applied for any jaghire, directly or indirectly, after that period; and that, when the Nabob presented him the jaghire (which was near six months afterwards), he did not know what that jaghire was; had not the least idea of the amount of it, nor of its being the quit-rent upon the Company's lands; and that he did believe the Nabob gave him that jaghire in consequence of the services he had rendered him, which have been stated by Mr. Sykes.
"That having looked upon the Nabob's answer as an evasive one, and that he was not inclined to comply with his request, he never wrote, nor thought, more upon the subject, until he received a second letter from Jugget Seit, in answer to his first, after the success against the King's son, mentioning that the Nabob had turned the thing in his mind, and was willing to grant him a jaghire in Bengal; but the nature of it, where, or what value it was to be, he was entirely ignorant of till the patent explained it. Jugget Seit was a banker, and a man of great interest and weight with the Nabob."—Parliamentary Reports, vol. iii. p. 154.
Transcriber's Note
Obvious errors of punctuation and diacritics were corrected.
There are at least two unpaired double quotation marks which the transcriber felt unable to correct with confidence.