heart, as may be easily conceived from the means which I took to effect it. For the reasons at large, which induced me to propose that diversion, it will be sufficient to refer to my minute recommending it, and to the letters received from General Goddard near the same period of time. The subject is now become obsolete, and all the fair hopes, which I had built upon the prosecution of the Mahratta war, of its termination in a speedy, honourable, and advantageous peace, have been blasted by the dreadful calamities, which have befallen your arms in the dependencies of your presidency of Fort St. George; and changed the object of our pursuit from the aggrandizement of your power to its preservation. My present reasons for reverting to my own conduct on the occasion which I have mentioned, is to obviate the false conclusions, or purposed misrepresentations, which may be made of it, either as an artifice of ostentation, or as the effect of corrupt influence, by assuring you, that the money, by whatever means it came into your possession, was not my own; that I had myself no right to it, nor would or could have received it but for the occasion, which prompted me to avail myself of the accidental means, which were at that instant afforded me, of accepting and converting it to the property and use of the Company; and with this brief apology I shall dismiss the subject.

Something of affinity to this anecdote may appear in the first aspect of another transaction, which I shall proceed to relate, and of which it is more immediately my duty to inform you; you will have been advised, by repeated addresses of this government, of the arrival of an army at Cuttac under the command of Chimnajee Boosla, the second son of Moodajee Boosla, the Rajah of Berar.

The origin and destination of this force have been largely explained and detailed in the correspondence of the government of Berar, and in various parts of our consultations. The minute relation of these would exceed the bounds of a letter; I shall therefore confine myself to the principal fact. About the middle of the last year, a plan of confederacy was formed by the Nabob, Nizam Ally Cawn, by which it was proposed, that, while the army of the Mahrattas, under the command of Mahdajee Sindia and Tuckoojee Hoolkar, was employed to check the operations of General Goddard in the west of

India, Hyder Ally Cawn should invade the Carnatic; Moodajee Boosla the provinces of Bengal; and he himself the Sircars of Rajamundry and Chicacole.

The government of Berar was required to accept the part assigned it in this combination, and to march a large body of troops immediately into Bengal. To enforce the request on the part of the ruling member of the Mahratta state, menaces of instant hostility, by the combined forces, were added by Mahdajee Sindia, Tuckoojee Hoolkar, and Nizam Ally Cawn, in letters written by them to Moodajee Boosla on the occasion. He was not in a state to sustain the brunt of so formidable a league, and ostensibly yielded. Such at least was the turn which he gave to his acquiescence, in his letters to me; and his subsequent conduct has justified his professions. I was early and progressively acquainted by. him with the requisition, and with the measures which were intended to be taken, and which were taken by him upon it. The army professedly destined for Bengal marched on the dusserra of the last year, corresponding with the 7th of October. Instead of taking the direct course to Behar, which had been prescribed, it proceeded by varied deviations and studied delays to Cuttac, where it arrived late in May last, having performed a practicable journey of three months in seven, and concluded it at the instant commencement of the rains, which of course would preclude its operations, and afford the government of Berar a further interval of five months to provide for the part which it would then be compelled to choose. In the mean time letters were continually written by the Rajah and his minister to this government, explanatory of their situation and motives; proposing their mediation and guarantee for a peace and alliance with the peshwa; and professing, without solicitation on our part, the most friendly disposition towards us, and the most determined resolution to maintain it.

Conformably to these assurances, and the acceptance of a proposal made by Moodajee Boosla to depute his minister to Bengal for the purpose of negotiating and concluding the proposed treaty of peace, application had been made to the peshwa for credentials to the same effect. In the mean time the fatal news arrived of the defeat of your army at Conjeveram. It now became necessary, that every other

object should give place, or be made subservient, to the preservation of the Carnatic; nor would the measures requisite for that end admit an instant of delay. Peace with the Mahrattas was the first object; to conciliate their alliance, and that of every other power in natural enmity with Hyder Ally, the next.-Instant measures were taken (as our general advices will inform you) to secure both these points, and to employ the government of Berar as the channel and instrument of accomplishing them. Its army still lay on cur borders, and in distress for a long arrear of pay, not less occasioned by the want of pecuniary funds, than a stoppage of communication. An application had been made to us for a supply of money; and the sum specified for the complete relief of the army was sixteen lacks. We had neither money to spare, nor, in the apparent state of that government in its relation to ours, would it have been either prudent or consistent with our public credit to have afforded it. It was, nevertheless, my decided opinion, that some aid should be given; not less as a necessary relief, than as an indication of confidence, and a return for the many instances of substantial kindness, which we had, within the course of the last two years, experienced from the government of Berar. I had an assurance, that such a proposal would receive the acquiescence of the board; but I knew, that it would not pass without opposition, and it would have become public, which might have defeated its purpose. Convinced of the necessity of the expedient, and assured of the sincerity of the government of Berar from evidences of stronger proof to me than I could make them appear to the other members of the board, I resolved to adopt it, and take the entire responsibility of it upon myself. In this mode, a less considerable sum would suffice; I accordingly caused three lacks of rupees to be delivered to the minister of the Rajah of Berar resident in Calcutta; he has transmitted it to Cuttac.-Two-thirds of this sum I have raised by my own credit, and shall charge it in my official accounts; the other third I have supplied from the cash in my hands belonging to the Honourable Company. I have given due notice to Moodajee Boosla of this transaction, and explained it to have been a private act of my own, unknown to the other members of the council. I have given him expectations of the remainder

of the amount required for the arrears of his army, proportioned to the extent, to which he may put it in my power to propose it as a public gratuity by his effectual orders for the recall of these troops, or for their junction with ours.

I hope I shall receive your approbation of what I have done for your service, and your indulgence for the length of this narrative, which I could not comprise within a narrower compass. I have the honour to be, Honourable Sirs,

Your most faithful, obedient,
and humble servant,

WARREN HASTINGS.

APPENDIX B. No. 2.

AN Account of Money paid into the Company's Treasury by the Governor-General, since the Year 1773.

APPENDIX B. No. 3.

To the Honourable the Secret Committee of the Honourable Court of Directors.

HONOURABLE SIRS,

Fort William, 22nd May, 1782.

In a letter, which I have had the honour to address you in duplicate, and of which a triplicate accompanies this, dated 20th January, 1782, I informed you, that I had received the offer of a sum of money from the Nabob vizier and his ministers to the nominal value of ten lacks of Lucknow siccas; and that bills on the house of Gopaul Doss had been actually given me for the amount, which I had accepted for the use of the honourable Company; and I promised to account with you for the same as soon as it should be in my power, after the whole sum had come into my possession. This promise I now perform; and, deeming it consistent with the spirit of it, I have added such other sums as have been occasionally converted to the Company's property through my means, and in consequence of the like original destination. Of the second of these you have been already advised in a letter, which I had the honour to address the honourable court of directors, dated 29th November, 1780. Both this and the third article were paid immediately to the treasury, by my order to the sub-treasurer to receive them on the Company's account, but never passed through my hands. The three sums, for which bonds were granted, were in like manner paid to the Company's treasury, without passing through my hands; but their appropriation was not specified.

The sum of 58,000 current rupees was received while I was on my journey to Benares, and applied as expressed in the account.

As to the manner in which these sums have been expended, the reference which I have made of it, in the accompanying account, to the several accounts in which they are credited, renders any other specification of it unnecessary; besides that those accounts either have, or will have, received a much stronger authentication than any that I could give to mine.