years after, when it was too late, saw the absolute
necessity of a removal of the intolerable grievance of this licentious
soldiery, which, under pretence of defending it, held the country under
military execution. A new treaty and arrangement, according to the
pleasure of Mr. Hastings, took place; and this new treaty was broken in
the old manner, in every essential article. The soldiery were again
sent, and again set loose. The effect of all his manoeuvres, from which
it seems he was sanguine enough to entertain hopes, upon the state of
the country, he himself informs us,--"The event has proved the _reverse_
of these hopes, and _accumulation of distress, debasement, and
dissatisfaction_ to the Nabob, and _disappointment and disgrace to
me_.--Every measure [which he had himself proposed] has been _so
conducted_ as to give him cause of displeasure. There are no officers
established by which his affairs could be regularly conducted: mean,
incapable, and indigent men have been appointed. A number of the
districts without authority, and without the means of personal
protection; some of them have been murdered by the zemindars, and those
zemindars, instead of punishment, have been permitted to retain their
zemindaries, with independent authority; _all_ the other zemindars
suffered to rise up in rebellion, and to insult the authority of the
sircar, without any attempt made to suppress them; and the Company's
debt, instead of being discharged by the assignments and extraordinary
sources of money provided for that _purpose, is likely to exceed even
the amount at which it stood at the time in which the arrangement with
his Excellency was concluded_." The House will smile at the resource on
which the Directors take credit as such a certainty in their curious
account.

This is Mr. Hastings's own narrative of the effects of his own
settlement. This is the state of the country which we have been told is
in perfect peace and order; and, what is curious, he informs us, that
_every part of this was foretold to him in the order and manner in which
it happened_, at the very time he made his arrangement of men and
measures.

The invariable course of the Company's policy is this: either they set
up some prince too odious to maintain himself without the necessity of
their assistance, or they soon render him odious by making him the
instrument of their government. In that case troops are bountifully sent
to him to maintain his authority. T