s held under a
strict guard,--although, at the same time, the confiscated estates were
actually in the Company's possession, and found to exceed the amount of
what they were rated at in the general list of confiscated estates,[64]
and although the Assistant Resident, Johnson, did confess, "that the
object of distressing the Bhow Begum was merely to obtain a
_ready-money_ instead of a _dilatory payment_, and that this ready-money
payment, if not paid, was recoverable in the course of a few months upon
the jaghires in his possession, and that therefore it was not worth
proceeding to any extremities, beyond the one described," (namely, the
confinement of the princesses, and the imprisonment and fettering of
their ministers,) "upon so respectable a family."[65]

XXX. That, after the surrender of the treasure, and the passing the
bonds and obligations given as aforesaid, the Resident having been
strictly ordered by the said Warren Hastings not to make any settlement
whatsoever with the said women of high rank, the Nabob was induced to
leave the city of Fyzabad without taking leave of his mother, or showing
her any mark of duty or civility. And on the same day the Resident left
the city aforesaid; and after his return to Lucknow, in order to pacify
the said Hastings, who appeared to resent that the Nabob was not urged
to greater degrees of rigor than those hitherto used towards his mother,
he, the said Resident, did, in his letter of the 6th February, give him
an assurance in the following words:--"I shall, as you direct, use my
influence to dissuade his Excellency from concluding _any settlement_
until I have your further commands."

XXXI. That the payment of the bond last extorted from the eunuchs was
soon after commenced, and the grandmother, as well as the mother, were
now compelled to deliver what they declared was _the extent of the
whole_ of both their possessions, including down to their _table
utensils_; which, as the Resident admitted, "they had been and were
still delivering, and that no proof had yet been obtained of their
having more."

XXXII. That bullion, jewels, and goods, to the amount of five hundred
thousand pounds and upwards, were actually received by the Resident for
the use of the Company before the 23d of February, 1782; and there
remained on the said extorted bond no more than about twenty-five
thousand pounds, according to the statement of the eunuchs, and not
above fifty thousand according to tha