onary in India.

The time was approaching, however, when he was to be stripped of that
robe which has never, since the Revolution, been disgraced so foully as
by him. The state of India had for some time occupied much of the
attention of the British Parliament. Towards the close of the American
war, two committees of the Commons sat on Eastern affairs. In one Edmund
Burke took the lead. The other was under the presidency of the able and
versatile Henry Dundas, then Lord Advocate of Scotland. Great as are the
changes which, during the last sixty years, have taken place in our
Asiatic dominions, the reports which those committees laid on the table
of the House will still be found most interesting and instructive.

There was as yet no connection between the Company and either of the
great parties in the state. The ministers had no motive to defend Indian
abuses. On the contrary, it was for their interest to show, if possible,
that the government and patronage of our Oriental empire might, with
advantage, be transferred to themselves. The votes, therefore, which, in
consequence of the reports made by the two committees, were passed by
the Commons, breathed the spirit of stern and indignant justice. The
severest epithets were applied to several of the measures of Hastings,
especially to the Rohilla war; and it was resolved, on the motion of Mr.
Dundas, that the Company ought to recall a Governor-General who had
brought such calamities on the Indian people, and such dishonor on the
British name. An act was passed for limiting the jurisdiction of the
Supreme Court. The bargain which Hastings had made with the Chief
Justice was condemned in the strongest terms; and an address was
presented to the King, praying that Impey might be ordered home to
answer for his misdeeds.

Impey was recalled by a letter from the Secretary of State. But the
proprietors of India Stock resolutely refused to dismiss Hastings from
their service, and passed a resolution affirming, what was undeniably
true, that they were entrusted by law with the right of naming and
removing their Governor-General, and that they were not bound to obey
the directions of a single branch of the legislature with respect to
such nomination or removal.

Thus supported by his employers, Hastings remained at the head of the
government of Bengal till the spring of 1785. His administration, so
eventful and stormy, closed in almost perfect quiet. In the Council
there was no r