The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 08 (of 12)Burke, Edmund
History
The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 08 (of 12)
Burke, Edmund
Great Britain -- Politics and government -- 1760-1820; Political science -- Early works to 1800
In another remonstrance he thus expresses himself. "The affairs of this
world are unstable, and soon pass away: it would therefore be incumbent
on the _English_ gentlemen to show _some_ friendship for me in my
_necessities_,--I, who have always exerted my very life in the service
of the English, _assigned over to them all the resources left in my
country_, stopped my very household expenses, together with the jaghires
of my servants and dependants, to the amount of 98,98,375 rupees.
Besides this, as to the jaghires of my grandmother, mother, and uncle,
which were granted to them for their support, _agreeable to
engagements_, you are the _masters_,--if the Council have sent orders
for the stopping their jaghires also, stop them. I have no resources
left in my country, and have no friends by me, being even distressed in
my daily subsistence. I have some elephants, horses, and the houses
which I inhabit: if they can be of any service to my friends, they are
ready. Whenever you can discover any resources, seize upon them: I shall
not interfere to prevent you. In my present distress for my daily
expenses, I was in hopes that they would have excused some part of my
debt. Of what use is it for me to relate my situation, which is known to
the whole world? This much is sufficient."
The truth of all these representations is nowhere contested by Mr.
Hastings. It is, indeed, admitted in something stronger than words;
for, upon account of the Nabob's condition, and the no less distressed
condition of his dominions, he thought it fit to withdraw from him and
them a large body of the Company's troops, together with all the English
of a civil description, who were found no less burdensome than the
military. This was done on the declared inability of the country any
longer to support them,--a country not much inferior to England in
extent and fertility, and, till lately at least, its equal in population
and culture.
It was to a prince, in a state so far remote from freedom, authority,
and opulence, so penetrated with the treatment he had received, and the
behavior he had met with from Mr. Hastings, that Mr. Hastings has chosen
to attribute a disposition so very generous and munificent as, of his
own free grace and mere motion, to make him a present, at one donation,
of upwards of one hundred thousand pounds sterling. This vast private
donation was given at the moment of vast instant demands severely
exacted on account of the Company, and accumulated on immense debts to
the same body,--and all taken from a ruined prince and almost desolated
territory.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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