That the said Warren Hastings and his Council were sensible of the true nature of the enterprise in which they had engaged the Company's arms, and of the heavy responsibility to which it would subject himself and the Council,--"the personal hazard they, the Council, run, in undertaking so _uncommon_ a measure without _positive_ instructions, at their own risk, with the eyes of the whole nation on the affairs of the Company, and the passions and prejudices of almost every man in England inflamed against the conduct of the Company and the character of its servants"; yet they engaged in the very practice which had brought such odium on the Company, and on the character of its servants, though they further say that they had continually before _their eyes the dread of forfeiting the favor of their employers_, and becoming the "objects of _popular_ invectives." The said Warren Hastings himself says, at the very time when he proposed the measure, "I must confess I entertain some doubts as to its expediency at this time, from the circumstances of the _Company_ at home, exposed to _popular_ clamor, and all its measures liable to be canvassed in _Parliament_, their charter drawing to a close, and his Majesty's ministers unquestionably ready to take advantage of every unfavorable circumstance in the negotiations of its renewal." All these considerations did not prevent the said Warren Hastings from making and carrying into execution the said mercenary agreement for a sum of money, the payment of which the Nabob endeavored to evade on a construction of the verbal treaty, and was so far from being insisted on, as it ought to have been, by the said Warren Hastings, that, when, after the completion of the service, the commander-in-chief was directed to make a demand of the money, the agent of the said Warren Hastings at the same time assured the Nabob "that the demand was nothing more than matter of form, common, and even necessary, in all public transactions, and that, although the board considered the claim of the government literally due, it was not the intention of administration to prescribe to his Excellency _the mode, or even limits, of payment_." Nor was any part of the money recovered, until the establishment of the Governor-General and Council by act of Parliament, and their determination to withdraw the brigade from the Nabob's service,--the Resident at his court, appointed by the said Warren Hastings, having written, _that he had experienced much duplicity and deceit in most of his transactions with his Excellency_; and the said Nabob and his successors falling back in other payments in the same or greater proportion as he advanced in the payment of this debt, the consideration of lucre to the Company, the declared motive to this shameful transaction, totally failed, and no money in effect and substance (as far as by any account to be depended on appears) has been obtained.