XVII. That the first of his three instituted projects, namely, the depriving the Rajah of his territories, was by himself considered as a measure likely to be productive of much odium to the British government: he having declared, whatever opinions he might entertain of its justice, "that it would have an appearance of _severity_, and might furnish grounds _unfavorable to the credit of our government, and to his own reputation_, from the natural influence which every _act of rigor_, exercised in the persons of men in _elevated situations_, is apt to impress on those who are too remote from the scene of action to judge, by any evidence of the facts themselves, of their motives or propriety." And the second attempt, the sum of money which he aimed at by attacking the fortresses of the Rajah, and plundering them of the treasure supposed to be there secured, besides the obvious uncertainty of acquiring what was thus sought, would be liable to the same imputations with the former. And with regard to the third project, namely, the sale of the Company's sovereignty to the Nabob of Oude, and his having actually received proposals for the same, it was an high offence to the Company, as presuming, without their authority or consent, to put up to sale their sovereign rights, and particularly to put them up to sale to that very person against whom the independence of the said province had been declared by the Governor-General and Council to be necessary, as a barrier for the security of the other provinces, in case of a future rupture with him.[59] It was an heinous injury to the said Rajah to attempt to change his relation without his consent, especially on account of the person to whom he was to be made over for money, by reason of the known enmity subsisting between his family and that of the Nabob, who was to be the purchaser; and it was a grievous outrage on the innocent inhabitants of the zemindary of Benares to propose putting them under a person long before described by himself to the Court of Directors "to want the qualities of the head and heart requisite for his station"; and a letter from the British Resident at Oude, transmitted to the said Court, represents him "to have wholly lost, by his _oppressions_, the confidence and affections of his own subjects"; and whose distresses, and the known disorders in his government, he, the said Hastings, did attribute solely to his own bad conduct and evil character; admitting also, in a letter written to Edward Wheler, Esquire, and transmitted to the Court of Directors, "that many circumstances did favor suspicion of his [the said Nabob's] fidelity to the English interest, the Nabob being surrounded by men base in their characters and improvident in their understandings, his favorites, and his companions of his looser hours. These had every cause to dread the effect of my influence on theirs; and both these, and the relations of the family, whose views of consequence and power were intercepted by our