The lands held by the zemindars of that country are of many descriptions. The first and most general are those that pay revenue; the others are of the nature of demesne lands, which are free, and pay no rent to government. The latter are for the immediate support of the zemindars and their families,--as from the former they derive their influence, authority, and the means of upholding their dignity. The lands of the former description were immediately attached, sequestered, and sold for the most trifling consideration. The rent-free lands, the best and richest lands of the whole province, were sold,--sold for--what do your Lordships think? They were sold for less than one year's purchase,--at less than one year's purchase, at the most underrated value; so that the fee-simple of an English acre of rent-free land sold at the rate of seven or eight shillings. Such a sale, on such terms, strongly indicated the purchaser. And how did it turn out in fact? The purchaser was the very agent and instrument of Mr. Hastings, Debi Sing himself. He made the exaction; he forced the sale; he reduced the rate; and he became the purchaser at less than one year's purchase, and paid with the very money which he had extorted from the miserable vendors. When he had thus sold and separated these lands, he united the whole body of them, amounting to about 7,000_l._ sterling a year (but, according to the rate of money and living in that country, equivalent to a rental in England of 30,000_l._ a year); and then having raised in the new letting, as on the sale he had fraudulently reduced those lands, he reserved them as an estate for himself, or to whomsoever resembling himself Mr. Hastings should order them to be disposed. The lands, thus sold for next to nothing, left of course the late landholder still in debt. The failure of fund, the rigorous exaction of debt, and the multiplication of new arbitrary taxes next carried off the goods.