The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 11 (of 12)Burke, Edmund
History
The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 11 (of 12)
Burke, Edmund
Great Britain -- Politics and government -- 1760-1820; Political science -- Early works to 1800
his country,) "I now think it my duty to remove the possibility of your
remaining unacquainted with, a circumstance which may not be unconnected
with the present conduct of the Rajah."
Here is a man that comes with information long after the fact deposed
to, and, after having left to another the communication of his
intelligence to the proper authority, that other neglects the matter. No
letter of Mr. Markham's appears, communicating any such conversation to
Mr. Hastings: and, indeed, why he did not do so must appear very obvious
to your Lordships; for a more contemptible, ridiculous, and absurd story
never was invented. Does Mr. Balfour come forward and tell him who his
informant was? No. Does he say, "He was an informant whom I dare not
name, upon account of his great consequence, and the great confidence I
had in him"? No. He only says slightly, "I have some confidence in him."
It is upon this evidence of a reporter of what another is _said_ to have
_said_, that Mr. Hastings and his Council rely for proof, and have
thought proper to charge the Rajah, with having conceived rebellious
designs soon after the time when Mr. Hastings had declared his belief
that no such designs had been formed.
Mr. Hastings has done with his charge of rebellion what he did with his
declaration of arbitrary power: after he had vomited it up in one place,
he returns to it in another. He here declares (after he had recorded
his belief that no rebellion was ever intended) that Mr. Markham was in
possession of information which he might have believed, if it had been
communicated to him. Good heavens! when you review all these
circumstances, and consider the principles upon which this man was tried
and punished, what must you think of the miserable situation of persons
of the highest rank in that country, under the government of men who are
disposed to disgrace and ruin them in this iniquitous manner!
Mr. Balfour is in Europe, I believe. How comes it that he is not
produced here to tell your Lordships who was his informer, and what he
knows of the transaction? They have not produced him, but have thought
fit to rely upon this miserable, beggarly semblance of evidence, the
very production of which was a crime, when brought forward for the
purpose of giving color to acts of injustice and oppression. If you ask,
Who is this Mr. Balfour? He is a person who was a military collector of
revenue in the province of Rohilcund: a country now ruined and
desolated, but once the garden of the world. It was from the depth of
that horrible devastating system that he gave this ridiculous,
contemptible evidence, which if it can be equalled, I shall admit that
there is not one word we have said that you ought to attend to.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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