But let us now come to the main point, which is to ascertain what sums the country could really bear. Mr. Hastings maintains (whether in the speech of his counsel or otherwise I do not recollect) that the revenue of the country was 400,000_l._, that it constantly paid that sum, and flourished under the payment. In answer to this, I refer your Lordships, first, to Mr. Markham's declaration, and the Wassil Baakee, which is in page 1750 of the printed Minutes. I next refer your Lordships to Mr. Duncan's Reports, in page 2493. According to Mr. Duncan's public estimate of the revenue of Benares, the net collections of the very year we are speaking of, when Durbege Sing had the management, and when Mr. Markham, his Persian moonshee, and a clerk in his private house, made their estimates without any documents, or with whatever documents, or God only knows, for nothing appears on the record of the transaction,--the collections yielded in that year but 340,000_l._, that is, 20,000_l._ less than Mr. Markham's estimate. But take it which way you will, whether you take it at Mr. Markham's 360,000_l._, or at Mr. Duncan's 340,000_l._, your Lordships will see, that, after reserving 60,000_l._ for his own private expenses, the Rajah could not realize a sum nearly equal to the tribute demanded. Your Lordships have also in evidence before you an account of the produce of the country for I believe full five years after this period, from which it appears that it never realized the forty lacs, or anything like it,--yielding only thirty-seven and thirty-nine lacs, or thereabouts, which is 20,000_l._ short of Mr. Markham's estimate, and 160,000_l._ short of Mr. Hastings's. On what data could the prisoner at your bar have formed this estimate? Where were all the clerks and mutsuddies, where were all the men of business in Benares, who could have given him complete information upon the subject? We do not find the trace of any of them; all our information is Mr. Markham's moonshee, and some clerk of Durbege Sing's employed in Mr. Markham's private counting-house, in estimating revenues of a country. The disposable revenue was still further reduced by the jaghires which Mr. Hastings granted, but to what amount does not appear. He mentions the increase in the revenue by the confiscation of the estates of the Baboos, who had been in rebellion. This he rates at six lacs. But we have inspected the accounts, we have examined them with that sedulous attention which belongs to that branch of the legislature that has the care of the public revenues, and we have not found one trace of this addition. Whether these confiscations were ever actually made remains doubtful; but if they were made, the application or the receipt of the money they yielded does not appear in any account whatever. I leave your Lordships to judge of this.