of their own; and who, it has been proved, lived in a distinct dwelling, were causelessly implicated, nevertheless, in the same punishment. Their residence surrounded with guards, they were driven to despair by famine, and when they poured forth in sad procession, were beaten with bludgeons, and forced back by the soldiery to the scene of madness which they had quitted. These are acts, my Lords, which, when told, need no comment. I will not offer a single syllable to awaken your Lordships' feelings; but leave it to the facts which have been stated to make their own impression.*

VI. The inquiry which now only remains, my Lords, is, whether Mr Hastings is to be answerable for the crimes committed by his agents? | It has been fully proved that Mr Middleton signed the treaty with the superior begum in October 1778. He also acknowledged signing some others of a different date, but could not recollect the authority by which he did it! These treaties were recognised by Mr Hastings, as appears by the evidence of Mr Purling, in the year 1780. In that of October 1778, the jaghire was secured, which was allotted for the support of the women in the khord mahal. But still the prisoner pleads that he is not accountable for the cruelties which were exercised. His is the plea which tyranny, aided by its prime minister, treachery, is always sure to set up. Mr Middleton has attempted to strengthen this ground by endeavouring to claim the whole infamy in these transactions, and to monopolise the guilt! He dared even to aver, that he had been condemned by Mr Hastings for the ignominious part he had acted. He dared to avow this, because Mr Hastings was on his trial, and he thought he never would be arraigned; but in the face of this Court, and before he left the bar, he was compelled to confess that it was for the lenience, and not the severity of his proceedings, that he had been reproved by the prisoner.

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It will not, I trust, be concluded that because Mr Hastings has not marked every passing shade of guilt, and because he has only given the bold outline of cruelty, he is therefore to be acquitted. It is laid down by the law of England, that law which is the perfection of reason, that a person ordering an act to be done by his agent is answerable for that act with all its consequences, "Quod facit per alium, facit per se." Middleton was appointed, in 1777, the confidential agent, the second self of Mr Hastings. The governorgeneral ordered the measure. Even if he never saw, nor heard afterward of its consequences, he was therefore answerable for every pang that was inflicted, and for all the blood that was shed. But he did hear, and that instantly, of the whole. He wrote to accuse Middleton of forbearance and of neglect ! He commanded him to work upon the hopes and fears of the princesses, and to leave no means untried, until, to speak his own language, which was better suited to the banditti of a cavern, "he obtained possession of the secret hoards of the old ladies." He would not allow even of a delay of two days to smooth the compelled approaches of a son to his mother, on this occasion! His orders were peremptory. After this, my Lords, can it be said that the prisoner was ignorant of the acts, or not culpable for their consequences? It is true, he did not direct the guards, the famine, and the bludgeons; he did not weigh the fetters, nor number the lashes to be inflicted on his victims; but yet he is just as guilty as if he had borne an active and personal share in each transaction. It is as if he had commanded that the heart should be torn from the bosom, and enjoined that no blood should follow. He is in the same degree accountable to the law, to his country, to his conscience, and to his GOD!

The prisoner has endeavoured also to get rid of a part of his guilt, by observing that he was but

would only be subjected to severer coercion, unless they performed, without delay, what they averred themselves unable to perform. They were accordingly soon after removed to Lucknow, and cruelties inflicted upon them, of which the nature is not disclosed; of which the following letter, addressed by the assistant resident to the commanding officer of the English guard, is a disgraceful proof: 'Sir,-The nabob having determined to inflict corporeal punishment upon the prisoners under your guard, this is to desire that his officers, when they come, may have free access to the prisoners, and be permitted to do with them as they shall see proper.' The women in the zenana, in the meanwhile, were, at various times, deprived of food, till they were on the point of perishing for want. The rigours went on increasing till the month of December [that is, for nearly a year], when the resident, convinced by his own experience, and the representation of the officer commanding the guard by which the princesses were coerced, that everything which force could accomplish was already performed, removed, of his own authority, the guard from the palace of the begums, and set at liberty their ministers."—Mill's

one of the supreme council, and that all the rest had sanctioned those transactions with their approbation. Even if it were true that others did participate in the guilt, it cannot tend to diminish his criminality. But the fact is, that the council erred in nothing so much as in a reprehensible credulity given to the declarations of the governor-general. They knew not a word of those transactions until they were finally concluded. It was not until the January following that they saw the mass of falsehood which had been published under the title of "Mr Hastings' Narrative." They were, then, unaccountably duped to permit a letter to pass, dated the 29th of November, intended to seduce the directors into a belief that they had received intelligence at that time, which was not the fact. These observations, my Lords, are not meant to cast any obloquy on the council; they undoubtedly were deceived; and the deceit practised on them is a decided proof of his consciousness of guilt. When tired of corporeal infliction, Mr Hastings was gratified by insulting the understanding. The coolness and reflection with which this act was managed and concerted raises its enormity and blackens its turpitude. It proves the prisoner to be that monster in nature, a deliberate and reasoning tyrant! Other tyrants of whom we read, such as a Nero, or a Caligula, were urged to their crimes by the impetuosity of passion. High rank disqualified them from advice, and perhaps equally prevented reflection. But in the prisoner we have a man born in a state of mediocrity; bred to mercantile life; used to system; and accustomed to regularity; who was accountable to his masters, and therefore was compelled to think and to deliberate on every part of his conduct. It is this cool deliberation, I say, which renders his crimes more horrible, and his character more atrocious.

When, my Lords, the Board of Directors received the advices which Mr Hastings thought proper to transmit, though unfurnished with any other materials to form their judgment, they expressed very strongly their doubts, and properly ordered an inquiry into the circumstances of the alleged disaffection of the begums, declaring it, at the same time, to be a debt which was due to the honour and justice of the British This inquiry, however, Mr Hastings thought it absolutely necessary to elude. He stated to the council, in answer, "that it would revive those animosities that subsisted between the begums and the nabob [Asoph Dowlah], which had then subsided. If the former were inclined to appeal to a foreign jurisdiction, they were the best judges of their own feeling, and should be left to make their own complaint."

nation.

All this, however, my Lords, is nothing to the magnificent paragraph which concludes this communication. "Besides," says he, "I hope it will not be a departure from official language to say, that the majesty of justice ought not to be approached without solicitation. She ought not to descend to inflame or provoke, but to withhold her judgment until she is called on to determine." What is still more astonishing is, that Sir John Macpherson, who, though a man of sense and honour, is rather Oriental in his imagination, and not learned in the sublime and beautiful from the immortal leader of this prosecution, was caught by this bold, bombastic quibble, and joined in the same words, "That the majesty of justice ought not to be approached without solicitation." But, my Lords, do you, the judges of this land, and the expounders of its rightful laws-do you approve of this mockery and call it the character of justice, which takes the form of right to excite wrong? No, my Lords, justice is not this halt and miserable object; it is not the ineffective bawble of an Indian pagod; it is not the portentous phantom of despair; it is not like any fabled monster, formed in the eclipse of reason, and found in some unhallowed grove of superstitious darkness and political dismay! No, my Lords. In the happy reverse of all this, I turn from the disgusting caricature to the real image! Justice I have now before me august and pure! The abstract idea of all that would be perfect in the spirits and the aspirings of men!—where the mind rises; where the heart expands; where the countenance is ever placid and benign; where her favourite attitude is to stoop to the unfortunate; to hear their cry and to help them; to rescue and relieve, to succour and save; majestic, from its mercy; venerable, from its utility; uplifted, without pride; firm, without obduracy; beneficent in each preference; lovely, though in her frown!

On that justice I rely: deliberate and sure, abstracted from all party purpose and political speculation; not on words, but on facts. You, my Lords, who hear me, I conjure, by those rights which it is your best privilege to preserve; by that fame which it is your best pleasure to inherit; by all those feelings which refer to the first term in the series of existence, the original compact of our nature, our controlling rank in the creation. This is the call on all to administer to truth and equity, as they would satisfy the laws and satisfy themselves, with the most exalted bliss possible or conceivable for our nature; the self-approving consciousness of virtue, when the condemnation we look for will be one of the most ample mercies accomplished for mankind since the creation of the world! My Lords, I have done.

they can show that their proposition of a gradual abolition is more likely than ours to secure the object which we have in view; that by proceeding gradually we shall arrive more speedily at our end, and attain it with more certainty, than by a direct vote immediately to abolish; if they can show to the satisfaction both of myself and the committee, that our proposition has more the appearance of a speedy abolition than the reality of it, undoubtedly they will in this case make a convert of me and my honourable friend who moved the question. They will make a convert of every man among us who looks to this (which I trust we all do) as a question not to be determined by theoretical principles or enthusiastic feelings, but considers the practicability of the measure, aiming simply to affect his object in the shortest time, and in the surest possible manner. If, however, I shall be able to show that our measure proceeds more directly to its object, and secures it with more certainty, and within a less distant period; and that the slave trade will on our plan be abolished sooner than on theirs, may I not then hope that my right honourable friends will be as ready to adopt our proposition, as we should in the other case be willing to accede to theirs?

One of my right honourable friends has stated that an Act passed here for the abolition of the slave trade would not secure its abolition. Now, sir, I should be glad to know why an Act of the British legislature, enforced by all those sanctions which we have undoubtedly the power and the right to apply, is not to be effectual; at least, as to every material purpose? Will not the executive power have the same appointment of the officers and the courts of judicature, by which all the causes relating to this subject must be tried, that it has in other cases? Will there not be the same system of law by which we now maintain a monopoly of commerce? If the same law, sir, be applied to the prohibition of the slave trade which is applied in the case of other contraband commerce, with all the same means of the country to back it, I am at a loss to know why the actual and total abolition is not as likely to be effected in this way, as by any plan or project of my honourable friends, for bringing about a gradual termination of it. But my observation is extremely fortified by what fell from my honourable friend who spoke last. He has told you, sir, that if you will have patience with it for a few years, the slave trade must drop of itself, from the increasing dearness of the commodity imported, and the increasing progress, on the other hand, of internal population. Is it true, then, that the importations are so expensive and disadvantageous already, that the internal population is even now becoming a cheaper resource? I ask, then, if you leave to the importer no means of importation but by smuggling, and if, besides all the present disadvantages, you load him with all the charges and hazards of the

smuggler, by taking care that the laws against smuggling are in this case watchfully and rigor. ously enforced, is there any danger of any considerable supply of fresh slaves being poured into the islands through this channel? And is there any real ground of fear, because a few slaves may have been smuggled in or out of the islands, that a bill will be useless and ineffectual on any such ground? The question under these circumstances will not bear a dispute.

I. Perhaps, however, my honourable friends may take up another ground, and say, "It is true your measure would shut out further importations more immediately; but we do not mean to shut them out immediately. We think it right, on grounds of general expediency, that they should not be immediately shut out." Let us therefore now come to this question of the expediency of making the abolition distant and gradual, rather than immediate.

The argument of expediency, in my opinion, like every other argument in this disquisition, will not justify the continuance of the slave trade for one unnecessary hour. Supposing it to be in our power, which I have shown it is, to enforce the prohibition from this present time, the expediency of doing it is to me so clear, that if I went on this principle alone, I should not feel a moment's hesitation. What is the argument of expediency stated on the other side? It is doubted whether the deaths and births in the islands are, as yet, so nearly equal as to insure the keeping up a sufficient stock of labourers. In answer to this, I took the liberty of mentioning in a former year what appeared to me to be the state of population at that time. My observations were taken from documents which we have reason to judge authentic, and which carried on the face of them the conclusions I then stated; they were the clear, simple, and obvious result of a careful examination which I made into this subject, and any gentleman who will take the same pains may arrive at the same degree of satisfaction.

These calculations, however, applied to a period of time that is now four or five years past. The births were then, in the general view of them, nearly equal to the deaths; and, as the state of population was shown, by a considerable retrospect, to be regularly increasing, an excess of births must, before this time, have taken place.

Another observation has been made as to the disproportion of the sexes. This, however, is a disparity which existed in any material degree only in former years; it is a disparity of which the slave trade has been itself the cause, which will gradually diminish, as the slave trade diminishes, and must entirely cease if the trade shall be abolished; but which, nevertheless, is made the very plea for its continuance. I believe this disproportion of the sexes, taking the whole number of the islands, Creole as well as imported