The man, under
every difficulty and every distress, gave an answer to every particular
of the charge, as exact and punctilious as could have been made to
articles of impeachment in this House.
I must here request your Lordships to consider the order of these
proceedings. Mr. Hastings, having determined upon the utter ruin and
destruction of this unfortunate prince, endeavored, by the arrest of his
person, by a contemptuous disregard to his submissive applications, by
the appointment of a deputy who was personally odious to him, and by the
terror of still greater insults, he endeavored, I say, to goad him on to
the commission of some acts of resistance sufficient to give a color of
justice to that last dreadful extremity to which he had resolved to
carry his malignant rapacity. Failing in this wicked project, and
studiously avoiding the declaration of any terms upon which the Rajah
might redeem himself from these violent proceedings, he next declared
his intention of seizing his forts, the depository of his victim's
honor, and of the means of his subsistence. He required him to deliver
up his accounts and accountants, together with all persons who were
acquainted with the particulars of his effects and treasures, for the
purpose of transferring those effects to such persons as he (Mr.
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