We cannot discover that he was
subjected to any terms, or confined by any limitations. Armed with
arbitrary power, and exercising that power under a false title, his
exactions from the poor natives were only limited by his own pleasure.
Under these circumstances, we are now to ask what there was to prevent
him from robbing and ruining the people, and what security against his
robbing the exchequer of the person whose revenue he farmed.
You are told by the witnesses in the clearest manner, (and, after what
you have heard of the state of Oude, you cannot doubt the fact,) that
nobody, not even the Nabob, dared to complain against him,--that he was
considered as a man authorized and supported by the power of the British
government; and it is proved in the evidence before you that he vexed
and harassed the country to the utmost extent which we have stated in
our article of charge, and which you would naturally expect from a man
acting under such false names with such real powers. We have proved that
from some of the principal zemindars in that country, who held farms let
to them for twenty-seven thousand rupees a year, a rent of sixty
thousand was demanded, and in some cases enforced,--and that upon the
refusal of one of them to comply with this demand, he was driven out of
the country.
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