transmitting any such paper to the said Marquis Wellesley; but that the said William Scott, during the short time that the said paper remained in his hands, did surreptitiously take a copy thereof, and the said copy did immediately transmit to the said Marquis Wellesley, together with an account of all circumstances under which, and all the means whereby, the said copy had been obtained; and that, between the month of May last-mentioned, and the month of July, 1801, the said Marquis Wellesley, through the means of and in concert with the said William Scott, did make preparations for obtaining an attested copy of the said paper from the Nabob Vizier, which copy they at last obtained. That, in the said paper of requests, the Nabob Vizier having expressed his wish, that should any person have ob"tained, or should thereafter obtain, by "breach of trust or other means, possession "of specie or property belonging to the "Sircar of Oude, no one should obstruct his "taking back such property;" and the said Marquis Wellesley intending to strip him of all authority, and all means of self-protection, seized upon the wish, so expressed by the Nabob Vizier, as a means of rendering him odious and detestable in the eyes of the most wealthy of his subjects, whose riches and jewels to be able to confiscate at pleasure, he the said Marquis Wellesley pretended to regard as the object of the wish so expressed by the Nabob Vizier. That the said Marquis Wellesley, thus falsely pretending, did, on the 2d of June, 1801, thus write to the Nabob Vizier: "The publication of the ar"ticles tendered by his excellency to the governor general, and still more any attempt to carry them into effect, would inevitably occasion the most dreadful con"vulsions in the province of Oude, and "would for ever alienate from his excel lency's person and government every scn"timent of affection, obedience, or respect; "and the governor general, therefore, not "only expresses his anxious hope that the "Nabob Vizier will never revive the pro ject contained in the proposed articles, but "his lordship most carnestly recommends it "to his excellency to exert every possible "precaution to prevent the tenor of those propositions from transpiring in his excel"lency's court, or among any description of "his excellency's subjects." That the said Marquis Wellesley, while he was thus writing to the Nabob Vizier, while he was thus expressing his apprehensions lest the Nabob Vizier should suffer the knowledge of his wish so expressed to transpire amongst any description of his subjects, was actually con cipal personages in Oude, with attested "copies of such parts of that paper as tend "to disclose the comprehensive project of "confiscation, proscription, and tyrannical "violence, entertained by his excellency against his own family, nobility, and people. If you should concur with me in opinion, that such a communication to the persons named and described in the preceding paragraph might be useful, I au"thorise you to make it at the period of "time, and to the extent which you may 65 66 judge advisable." That the said William Scott, having before made use of numerous means to seduce the Nabob Vizier's subjects from their allegiance, did, in the month of July, 1801, make to certain amongst them a communication of the contents of the said paper of requests, accompanied with the false, malicious, and wicked construction thereon put by the said Marquis Wellesley, and for the foul and treacherous purposes afore-mentioned; and that, after all the transactions aforesaid, the said Marquis Wellesley did, in a public and official manner, express his entire satisfaction at the conduct of the said William Scott, and did, as a mark of such his satisfaction, appoint the said William Scott to be one of his honorary aides de camp, or legion of honour, a distinction which, agreeably to the express words of the said Marquis Wellesley, he had "reserved for such officers as had proved "highly meritorious in the field, or in the "conduct of negociations with foreign "states."--That, with respect to the pouring of troops into the territories of the said Nabob Vizier, the loading him with accumulated expenses, and the final seizure of one half of his territory, as a commutation for the suns so unjustly demanded, the said Marquis Wellesley having disbanded the troops of the said Nabob Vizier without his consent, which disbanding he had represented as sufficient to enable the said Nabob Vizier to meet all the demands that would ever come against him for the support of the Company's troops to be in lieu thereof introduced into the dominions of Oude; having introduced into the said dominions, corps upon corps, adding expense to expense, making, upon exaggerated and fraudulent estimates and returns, demand after demand on the treasury of the Nabob Vizier, while at the same time he undermined the authority of the said Nabob Vizier over the persons from whom his revenues were immediately received; having in fact seized upon great part of the territories from which the Nabob Vizier's revenues were derived, insomuch, that on the 18th of July, 1801, in answer to reproaches to him by the said William Scott made, relative to the nonpayment of the kist, the said Nabob Vizier, in the bitterness of his heart, thus represented the tyranny over him by the said Marquis Wellesley exercised: "In respect to the kist, you well know, that, in oppo"sition to and in defiance of me, you have "called before you the Aumils and their "Vakeels, (or messengers) and, without my acquiescence, or any participation on my part, you have told them that such and such countries belonged to the Company, "and have forbidden them giving me the 66 66 peishgee, or advance; and further, you "have directed the officers in command of "the troops to establish themselves in the "countries alluded to; judge then, what confusion these circumstances must have given rise to in the country, what confidence the Aumils can now repose in me,; having first deprived me of the means of "collecting the revenues, you then call upon me to make payments." Having, by means so unjust, and tyrannical, reduced the said Nabob Vizier to the situation here described, the said Marquis Wellesley, under the false pretence of being so authorised to act by the treaty of 1798, did demand, and by and through the means of his brother the honourable Henry Wellesley, by him unlawfully appointed to the mission at Lucknow, did, from the said Nabob Vizier force and extort the cession in perpetuity to the East India Company, of the one-half of the whole of the territories of Oude. That, in the month of November, 1801, a treaty, in which the said cession was stipulated for, was concluded with the Nabob Vizier; that the said Henry Wellesley, in order to compel the said Nabob Vizier thereunto to consent, did renew the alarming threats so frequently resorted to by the said Marquis Wellesley, by the means of, and in concert with the said William Scott; that he, the said Henry Wellesley, was instructed to declare, and to the said Nabob Vizier did declare, the settled determination of his bro'ther, the said Marquis Wellesley, to seize upon the whole of the dominions of Oude, unless the cession proposed was assented to; and that the said Marquis Wellesley, resorting again to his false, malicious, and wicked construction of the paper of requests, did instruct the said Henry Wellesley to present and to publish a declaration, containing the parts of the said paper referred to, together with the said Marquis Wellesley's construction thereof, to the end that the most opulent and powerful subjects of the said Nabob Vizier might thereby be induced to abandon their sovereign, and to join in the views of the said Marquis Wellesley; which said instructions were expressed in the following words; to wit: " You will communicate to "the Begum, to the other members of his "excellency's family, and to the principal persons of rank at the Vizier's court, the 66 nature and extent of those acts of arbitrary power to which the Vizier required the "sanction of the British name, as the con"dition of his consent to a territorial ces"sion. And his lordship directs that this unparallelled instance of rapacity and injustice, form a leading article in the declaration to be preferred by you, and "transmitted for his lordship's approbation. "You will also communicate to the Begum, "and to the other personages in question, a "copy of his lordship's reply to that part of "the Vizier's propositions. His lordship "has no doubt, that the knowledge of this "transaction will fully explain the neces"sity of the Company's assumption of the "civil and military government of Oude to "those persons who are the objects of his "excellency's proscription. His lordship is 66 " communication above directed to the fa- | "mily of the Vizier, and the principal per sons of his court will consequently pre"cede the delivery of that document to his Excellency the Vizier." That, notwithstanding the embarrassment and darger arising from intrigues so perfidious, notwithstanding the alarming threats and the persont insults from the said Henry Wellesley daily received; notwithstanding the great numbers and the menacing attitude of the Company's troops; notwithstanding the orders for a seizure, by hostile means, of the whole of the dominions of Oude, had actually been issued by the said Marquis WelJesley; all this notwithstanding, the said Nabob Vizier did, until he had exhausted every means of remonstrance, until resistance could no longer be continued without imminent danger to his life, and to the lives of his family, withhold his assent from, and decidedly reject, the treaty of cession as aforesaid, vader the mask of which treaty, but in fact by force of arms, the said Marquis Wellesley did wrest from the said Nabob Vizier a territory yielding an annual revenue of one croare and thirty-five lacs of rupees (or £1,682,500.) That though the said Nabob Vizier, thus persecuted and plundered, dreading further acts of injustice and violence, and anxiously wishing for the future to be free from the interference of British amity and advice, most earnestly besought the said Marquis Wellesley to leave him the sole management of the territory unto him the said Nabob Vizier now remaining, the said Marquis Wellesley by the means of, and in concert with his brother aforesaid, did, in manner and in terms the most haughty and insulting, reject the said request; guaranteeing unto the said Nabob Vizier and his heirs the sovereignty of the said remaining territory, solely upon the condition, that they should hold it under 'such a system of administration as might be recommended by the officers of the said East India Company: and, that this injurious and degrading condition was by the said Marquis Wellesley imposed under the impudent pretext of its being necessary, in order to secure the fulfilment of the treaty, of 1798; according to the letter, as well as to the spirit of which treaty the whole of the dominions of Oude were guaranteed to the Nabob Vizier and his heirs for ever, with "full "authority over his said dominions, his "household affairs, his troops, and his sub"jects." That, proceeding in the com 1 pleting of a triumph so inglorious, the said Marquis Wellesley, by the means of, and in concert with his said brother Henry Wellesley, did, at the moment of is taking pos session of the territories to the Company ceded as aforesaid, impose new and unprecedented burthens upon the people, aug. menting, in a proportion of nearly one-bif, the revenues from them before collected, and employing in the collection of those revenues, in extorting from the husbandman the very means of existeuce, those troops, these British regiments, which, with his wonted insincerity, he had introduced under the specious guise of a desire to defend the country against its external enemies, and to relieve the people from internal oppression. That, having by means of these his extor"tions, and other acts of oppression and of tranny, excited the resistance of certain amongst the Zemizdays and Rajahs before described, the raid Marquis Wellesley did, by the means of, and in concert with his brother aforesaid, cause the mansions and retreats of the said Rajahs to be surrounded, attacked, and plundered, and the said Ra jahs, their faithful adherents, their relations, vassals and servants, to be barbarously slain; thus finishing in violence and murder that which in fraud and perfidy he had begun: And that, in order to stifle the groans of com plaint, to extinguish all hope of redress, and his fraudulently acquired and tyrannical power the more securely to preserve and to exercise, he the said Marquis Wellesley, as well by himself as by his brother aforesaid, did declare, and unto the princes and people of India did, through the means of such de claration, proclaim, that no change of administration in Britain could stay the course of his proceedings as aforesaid; falsely and au daciously thereunto adding, that the said course, a course of fraudulent pretences, of pecuniary extortion, of political encroachment, and of territorial invasion and usurpation, had already received the approba"tion of his Sovereign, of Parliament, and -That in all and of the Company. singular the above recited acts and proceed. ings, the said Richard Colley Marquis Wellesley has been wholly unimindful of the solemn engagements of duty to the said East India Company, to his Sovereign, and to his Country, by bim entered into; has daringly contened the Parliament, the King, and the Laws, and dishonoured the British nation and name; and has therein been guilty of high offences, crimes, and misdemeanors. Printed by Cox and Baylis No. 75,- Great Queen Street, and published by R. Bagshaw, Bow Street, Covent Garden, where former Numbers may be had; sold also by J. Budd, Crown and Mitre, Pall-Mall. VOL. IX. No. 26.] LONDON, SATURDAY, JUNE 28, 1806. [PRICE 10D "What difference, therefore, is there between the conduct of Mr. Pitt and that of Lord Melville? And "yet, to the memory of the one we are granting all the honours due to the untarnished and meritorious dead, whi e we are pursuing the peace, the fortune, and the fame of the other!”TER, 1st Feb. 1906. 961] POLITICAL REGIS. [62 view of establishing this accusation, it was discovered, that Mr. Pitt, who had been during the whole of the time, first Lord of the Treasury, and, indeed, the prime minister and ruler of the country, but particularly as to all matters of money; it was discovered that this Mr. Pitt, who had himself introduced into parliament and had minutely explained the intention of the law which had been, as was alleged, so grossly violated by Lord Melville; it was discovered that this very Mr. Pitt had himself participated in all that was alleged against Lord Melville, for that, though duly informed, by a Bank of England director, that the naval money was withdrawn and nisapplied as afore-mentioned; though this fact was confirmed to him by the confession of Lord Melville himself, he took no measures to put a stop to the abuse; he never desired even that the abuse should cease; and, that, therefore, as to conniving at the misapplication of the naval money, he was a full participator with Lord Melville. But, in one respect he went much farther; for, it was discovered, during the aforesaid inquiries, that Mr. Pitt, not SUMMARY OF POLITICS. ACQUITTAL OF LORD MELVILLE.The history of the Impeachment of Lord Melville will, of course, be given, and in a very short time, in the Parliamentary Debates and Proceedings. An Analysis of the trial is given in another part of this sheet. It is, however, the peculiar office of a work like this, to observe upon the transaction; and, if all observation thereon has been abstained from for the two weeks, since the acquittal was pronounced, it has not been owing to any doubts respecting either the decision itself or the motives whence it proceeded; and, which decision and motives will, I trust, never be forgotten by the people of England, though, at present, they appear, in general, to be dumb-stricken by the force of their feelings upon the occasion.In Scotland, indeed, the feelings of the people have broken out into action; and, at Edinburgh in particular, the magistrates have found it necessary to advise the people not to laminate their houses for joy. At Berwick public rejoicings have taken place; and, it is stated, that, in order to render the manner of those rejoicings "more peculiar-only participated in the connivance, but, that ly appropriate, and more expressive of "the sentiments of the people, the bon"fires were made, in great part at least, of "empty and cast-off beer-barrels !”This may be rather grating to the souls of some persons; but, whatever other folks may think of it, Mr. Fox, Mr. Grey, Mr. Windham, Lord Henry Petty, Mr. Whitbread, and the rest of that party of politicians, have, assuredly, no reason to complam; for, as it has been frequently observed, they have, in their language and in their measures with regard to Mr. Pitt, made, and put upon record, a complete answer to every thing that they can say with regard to Lord Melville.Lord Melville was accused of a gross violation of the law, and a high breach of duty, in having permitted the naval money to be withdrawn from the Bank of England, to be lodged elsewhere, and to be, in some cases, employ-ed for the private advantage of individuals. In the course of the inquiries, made with a he participated in the acts of misapplication, and that he was, moreover, an instigator to such acts, he having, in the instance that came to light, received 40,0001. of the naval money from Lord Melville, which money he lent without interest, to two of his political supporters, who were members of the House of Commons; and, of this transaction, he did, observe, make no mention to his colleagues of the cabinet; he made no minute or other record of it any where; and the fact was found out; it was detected, in just the same way that all the facts relative to Lord Melville were.That this statement is correct, will not, I am persuaded, be denied'; and, let me ask any honest man, whether Mr. Pitt's offence, especially when we take into view the station he tiled, was not greater, legally as well as morally considered, than that of Lord Melville? I am sure the answer will be, that it was greater; and, it is hardly necessary to add, that, the moment a report was made to the House of Commons upon Mr. Pitt's conduct; upon the conduct of the cousin of Lord Grenville with whom the Foxes had coalesced; the moment a report was made upon his conduct, a bill of indemity was proposed, and that, too, by the prosecutors, by the impeachers of my Lord Melville! These impeachers eulogized Mr. Pitt. There was scarcely any good which they did not say of him upon the occasion. Nay, will any one of them now deny, that there was, at that moment, actually on foot a scheme, if not a negociation, for coalescing with him? The scheme then failed; but, was it entirely abandoned, until after the total failure of the Third Coalition upon the Continent? And, when, in January, Mr. Pitt died, though the Foxes declined voting him at monument, they were amongst the foremost to vote for the payment of his debts by the public, and this they did expressly upon the ground of his PUBLIC MERITS. As if all this were not enough to enable the world to draw an inference in favour of Lord Melville, MR. WHITBREAD, the zealous, the able, and the theretofore praiseworthy prosecutor of Lord Melville, did, even upon the trial, extol the public virtues, and particularly the PURITY of Mr. Pitt, and this in the very speech wherein he was making the last of his great efforts for obtaining against Lord Melville a sentence which should brand him with CORRUPTION for having acted with the connivance of that Mr. Pitt, for having participated an action with that Mr. Pitt, for having yielded to the instigations of that Mr. Pitt!--Mr. Whitbread has made a motion, in the House of Commons, for appointing a committee to examine the Journals of the House of Lords relative to the decision in the case of Lord Melville. I know not the object of this proposed examination; nor do I feel much interest about it; and, I believe, the public in general feel, in this respect, much about as I do. They have paid the debts of Mr. Pitt. I have borne my share of the burthen thus imposed upon us by the consent and even with the decided approbation of the Foxes; and, I solemnly declare, that I shall pay much more willingly, or rather, much less unwillingly, my share of the sum necessary to defray the expenses, to which Lord Melville has been put by his trial. Here are two men, who, whether the acts they have committed be criminal or not, have committed, the same ats; are, to all intents and purposes, associates and accomplices. One of them is indemnified before-hand; he dies, and his debts are discharged by the House of Commons, upon the score of his public merits. The other is, by that House of Commons, pursued and brought to trial, and, at the end of that trial, is acquitted upon every charge preferred against him; but, is, by such trial, put to an enormous expense. Now, whatever may be the opinion of those who have all along viewed these men with an impartial eye, and have, of course, wished to see the same fate attend them both; whatever may be the opinion of such men to the paying of Lord Melville's expenses, there, surely, can, with the indemnifiers of Pitt; the eulogizers of Pitt; the voters for the paying of Pitt's debts; with these men there surely can be no objection, or, at least, no objection that will bear urging openly, to the payment of Lord Melville's expenses, which would, besides, be an excellent finisher to this patriotic undertaking.Shall I be told, that this would operate as an insurmountable discouragement to impeachment in future My answer is, that MR. Fox, who was so eager for impeaching Lord Melville, has, for months past; indeed, ever since, he came into office, been endeavouring to persuade the House of Commons and the public, that impeachments are, to say the best of them, quite useless things! He has, it is true, been speaking about a proposition to impeach a friend of his principal associate in power; but, we must understand him in a general sense; and, if impeachments be quite use. less, I know of no better way to make the people dislike them than the one now talked of. But, it would be an insult to Mr. "Whitbread." I should be sorry to see Mr. Whitbread insulted, and I highly disapprove of the beer-barrel bon-fires; but, I must confess, that it is beyond my capacity to discover any cause of offence to Mr. Whitbread in the House of Commons putting Lord Melville upon the same footing as he, Mr. Whitbread, was so willing and so anxious to put Mr. Pitt, whom I have proved, over and over again proved, to have been a complete associate and accomplice with Lord Melville.- The point I aim at, and which, I trust, I shall have accomplished before I take my final leave of the subject is this, that both parties; that the INS as well as the OUTS; that the Fox party and that all parties in the House of Commons, and in the House of Lords, have, in one way or another, justified the acquittal of Lord Melville; and that they have, in this respect at least, given equal proof of the justice of their claim to the confidence of the people. The motion for an examination into the Lord's journals, together with certain expressions that have been dropped, here and there, would seem to insinuate that there is |