not consenting to or authorizing any negotiation for
such treaty, until after a cessation of hostilities
had been brought about with him by the Presidency
of Fort St. George, in August, 1783, and the ministers
of Tippoo had been received and treated with by that
Presidency, and commissioners, in return, actually
sent by the said Presidency to the court of Poonah:
which late and reluctant consent and authority were
extorted from him, the said Hastings, in consequence
of the acknowledgment of his agent at the court of
Mahdajee Sindia, upon whom the said Warren Hastings
had depended for enforcing the clauses of the Mahratta
treaty, of the precariousness of such dependence, and
of the necessity of that direct and separate treaty
with Tippoo, so long and so lately reprobated by the
said Warren Hastings, notwithstanding the information
and entreaties of the Presidency of Fort St. George,
as well as the known distresses and critical situation
of the Company’s affairs. That, though
the said Warren Hastings did at length give instructions
for negotiating and making peace with Tippoo, expressly
adding, that those instructions extended to all
the points which occurred to him or them as
capable of being agitated or gained upon the occasion,—though
the said instructions were sent after the said commissioners
by the Presidency of Fort St. George, with directions
to obey them,—though not only the said
instructions were obeyed, but advantages gained which
did not occur to the said Warren Hastings,—though
the said peace formed a contrast with the Mahratta
peace, in neither ceding any territory possessed by
the Company before the war, or delivering up any dependant
or ally to the vengeance of his adversaries, but providing
for the restoration of all the countries that had
been taken from the Company and their allies,—though
the Supreme Council of Calcutta, forming the legal
government of Bengal in the absence of the said Warren
Hastings, ratified the said treaty,—yet
the said Warren Hastings, then absent from the seat
of government, and out of the province of Bengal,
and forming no legal or integral part of the government
during such absence, did, after such ratification,
usurp the power of acting as a part of such government
(as if actually sitting in Council with the other
members of the same) in the consideration and unqualified
censure of the terms of the said peace.
That the Nabob of Arcot, with whom the said Hastings did keep up an unwarrantable clandestine correspondence, without any communication with the Presidency of Madras, wrote a letter of complaint, dated the 27th of March, 1784, against the Presidency of that place, without any communication thereof to the said Presidency, the said complaint being addressed to the said Warren Hastings, the substance of which complaint was, that he, the Nabob, had not been made a party to the late treaty; and although his interest had been sufficiently provided for in the said treaty, the said Warren Hastings