We next proceed to give you our sentiments respecting the private debts of the Nabob; and we cannot but acknowledge that the origin and justice, both of the loan of 1767, and the loan of 1777, commonly called the Cavalry Loan, appear to us clear and indisputable, agreeable to the true sense and spirit of the late act of Parliament.

In speaking of the loan of 1767, we are to be understood as speaking of the debt as constituted by the original bonds of that year, bearing interest at 10_l._ per cent; and therefore, if any of the Nabob’s creditors, under a pretence that their debts made part of the consolidated debt of 1767, although secured by bonds of a subsequent date, carrying an interest exceeding 10_l._ per cent, shall claim the benefit of the following orders, we direct that you pay no regard to such claims, without further especial instructions for that purpose.

With respect to the consolidated debt of 1777, it certainly stands upon a less favorable footing.  So early as the 27th March, 1769, it was ordered by our then President and Council of Fort St. George, that, for the preventing all persons living under the Company’s protection from having any dealings with any of the country powers or their ministers without the knowledge or consent of the Board, an advertisement should be published, by fixing it up at the sea-gate, and sending round a copy to the Company’s servants and inhabitants, and to the different subordinates, and our garrisons, and giving it out in general orders, stating therein that the President and Council did consider the irreversible order of the Court of Directors of the year 1714 (whereby their people were prohibited from having any dealings with the country governments in money matters) to be in full force and vigor, and thereby expressly forbidding all servants of the Company, and other Europeans under their jurisdiction, to make loans or have any money transactions with any of the princes or states in India, without special license and permission of the President and Council for the time being, except only in the particular cases there mentioned, and declaring that any wilful deviation therefrom should be deemed a breach of orders, and treated as such.  And on the 4th of March, 1778, it was resolved by our President and Council of Fort St George, that the consolidated debt of 1777 was not, on any respect whatever, conducted under the auspices or protection of that government; and on the circumstance of the consolidation of the said debt being made known to us, we did, on the 23rd of December, 1778, write to you in the following terms:  “Your account of the Nabob’s private debts is very alarming; but from whatever cause or causes those debts have been contracted or increased, we hereby repeat our orders, that the sanction of the Company be on no account given to any kind of security for the payment or liquidation of any part thereof, (except by the express authority of the Court of Directors,) on any account or pretence whatever.”