“Sir,—­In consequence of your letter of the 17th, I must request the favor of you to inform the Select Committee that I expect from their justice, on any matter of public record in which I am personally to be brought forward to the notice of the House, that they will at the same time point out to the House what part of such matter has been verified, and what parts have not nor ever were attempted to be verified, though introduced in debate and entered on the records of the Governor-General and Council of Bengal.  I am anxious the information should be complete, or the House will not be competent to judge; and if it is complete, it will preclude all explanation as unnecessary.

  “I am, Sir,
    “Your most obedient humble servant,
      “RICHARD BARWELL.

  “St. James’s Square, 22nd April, 1783.

“P.S.  As I am this moment returned from the country, I had it not in my power to be earlier in acknowledging your letter of the 17th.”

Your Committee applied to Mr. Barwell to communicate any papers which might tend to the elucidation of matters before them in which he was concerned.  This he has declined to do.  Your Committee conceive that under the orders of the House they are by no means obliged to make a complete state of all the evidence which may tend to criminate or exculpate every person whose transactions they may find it expedient to report:  this, if not specially ordered, has not hitherto been, as they apprehend, the usage of any committee of this House.  It is not for your Committee, but for the discretion of the party, to call for, and for the wisdom of the House to institute, such proceedings as may tend finally to condemn or acquit.  The Reports of your Committee are no charges, though they may possibly furnish matter for charge; and no representations or observations of theirs can either clear or convict on any proceeding which may hereafter be grounded on the facts which they produce to the House.  Their opinions are not of a judicial nature.  Your Committee has taken abundant care that every important fact in their Report should be attended with the authority for it, either in the course of their reflections or in the Appendix:  to report everything upon every subject before them which is to be found on the records of the Company would be to transcribe, and in the event to print, almost the whole of those voluminous papers.  The matter which appears before them is in a summary manner this.

The Dacca merchants begin by complaining that in November, 1773, Mr. Richard Barwell, then Chief of Dacca, had deprived them of their employment and means of subsistence; that he had extorted from them 44,224 Arcot rupees (4,731_l._) by the terror of his threats, by long imprisonment, and cruel confinement in the stocks; that afterwards they were confined in a small room near the factory-gate, under a guard of sepoys; that their food was stopped, and they remained starving a whole day; that they were not permitted to take