The next thing for your Lordships’ consideration is the conduct of Mr. Hastings upon this occasion.  You would imagine that he would have treated the accusation with a cold and manly disdain; that he would have challenged and defied inquiry, and desired to see his accuser face to face.  This is what any man would do in such a situation.  I can conceive very well that a man composed, firm, and collected in himself, conscious of not only integrity, but known integrity, conscious of a whole life beyond the reach of suspicion,—­that a man placed in such a situation might oppose general character to general accusation, and stand collected in himself, poised on his own base, and defying all the calumnies in the world.  But as it shows a great and is a proof of a virtuous mind to despise calumny, it is the proof of a guilty mind to despise a specific accusation, when made before a competent authority, and with competent means to prove it.  As Mr. Hastings’s conduct was what no man living expected, I will venture to say that no expression can do it justice but his own.  Upon reading the letter, and a motion being made that Rajah Nundcomar be brought before the board to prove the charge against the Governor-General, the Governor-General enters the following minute.

“Before the question is put, I declare that I will not suffer Nundcomar to appear before the board as my accuser.  I know what belongs to the dignity and character of the first member of this administration.  I will not sit at this board in the character of a criminal, nor do I acknowledge the members of this board to be my judges.  I am reduced on this occasion to make the declaration, that I look upon General Clavering, Colonel Monson, and Mr. Francis as my accusers.  I cannot prove this in the direct letter of the law, but in my conscience I regard them as such, and I will give my reasons for it.  On their arrival at this place, and on the first formation of the Council, they thought proper to take immediate and decisive measures in contradiction and for the repeal of those which were formed by me in conjunction with the last administration.  I appealed to the Court of Directors from their acts.  Many subsequent letters have been transmitted both by them and by me to the Court of Directors:  by me, in protestation against their conduct; by them, in justification of it.  Quitting this ground, they since appear to me to have chosen other modes of attack, apparently calculated to divert my attention and to withdraw that of the public from the subject of our first differences, which regarded only the measures that were necessary for the good of the service, to attacks directly and personally levelled at me for matters which tend to draw a personal and popular odium upon me:  and fit instruments they have found for their purpose,—­Mr. Joseph Fowke, Mahrajah Nundcomar, Roopnarain Chowdry, and the Ranny of Burdwan.