crime they are sure to meet the ghost of some former defence, which, like the spectre in Virgil, drives them back.  The prisoner at your bar, like the hero of the poet, when he attempts to make his escape by one evasion, is stopped by the appearance of some former contradictory averment.  If he attempts to escape by one door, there his criminal allegations of one kind stop him; if he attempts to escape at another, the facts and allegations intended for some other wicked purpose stare him full in the face.

             Quacunque viam sibi fraude petivit,
    Successum Dea dira negat.

The paper I hold in my hand contains Nundcomar’s accusation of Mr. Hastings.  It consists of a variety of charges; and I will first read to you what is said by Nundcomar of these forts, which it is pretended could be held for none but suspicious and rebellious purposes.

“At the time Mr. Hastings was going to Benares, he desired me to give him an account in writing of any lands which, though properly belonging to the Subah of Bahar, might have come under the dominion of Bulwant Sing, that they might be recovered from his son, Rajah Cheyt Sing.  The purgunnahs of Kera, Mungrora, and Bidjegur were exactly in this situation, having been usurped by Bulwant Sing from the Subah of Bahar.  I accordingly delivered to Mr. Hastings the accounts of them, from the entrance of the Company upon the dewanny to the year 1179 of the Fusseli era, stated at twenty-four lacs.  Mr. Hastings said, ’Give a copy of this to Roy Rada Churn, that, if Cheyt Sing is backward in acknowledging this claim, Rada Churn may answer and confute him.’  Why Mr. Hastings, when he arrived at Benares, and had called Rajah Cheyt Sing before him, left these countries still in the Rajah’s usurpations it remains with Mr. Hastings to explain.”

This is Nundcomar’s charge.  Here follows Mr. Hastings’s reply.

“I recollect an information given me by Nundcomar concerning the pretended usurpations made by the Rajah of Benares, of the purgunnahs of Kera, Mungrora, and Bidjegur.” (Your Lordships will recollect that Bidjegur is one of those very forts which he declares could not be held but for suspicious and rebellious purposes.) “I do not recollect his mentioning it again, when I set out for Benares; neither did I ever intimate the subject, either to Cheyt Sing or his ministers, because I knew I could not support the claim; and to have made it and dropped it would have been in every sense dishonorable.  Not that I passed by it with indifference or inattention.  I took pains to investigate the foundation of this title, and recommended it to the particular inquiry of Mr. Vansittart, who was the Chief of Patna, at the time in which I received the first intimation.  The following letter and voucher, which I received from him, contain a complete statement of this pretended usurpation.”