Observe, my Lords, the person that put Durbege Sing in prison was Mr. Markham; while the complaint in the arzee is, that Mr. Markham was himself the cause of the very failure for which he imprisoned him.  Now what was the conduct of Mr. Hastings as judge?  He has two persons before him:  the one in the ostensible care of the revenue of the country; the other his own agent, acting under his authority.  The first is accused by the second of default in his payments; the latter is complained of by the former, who says that the occasion of the accusation had been furnished by him, the accuser.  The judge, instead of granting redress, dismisses the complaints against Mr. Markham with reprehension, and sends the complainant to rot in prison, without making one inquiry, or giving himself the trouble of stating to Mr. Markham the complaints against him, and desiring him to clear himself from them.  My Lords, if there were nothing but this to mark the treacherous and perfidious nature of his conduct, this would be sufficient.

In this state of things, Mr. Hastings thus writes.

“To Mr. Markham.  The measures which you have taken with Baboo Durbege Sing are perfectly right and proper, so far as they go; and we now direct that you exact from him, with the utmost rigor, every rupee of the collections which it shall appear that he has made and not brought to account, and either confine him at Benares, or send him prisoner to Chunar, and keep him in confinement until he shall have discharged the whole of the amount due from him.”

He here employs the very person against whom the complaint is made to imprison the complainant.  He approves the conduct of his agent without having heard his defence, and leaves him, at his option, to keep his victim a prisoner at Benares, or to imprison him in the fortress of Chunar, the infernal place to which he sends the persons whom he has a mind to extort money from.

Your Lordships will be curious to know how this debt of Durbege Sing stood at the time of his imprisonment.  I will state the matter to your Lordships briefly, and in plain language, referring you for the particulars of the account to the papers which are in your Minutes.  It appears from them, that, towards the end of the yearly account in 1782, a kist or payment of eight lacs (about 80,000_l._), the balance of the annual tribute, was due.  In part of this kist, Durbege Sing paid two lacs (20,000_l._).  Of the remaining six lacs (60,000_l._), the outstanding debts in the country due to the revenue, but not collected by the Naib, amounted to four lacs (40,000_l._).  Thus far the account is not controverted by the accusing party.  But Mr. Markham asserts that he shall be able to prove that the Naib had also actually received the other two lacs (20,000_l._), and consequently was an actual defaulter to that amount, and had, upon the whole, suffered the annual tribute to fall six lacs in arrear.  The Naib denies the receipt of