The next point for your Lordships’ consideration is the evidence which he produces to prove the falsity of a paper written by himself.  Why, he himself is the sole evidence.  And how does he prove it?  Why, says he, “The reason of my writing that letter was this:  she had sent a person with me as an escort, and this person was desirous of receiving some proof that he had done his duty; and therefore I wrote a complaisant letter.  I meant nothing by it.  It was written merely to satisfy the mind of the man.”  Now is that the way in which formal and solemn letters, written upon great occasions to great people, are to be explained away?  If he had said nothing but “Your servant, such a one, has done his duty,” this explanation might pass.  But you see it has another complexion.  It speaks of his owing his life to her.  But if you admit that it is possible (for possibilities have an unknown extent) that he wrote such a letter at such a time and for such a purpose, and that the letter he wrote was false, and that the falsity of the letter is proved by his own testimony given in an affidavit which we have also reason to believe is false, your Lordships must at the same time admit that it is one of the most complex pieces of fraud and falsehood that, I believe, ever existed in the world.  But it is worse than all this.  There is another letter, written some days after, which I will read to you, and which he has not pretended to say was written only to testify that a messenger had executed his commission properly.

“Your gracious letter,” (he thus writes,) “in answer to the petition of your servant from Goondah, exalted me.  From the contents, I became unspeakably impressed with the honor it conferred.”

My Lords, this letter was not sent back by a messenger, in acknowledgment of his having done his duty, but was written in consequence of a correspondence in the nature of a petition for something or other which he made to the Begum.  That petition they have suppressed and sunk.  It is plain, however, that the petition had been sent, and was granted; and therefore the apology that is made for the former letter does not apply to this letter, which was written afterwards.

How, then, do they attempt to get rid of this difficulty?  Why, says Captain Gordon, “The Colonel Saib (by whom was meant Colonel Hannay) was not at Goondah, as stated in the letter, but at Succara, about eighteen miles from it, and therefore you ought not to pay much regard to this paper.”  But he does not deny the letter, nor was it possible for him to deny it.  He says Colonel Hannay was not there.  But how do we know whether Colonel Hannay was there or not?  We have only his own word for it.  But supposing he was not there, and that it was clearly proved that he was eighteen miles distant from it, Major Naylor was certainly with Captain Gordon at the time.  Might not his Persian scribe (for he does not pretend to say he wrote the letter himself)