The situation of the Company, under this perpetual variation in the
system of their investment, is truly perplexing. The manner in which
they arrive at any knowledge of it is no less so. The letter to Lord
Macartney, by which the variation is discovered, was not intended for
transmission to the Directors. It was merely for the information of
those who were admitted to a share of the subscription at Madras. When
Mr. Hastings sent this information to those subscribers, he might well
enough have presumed an event to happen which did happen,--that is,
that a vessel might be dispatched from Madras to Europe: and indeed, by
that, and by every devisable means, he ought not only to have apprised
the Directors of this most material change in the plan of the
investment, but to have entered fully into the grounds and reasons of
his making it.
It appears to your Committee that the ships which brought to England the
plan of the 8th of April did not sail from Bengal until the 1st of May.
If the change had been in contemplation for any time before the 30th of
April, two days would have sufficed to send an account of it, and it
might have arrived along with the plan which it affected.
Pages:
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114