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Burke, Edmund, 1729-1797

"The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 08 (of 12)"


To these two accounts, thus essentially varying, he has added a
third,[34] varying at least as essentially from both. In his last or
third account, which is a statement of all the sums he has received in
an extraordinary manner, and confessed to be the Company's property, he
reverses the items of his first account, and, instead of allowing the
Company but one third and claiming two thirds for himself, he enters two
of the bonds, each for a lac of rupees, as belonging to the Company: of
the third bond, which appears so distinctly in the Consultations and in
the Treasury accounts, not one word is said; ten thousand pounds is
absorbed, sinks, and disappears at once, and no explanation whatsoever
concerning it is given; Mr. Hastings seems not yet to have decided to
whose account it ought to be placed. In this manner his debt to the
Company, or the Company's to him, is just what he thinks fit. In a
single article he has varied three times. In one account he states the
whole to be his own; in another he claims two thirds; in the last he
gives up the claim of the two thirds, and says nothing to the remaining
portion.


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