The
complainant offers to pay to the Company the forty thousand rupees which
were corruptly paid to these gentlemen, and to content himself with the
allowance of thirty-two thousand. Mr. Hastings was, if on any occasion
of his life, strongly called upon to bring this matter to the most
distinct issue; and Mr. Barwell, who supported his administration, and
as such ought to have been tender for his honor, was bound to help him
to get to the bottom of it, if his enemies should be ungenerous enough
to countenance such an accusation, without permitting it to be detected
and exposed. But the course they held was directly contrary. They began
by an objection to receive the complaint, in which they obstinately
persevered as far as their power went. Mr. Barwell was of opinion that
the Company's instructions to inquire into peculation were intended for
the public interests,--that it could not forward the public interests to
enter into these inquiries,--and that "he never would be a channel of
aspersing any character, while it cannot conduce to the good of
government.
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