ought to have been forborne, even if, to the fullest council, this specific measure had not been prohibited by the superior authority.  It was in this very situation that one man had the hardiness to conceive and the temerity to execute a total revolution in the form and the persons composing the government of a great kingdom.  Without any previous step, at one stroke, the whole constitution, of Bengal, civil and criminal, was swept away.  The counsellors were recalled from their provinces; upwards of fifty of the principal officers of government were turned out of employ, and rendered dependent on Mr. Hastings for their immediate subsistence, and for all hope of future provision.  The chief of each council, and one European collector of revenue, was left in each province.

But here, Sir, you may imagine a new government, of some permanent description, was established in the place of that which had been thus suddenly overturned.  No such thing.  Lest these chiefs, without councils, should be conceived to form the ground-plan of some future government, it was publicly declared that their continuance was only temporary and permissive.  The whole subordinate British administration of revenue was then vested in a committee in Calcutta, all creatures of the Governor-General; and the provincial management, under the permissive chief, was delivered over to native officers.

But that the revolution and the purposes of the revolution might be complete, to this committee were delegated, not only the functions of all the inferior, but, what will surprise the House, those of the supreme administration of revenue also.  Hitherto the Governor-General and Council had, in their revenue department, administered the finances of those kingdoms.  By the new scheme they are delegated to this committee, who are only to report their proceedings for approbation.

The key to the whole transaction is given in one of the instructions to the committee,—­“that it is not necessary that they should enter dissents.”  By this means the ancient plan of the Company’s administration was destroyed; but the plan of concealment was perfected.  To that moment the accounts of the revenues were tolerably clear,—­or at least means were furnished for inquiries, by which they might be rendered satisfactory.  In the obscure and silent gulf of this committee everything is now buried.  The thickest shades of night surround all their transactions.  No effectual means of detecting fraud, mismanagement, or misrepresentation exist.  The Directors, who have dared to talk with such confidence on their revenues, know nothing about them.  What used to fill volumes is now comprised under a few dry heads on a sheet of paper.  The natives, a people habitually made to concealment, are the chief managers of the revenue throughout the provinces.  I mean by natives such wretches as your rulers select out of them as most fitted for their purposes.  As a proper keystone to bind the arch, a native, one Gunga Govind Sing, a man turned out of his employment by Sir John Clavering for malversation in office, is made the corresponding secretary, and, indeed, the great moving principle of their new board.