The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. III | Page 2

to some millions of sterling money. There is strong reason to suspect that the body of these debts is wholly fictitious, and was never created by money _bona fide_ lent. But even on a supposition that this vast sum was really advanced, it was impossible that the very reality of such an astonishing transaction should not cause some degree of alarm and incite to some sort of inquiry.
It was not at all seemly, at a moment when the Company itself was so distressed as to require a suspension, by act of Parliament, of the payment of bills drawn on them from India,--and also a direct tax upon every house in England, in order to facilitate the vent of their goods, and to avoid instant insolvency,--at that very moment, that their servants should appear in so flourishing a condition, as, besides ten millions of other demands on their masters, to be entitled to claim a debt of three or four millions more from the territorial revenue of one of their dependent princes.
The ostensible pecuniary transactions of the Nabob of Arcot with very private persons are so enormous, that they evidently set aside every pretence of policy which might induce a prudent government in some instances to wink at ordinary loose practice in ill-managed departments. No caution could be too great in handling this matter, no scrutiny too exact. It was evidently the interest, and as evidently at least in the power, of the creditors, by admitting secret participation in this dark and undefined concern, to spread corruption to the greatest and the most alarming extent.
These facts relative to the debts were so notorious, the opinion of their being a principal source of the disorders of the British government in India was so undisputed and universal, that there was no party, no description of men in Parliament, who did not think themselves bound, if not in honor and conscience, at least in common decency, to institute a vigorous inquiry into the very bottom of the business, before they admitted any part of that vast and suspicious charge to be laid upon an exhausted country. Every plan concurred in directing such an inquiry, in order that whatever was discovered to be corrupt, fraudulent, or oppressive should lead to a due animadversion on the offenders, and, if anything fair and equitable in its origin should be found, (nobody suspected that much, comparatively speaking, would be so found,) it might be provided for,--in due subordination, however, to the ease of the subject and the service of the state.
These were the alleged grounds for an inquiry, settled in all the bills brought into Parliament relative to India,--and there were, I think, no less than four of them. By the bill commonly called Mr. Pitt's bill, the inquiry was specially, and by express words, committed to the Court of Directors, without any reserve for the interference of any other person or persons whatsoever. It was ordered that they should make the inquiry into the origin and justice of these debts, as far as the materials in their possession enabled them to proceed; and where they found those materials deficient, they should order the Presidency of Fort St. George (Madras) to complete the inquiry.
The Court of Directors applied themselves to the execution of the trust reposed in them. They first examined into the amount of the debt, which they computed, at compound interest, to be 2,945,600_l._ sterling. Whether their mode of computation, either of the original sums or the amount on compound interest, was exact, that is, whether they took the interest too high or the several capitals too low, is not material. On whatever principle any of the calculations were made up, none of them found the debt to differ from the recital of the act, which asserted that the sums claimed were "very large." The last head of these debts the Directors compute at 2,465,680_l._ sterling. Of the existence of this debt the Directors heard nothing until 1776, and they say, that, "although they had repeatedly written to the Nabob of Arcot, and to their servants, respecting the debt, yet they _had never been able to trace the origin thereof, or to obtain any satisfactory information on the subject_."
The Court of Directors, after stating the circumstances under which the debts appeared to them to have been contracted, add as follows:--"For these reasons we should have thought it our duty to inquire very minutely into those debts, even if the act of Parliament had been silent on the subject, before we concurred in any measure for their payment. But with the positive injunctions of the act before us to examine into their nature and origin, we are indispensably bound to direct such an inquiry to be instituted." They then order the President and Council of Madras to