in May, 1777, the said Warren Hastings granted to John Mackenzie a contract for the provision of opium, to continue three years, and without advertising for proposals. That this transaction was condemned by the Court of Directors, notwithstanding a clause had been inserted in that contract by which it was left open to the Court of Directors to annul the same at the expiration of the first or second year.
That, about the end of the year 1780, the said Warren Hastings, in contradiction to the order above mentioned, did take away the sale of the opium from the Board of Trade, though he disclaimed, at the same time, any intention of implying a censure on their management.
That in March, 1781, the said Warren Hastings did grant to Stephen Sulivan, son of Lawrence Sulivan, Chairman of the Court of Directors of the East India Company, a contract for the provision of opium, without advertising for proposals, and without even receiving any written proposals from him, the said Sulivan; that he granted this contract for four years, and at the request of the said Sulivan did omit that clause which was inserted in the preceding contract, and by which it was rendered liable to be determined by orders from the Company: the said Warren Hastings declaring, contrary to truth, that such clause was now unnecessary, as the Directors had approved the contract.
That the said Sulivan had been but a few months in Bengal when the above contract was given to him; that he was a stranger to the country, and to all the local commerce thereof, and therefore unqualified for the management of such a concern; and that the said Sulivan, instead of executing the contract himself, did, shortly after obtaining the same, assign it over to John Benn and others, and in consideration of such assignment did receive from the said Benn a great sum of money.
That from the preceding facts, as well as from sundry other circumstances of restrictions taken off (particularly by abolishing the office of inspector into the quality of the opium) and of beneficial clauses introduced, it appears that the said Warren Hastings gave this contract to the said Stephen Sulivan in contradiction to the orders of the Court of Directors, and without any regard to the interests of the India Company, for the sole purpose of creating an instant fortune for the said Sulivan at the expense of the India Company, without any claim of service or pretence of merit on his part, and without any apparent motive whatever, except that of securing or rewarding the attachment and support of his father, Lawrence Sulivan, a person of great authority and influence in the direction of the Company's affairs, and notoriously attached to and connected with the said Warren Hastings.
That the said Stephen Sulivan neither possessed nor pretended to possess any skill in the business of his contract; that he exerted no industry, nor showed or could show any exactness, in the performance of it, since he immediately sold the contract for a sum of money to another person, (for the sole purpose of which sale it must be presumed the same was given,) by which person another profit was to be made; and by that person the same was again sold to a third, by whom a third profit was to be made.
That the said Warren Hastings, at the very time when he engaged the Company in a contract for engrossing the whole of the opium produced in Bengal and Bahar in the ensuing four years on terms of such exorbitant profit to the contractor, affirmed, that "there was little prospect of selling the opium in Bengal at a reasonable price, and that it was but natural to suppose that the price of opium would fall, from the demand being lessened"; that in a letter dated the 5th of May, 1781, he informed the Directors, "that, owing to the indifferent state of the markets last season to the Eastward, and the very enhanced rates of insurance which the war had occasioned, they had not been able to dispose of the opium of the present year to so great an advantage as they expected, and that more than one half of it remained still in their warehouses." That the said Warren Hastings was guilty of a manifest breach of trust to his constituents and his employers in monopolizing, for their pretended use, an article of commerce for which he declared no purchasers had offered, and that there was little prospect of any offering, and the price of which, he said, it was but natural to suppose would fall.
That the said Warren Hastings, having, by his own act, loaded the Company with a commodity for which, either in the ordinary and regular course of public auction, or even by private contract, there was, as he affirmed, no sale, did, under pretence of finding a market for the same, engage the Company in an enterprise of great and certain expense, subject to a manifest risk, and full of disgrace to the East India Company, not only in their political character, as a great sovereign power in India, but in their commercial character, as an eminent and respectable body of merchants; and that the execution of this enterprise was accompanied with sundry other engagements with other persons, in all of which the Company's interest was constantly sacrificed to that of individuals favored by the said Warren Hastings.
That the said Warren Hastings first engaged in a scheme to export one thousand four hundred and sixty chests of opium, on the Company's account, on board a ship belonging to Cudbert Thornhill, half of which was to be disposed of in a coasting voyage, and the remainder in Canton. That, besides the freight and commission payable to the said Thornhill on this adventure, twelve pieces of cannon belonging to the Company were lent for arming the ship; though his original proposal was, that the ship should be armed at his expense. That this part of the adventure, depending for its success on a prudent and fortunate management of various sales and resales in the course of a circuitous voyage, and being exposed to such risk both of sea and enemy that all private traders had declined to be concerned in it, was particularly unfit for a great trading company, and could not be undertaken on their account with any rational prospect of advantage.
That the said Warren Hastings soon after engaged in another scheme for exporting two thousand chests of opium directly to China on the Company's account, and for that purpose accepted of an offer made by Henry Watson, the Company's chief engineer, to convey the same in a vessel of his own, and to deliver it to the Company's supra-cargoes. That, after the offer of the said Henry Watson had been accepted, a letter from him was produced at the board, in which he declared that he was unable to equip the ship with a proper number of cannon, and requested that he might be furnished with thirty-six guns from the Company's stores at Madras; with which request the board complied.
That it appears that George Williamson, the Company's auctioneer at Calcutta, having complained that by this mode of exporting the opium, which used to be sold by public auction, he lost his commission as auctioneer, the board allowed him to draw a commission of one per cent on all the opium which had been or was to be exported. That it appears that the contractor for opium (whose proper duties and emoluments as contractor ended with the delivery of the opium) was also allowed to draw a commission on the opium then shipping on the Company's account; but for what reason, or on what pretence, does not appear.
That the said Warren Hastings, in order to pay the said Stephen Sulivan in advance for the opium furnished or to be furnished by him in the first year of his contract, did borrow the sum of twenty lacs of rupees at eight per cent, or two hundred thousand pounds sterling, to be repaid by drafts to be drawn on the Company by their supra-cargoes in China, provided the opium consigned to them should arrive safe; but that, if the adventure failed, whether by the loss of the ships or otherwise, the subscribers to the above loan were to be repaid their capital and interest out of the Company's treasury in Bengal.
That the said Warren Hastings, having in this manner purchased a commodity for which he said there was no sale, and paid for it with money which he was obliged to borrow at a high interest, was still more criminal in his attempt, or pretended plan, to introduce it clandestinely into China. That the importation of opium into China is forbidden by the Chinese government; that the opium, on seizure, is burnt, the vessel that imports it confiscated, and the Chinese in whose possession it may be found for sale punished with death.
That the Governor-General and Council were well aware of the existence of these prohibitions and penalties, and did therefore inform the supra-cargoes in China, that the ship belonging to the said Henry Watson would enter the river at China as an armed ship, and would not be reported as bearing a cargo of opium, that being a contraband trade.
That,
