Page:A Comprehensive History of India Vol 1.djvu/582

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lllS'JOIiV or INJMA.

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Admiral Watson. — From print after T Hudiion.

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A D. 1766. of all the presidencies wa,s, in fact, anniiiilated, an<l nothing but itH recovery could save the Company from ruin. It is lather strange that, with tliis fact before them, members of tiie Mudraa council were found to argue that the

claims of Salabut Jung sliouhl still have the preference, and that the chums of Bengal would be satisfied by sending a fifty-gun ship, and deputies to treat with the nabol*. Tliis view, absurd as it now appears, would iiave been adopted had not one of the mem- bers, possessed of sounder judgment and more enlarged experience, put the ) natter in its true light, and succeeded, after a long war of words, in bringing over the whole council to his opinion. The resolution ultimately adopted, and assented to by Admiral Watson, after obtaining the sanction of a council of war, was that the whole squadron, having on board an adequate land force, should proceed to Bengal.

Before the armament could sail several periDlexing points remained to be

([Uestions to i i o i

be solved, decided. Who should command the land forces ? What should be the extent of his authority both in acting and in negotiation? In what relation ought he to stand to the late governor and council of Calcutta? Was he to be subject to them, or to act independent of them? The last of these questions was first considered. The members of the late Calcutta council, not satisfied with wrangling at Fulta, had each sent separate lettei's to the Madras presidency, and deemed it necessary for their own exculpation to charge each other Mith the grossest misconduct. Taking the matter as they represented it, they had proved unworthy of the authority with which they had been invested, or were so divided by mutual animosities as to be incapable of exercising it. Still, what right had the Madras presidency to sit in judgment on them ( The three pre- sidencies were co-ordinate, and accoimtable only to the court of directors. So long, therefore, as the appointment of the Calcutta council remained uncancelled their jurisdiction within theiv presidenc}', notwithstanding the ^•iolence which had deprived them of it, was unquestionable. Mr. Pigott, the governor of Madras, proposed to solve the difficulty by proceeding in jjerson to Bengal with the united powers of commander-in-chief, and general representative of the Company in all other affairs. This was mere extravagance. How could his council invest him with such powers? and if he had them, what kind of a com- mander was he likely to prove, when his only qualification was the opinion he had of his own sufficiency? This proposal havinsr fivllen to the ground, a kind