Page:The Marquess Cornwallis and the Consolidation of British Rule.djvu/110

104 rupees for the poor in the neighbourhood of the King's palace, transmitted by the Nawáb of Bengal, were all courteously but firmly refused. The Governor-General contented himself with sending the letters which accompanied these presents, to His Majesty the King of England.

Cornwallis's annoyance at the importunities of friends on behalf of candidates for office, breaks out amusingly in the letter to Lord Sydney already quoted: 'I think I told you how much Lord Ailesbury had distressed me by sending out Mr. Ritso. He is now writing in the secretary's office for 200 or 250 rupees per month, and I do not see the probability of my being able to give him anything better, without deserving to be impeached. I am still persecuted every day by people coming out with letters to me, who either get into jail or starve in the foreign Settlements. For God's sake do all in your power to stop this madness.' The Mr. Ritso alluded to was evidently employed in the secretariat as a copyist, or what used to be denominated a section-writer. Men of this class in later days were generally Eurasians, and they were remunerated by payment for so many words. Originally the rate was 750 words the rupee, but secretaries of an economical turn raised the rate of work to 1400 words.

It is pleasant after this denunciation of jobbery to turn to letters from Warren Hastings to the Governor-General. There are several allusions, in