Page:The Marquess of Hastings, K.G..djvu/191

 CHAPTER IX

Foreign Relations; Internal Affairs; the great case of Palmer & Co

So much space has been necessarily taken up with the great questions which agitated Central India, that there is little room left in this short sketch of the administration of Lord Hastings to describe the other public transactions which took place during the period of his active rule. It is therefore only proposed to indicate a few of them as briefly as possible, dividing those that relate to foreign affairs from matters that concern internal policy, and thus to complete, it is hoped, a general view of the important events in the far East which took place at this time.

Without entering upon the details of the irritating disputes with which the Indian Government became involved with Burma, and which soon afterwards culminated in a war, it will perhaps be sufficient to mention here, that though Lord Hastings had considerable difficulty in maintaining peaceable relations with that country, yet he succeeded in doing so by the adoption of a firm and conciliatory attitude. He was exceedingly unwilling to provoke a quarrel, and during