Page:Warren Hastings (Trotter).djvu/55

Rh thought, for his countrymen in India, when a King's minister came out to thwart the best efforts of the Company's officers, by sowing dissension between the Madras Council and the prince who owed everything to their support. It was true that Lindsay's successor, Sir Robert Harland, had been enjoined to act in all harmony with the Madras Government. But the post he held at the court of Muhammad Alí gave him an authority likely to clash with that of the Company, whose 'honour and importance' were ostensibly his chief concern. Hastings saw nothing but mischief in the 'unnatural powers' entrusted to Harland, 'powers given not to extend the British dominion, or increase the honour of the nation, but surreptitiously stolen out for the visible purpose of oppressing the King's subjects and weakening the hands by which his influence is sustained in India.' The Company's affairs would never prosper till the King's minister was recalled. 'His presence can do no good. He alienates the Nabob from the Company, and is the original cause of all the distress which you have suffered and are like to suffer in your finances.'

This was written to Sir George Colebrooke, then Chairman of the Court of Directors. As a loyal servant to his masters, Hastings pleaded that the recall of Harland was the only way to untie the hands of the Madras Government for administering the affairs of the Karnatic, and securing to the Company their proper share of any advantage gained by