THE HISTORY CHAPTER XVI. LORD CORNWALLIS'S ADMINISTRATION-THE THIRD MYSORE WAR-1786-1793. Sir John Macpherson's administration, 1785. HASTINGS left the government in the hands of Mr., afterwards Sir John, Macpherson, who presided over it for twenty months. He came out to Madras at the age of twenty-two, as purser in one of the Company's ships, but soon after his arrival quitted the sea for more lucrative employment at the court of the Nabob of the Carnatic, where he obtained great consideration. Under his influence the Nabob was induced to make a direct appeal to the Minister in England, as the most effectual means of regaining his political independence, and throwing off the restraints of the Madras government. Mr. Macpherson was charged with this mission, and accredited by a letter to the Duke of Grafton, which gained little for his patron, but a Madras writership for his young agent. Soon after his arrival at the Presidency he obtained one of the most lucrative appointments in the service, that of military paymaster, but was expelled from it by Lord Pigot, in 1776, on the ground that he was still a partizan of the Nabob. With his usual sagacity, he persuaded the Nabob to make his will, and appoint the king of England his executor and the 2 WAR BETWEEN TIPPOO, THE NIZAM, [СПАР. guardian of his children-an office which was most injudiciously accepted. Mr. Macpherson, who returned to England as the representative of the Nabob, with a full purse, was not long in obtaining a seat in Parliament, and made himself so useful to the Minister by his eloquent pen and his servile vote, as to obtain the appointment of second member of Council at Calcutta. The war with the Mahrattas and Hyder had produced the same effect on the finances of India as the war which England had been waging with the North American colonies produced on her finances. Troops to the number of 70,000 had been maintained for several years in provinces the most remote from each other, and a debt had been accumulated to the extent of six crores of rupees. The army and civil establishments were fifty lacs of rupees in arrears, and the whole machinery of government was in a state of disorder. Mr. Macpherson applied himself with great energy to financial reform, and effected reductions exceeding a crore of rupees. He received thanks from the Court of Directors, and a baronetcy from the Crown; but it is not to be concealed that his two successors, Lord Cornwallis and Sir John Shore, considered his pretensions to economy, except with regard to the reduction of salaries, a mere delusion, and his whole administration a failure. Wars between Mahrattas, and the Nizam, 1786. The treaty of Mangalore left Tippoo with unimpaired resources, and augmented his arrogance. The ink was scarcely dry, when he wrote to his French allies at Pondicherry that he was only waiting for an opportunity of crushing the Nizam and the Mahrattas, and exterminating the English. His first act after the pacification was to seize 30,000 native Christians on the Malabar coast, and cause them to be circumcised. The Hindoos south of the Kistna were treated with the same violence, and 2,000 brahmins destroyed themselves to avoid the indignity. Of the population of Coorg, 70,000 of all ages and both sexes were ruthlessly driven off to Seringapatam. Tippoo then proceeded to demand the cession XVI.] AND THE PESHWA. 3 of Beejapore from the Nizam, on some frivolous pretext, and attacked the Mahratta garrison of Nurgoond, of which he obtained possession- by an act of perfidy. Nana Furnuvese, finding Tippoo a more dangerous neighbour than his father had been, proceeded to form an alliance with the Nizam early in 1786, for the conquest and partition of his whole territory. The allied army opened the campaign on the 1st of May, by the siege of Badamee, which surrendered before the end of the month. After various assaults and repulses, whick generally terminated to the advantage of Tippoo, he brought this campaign of nine months to an unexpected termination by a voluntary offer of peace. A treaty was accordingly concluded between the belligerents in April, 1787, by which Tippoo engaged to pay forty-five lacs of rupees of tribute, and to surrender many of the places he had captured. This sudden change of policy was subsequently explained by the great efficiency given to the military establishments of the Company by the new Governor-General, Lord Cornwallis, and which led Tippoo to suppose that the English were about to take part in the war against him. Lord Macarteny offered the GovernorGeneralship, 1786. Lord Macartney, who had taken Calcutta on his way to England, was detained there by severe illness, and was agreeably surprised on his recovery to receive the unsolicited offer of the Governor-Generalship, as a token of the estimation in which his services were held by Mr. Pitt and Mr. Dundas. Instead, however, of accepting the appointment, and taking the oaths and his seat in Council, he postponed the acceptance of it till he had an opportunity of conferring with the Ministry on the additional powers which he deemed necessary to impart dignity and efficiency to the office. He embarked therefore for England, and on his arrival submitted his views, which were in every respect judicious, to the Court of Directors and to the Prime Minister, by whom they were entertained with great complacency. But all his prospects were at once blighted when he proceeded farther to solicit such token of 4 NEW SYSTEM OF APPOINTMENT. [CHAP. the royal favour as should demonstrate that he entered upon this responsible office with the entire confidence of the. Ministers of the Crown, as well as of the Court of Directors. The request was not only in itself reasonable, but essential to the efficiency and vigour of the government. It was the absence of this support which had subjected the administration of Hastings to the greatest embarrassment. But Mr. Dundas, who had sustained the nomination of Lord Macarteny against a violent opposition in the Cabinet, took umbrage that "he did not rather repose his future fortunes in our hands than make it the subject of a sine qua non preliminary." Within three days of the receipt of this request, Lord Cornwallis was gazetted Governor-General of India. Change in the system of government. The government of the Company's affairs in India had hitherto been entrusted to one of their own servants, on the ground that local experience was the most important qualification for the office. But this principle of selection, though well suited to the requirements of a factory, was ill adapted to the government of an empire The advantage arising from this knowledge of the country' and the people, however great, was found to be over-balanced by the trammels of local associations, and the difficulty of exercising due control over those who had previously been in the position of equals. The transcendant ability of Hastings himself had been too often neutralized by these connections, and he had been obliged to meet the cabals and intrigues which beset him in the Council chamber by compromises, which weakened the authority of government, and strengthened abuses. These considerations induced the Ministry to place the government in the hands of a nobleman of elevated rank and high character, and unfettered by any local ties. The choice fell on Lord Cornwallis, who had filled several posts of importance, both military and diplomatic, and who stood so high in the estimation of the country that even the surrender of a British army to Washington at Yorktown, which decided the question of American independence, XVI.] LORD CORNWALLIS GOVERNOK-GENERAL. 5 had not shaken his credit. It was within eight months of that disaster, that his name was mentioned by Mr. Dundas, in reference to the future government of India, and was received with great satisfaction by both parties in the House of Commons, who united in paying homage to his talents. He was appointed Governor-General in February, 1786, and reached Calcutta in the month of September. Thus, by the singular caprice of circumstances, the man who had lost America was sent out to govern India, and the man who had saved India was subjected to a prosecution for high crimes and misdemeanours. Lord Cornwallis's government commenced under the happiest auspices. He enjoyed the entire confidence of Mr. Pitt, and, more especially, of Mr. Dundas, the Indian Minister, who remarked in one of his letters, that they never before had a government in India and in England acting in perfect harmony, on principles of perfect purity and independence." The spirit of insubordination and faction which had deranged Hastings's administration was at once subdued by the dignity and firmness of Lord Cornwallis's character, and the current of public business began to run smoothly, as soon as he assumed the charge of it. 66 Correction of abuses, 1786-88. The first three years of his administration were devoted to the correction of abuses, to which it is necessary to advert more particularly, to indicate the progress of integrity in the public service. The Court of of Directors still continued to act on the old and vicious principle of "small salaries and large perquisites." The salaries came from their own treasury, which they guarded with the parsimony of a miser, the perquisites came from the people, and excited little observation, though they served to vitiate the whole system of government. Every man who returned to England rich was considered a rogue, and every man who came home poor was set down as a fool. Hastings made some effort to correct these abuses, but he had not sufficient official strength to stem the tide, and he was often obliged to allay opposition by the bribe of places and emoluments. The |