To the account of the 22d of May, of the indorsement, is added the declaration upon oath. But why any man need to declare upon oath that the money which he has fraudulently taken and concealed from another person is not his is the most extraordinary thing in the world. If he had a mind to have it placed to his credit as his own, then an oath would be necessary; but in this case any one would believe him upon his word. He comes, however, and says, "This is indorsed upon oath." Oath! before what magistrate? In whose possession were the bonds? Were they given up? There is no trace of that upon the record, and it stands for him to prove that they were ever given up, and in any hands but Mr. Larkins's and his own. So here are the bonds, begun in obscurity and ending in obscurity, ashes to ashes, dust to dust, corruption to corruption, and fraud to fraud. This is all we see of these bonds, till Mr. Larkins, to whom he writes some letter concerning them which does not appear, is called to read a funeral sermon over them.
My Lords, I am come now near the period of this class of Mr. Hastings's bribes. I am a little exhausted. There are many circumstances that might make me wish not to delay this business by taking up another day at your Lordships' bar, in order to go through this long, intricate scene of corruption. But my strength now fails me. I hope within a very short time, to-morrow or the next court-day, to finish it, and to go directly into evidence, as I long much to do, to substantiate the charge; but it was necessary that the evidence should be explained. You have heard as much of the drama as I could go through: bear with my weakness a little: Mr. Larkins's letter will be the epilogue to it. I have already incurred the censure of the prisoner; I mean to increase it, by bringing home to him the proof of his crimes, and to display them in all their force and turpitude. It is my duty to do it; I feel it an obligation nearest to my heart.
[8] See this letter in the Appendix to the Eighth and Sixteenth Charges, Vol. IX. pp. 319-325, in the present edition.
My Lords,--When I had the honor last to address you from this place, I endeavored to press this position upon your minds, and to fortify it by the example of the proceedings of Mr. Hastings,--that obscurity and inaccuracies in a matter of account constituted a just presumption of fraud. I showed, from his own letters, that his accounts were confused and inaccurate. I am ready, my Lords, to admit that there are situations in which a minister in high office may use concealment: it may be his duty to use concealment from the enemies of his masters; it may be prudent to use concealment from his inferiors in the service. It will always be suspicious to use concealment from his colleagues and coördinates in office; but when, in a money transaction, any man uses concealment with regard to them to whom the money belongs, he is guilty of a fraud. My Lords, I have shown you that Mr. Hastings kept no account, by his own confession, of the moneys that he had privately taken, as he pretends, for the Company's service, and we have but too much reason to presume for his own. We have shown you, my Lords, that he has not only no accounts, but no memory; we have shown that he does not even understand his own motives; that, when called upon to recollect them, he begs to guess at them; and that as his memory is to be supplied by his guess, so he has no confidence in his guesses. He at first finds, after a lapse of about a year and a half, or somewhat less, that he cannot recollect what his motives were to certain actions which upon the very face of them appeared fraudulent. He is called to an account some years after, to explain what they were, and he makes a just reflection upon it,--namely, that, as his memory did not enable him to find out his own motive at the former time, it is not to be expected that it would be clearer a year after. Your Lordships will, however, recollect, that in the Cheltenham letter, which is made of no perishable stuff, he begins again to guess; but after he has guessed and guessed again, and after he has gone through all the motives he can possibly assign for the action, he tells you he does not know whether those were his real motives, or whether he has not invented them since.