d term of years the entire administration of India and the control
of an amount of patronage, estimated at not less than three hundred
thousand a year. This would enable them to oppose to the royal
prerogative of patronage an influence of like nature that brought with it
scarcely less than royal power. It is scarcely surprising that Pitt
should have employed all his eloquence and all his energy against what he
described as "the boldest and most unconstitutional measure ever
attempted, transferring at one stroke, in spite of all charters and
compacts, the immense patronage and influence of the East to Charles Fox
in or out of office."

[Sidenote: 1783--Henry Dundas and James Sayer]

If Pitt was the most conspicuous opponent of the India Bills, only less
conspicuous was a man who, though much Pitt's senior, was still young,
and who had already made himself prominent in the House of Commons, not
merely as a politician of general ability, but as one who took a special
interest in the affairs of India. Henry Dundas had been a characteristic
ornament of the Scottish bar, at once a skilful lawyer and an attractive
man of the world when, eight years before the existence of the Coalition
Ministry, he had come to St. Stephen's as Lord Advocate. An ambition to
shine as a statesman and an extraordinary power of application had
equipped him with the varied information that enabled him to assert
himself as an authority in many departments of national business. He had
early recognized the importance of India as a field for the powers of a
rising politician, and he had devoted to India and to Indian affairs that
tireless assiduity which permitted him at once to appear a convivial
spirit with the temperament and leisure of a man of pleasure, and a
master of profound and intricate subjects, the secret of which was only
known to those who were acquainted with his habit of early rising and his
indefatigable capacity for work in the time that he allotted to work.
When the public attention was {233} directed to India, towards the close
of the American war, and when a very general sense of indignation was
aroused by the mismanagement that lessened and that threatened to destroy
British influence in the East, Dundas came forward with the confident air
of one who was intimately acquainted with the complicated problem and who
believed himself perfectly competent to set all difficulties right. He
was the chairman of the select committee of