ivan,
thought proper to reverse the decree of his masters, and by his own
authority to recall it to the Council. By this step he became
responsible for all the consequences.

The Board of Trade appear, indeed, to merit reprehension for disposing
of the opium by private contract, as by that means the unerring standard
of the public market cannot be applied to it. But they justified
themselves by their success; and one of their members informed your
Committee that their last sale had been a good one: and though he
apprehended a fall in the next, it was not such as in the opinion of
your Committee could justify the Council-General in having recourse to
untried and hazardous speculations of commerce. It appears that there
must have been a market, and one sufficiently lively. They assign as a
reason of this assigned [alleged?] dulness of demand, that the Dutch had
been expelled from Bengal, and could not carry the usual quantity to
Batavia. But the Danes were not expelled from Bengal, and Portuguese
ships traded there: neither of them were interdicted at Batavia, and the
trade to the eastern ports was free to them. The Danes actually applied
for and obtained an increase of the quantity to which their purchases
had been limited; and as they asked, so they received this indulgence as
a great favor. It does not appear that they were not very ready to
supply the place of the Dutch. On the other hand, there is no doubt that
the Dutch would most gladly receive an article, convenient, if not
necessary, to the circulation of their commerce, from the Danes, or
under any name; nor was it fit that the Company should use an extreme
strictness in any inquiry concerning the necessary disposal of one of
their own staple commodities.

The supply of the Canton treasury with funds for the provision of the
next year's China investment was the ground of this plan. But the
Council-General appear still to have the particular advantage of Mr.
Sulivan in view,--and, not satisfied with breaking so many of the
Company's orders for that purpose, to make the contract an object
salable to the greatest advantage, were obliged to transfer their
personal partiality from Mr. Sulivan to the contract itself, and to hand
it over to the assignees through all their successions. When the opium
was delivered, the duties and emoluments of the contractor ended; but
(it appears from Mr. Williamson's letter, 18th October, 1781, and it is
not denied by the Council-Ge