y, in an account of a doubtful
transaction, and to a superior, was never done before.

"_Were_ your Honorable Court to question me upon these points, I _would_
answer, that the sums were taken for the Company's benefit, at times in
which the Company very much stood in need of them; that I _either_ chose
to conceal the first receipts from public curiosity by receiving bonds
for the amount, or _possibly acted without any studied design_ which my
memory could at this distance of time verify."[51]

He here professes not to be certain of the motives by which he was
himself actuated in so extraordinary a concealment, and in the use of
such extraordinary means to effect it; and as if the acts in question
were those of an absolute stranger, and not his own, he gives various
loose conjectures concerning the motive to them. He even supposes, in
taking presents contrary to law, and in taking bonds for them as his
own, contrary to what he admits to be truth and fact, that he might have
acted without any distinct motive at all, or at least such as his
memory could reach at that distance of time. That immense distance, in
the faintness of which his recollection is so completely lost as to set
him guessing at his motives for his own conduct, was from the 15th of
January, 1781, when the bonds at his own request were given, to the date
of this letter, which is the 22d of May, 1782,--that is to say, about
one year and four months.

As to the other sums, for which no bond was taken, the ground for the
difference in his explanation is still more extraordinary: he says, "I
did not think it worth my care to observe the same means with _the
rest_."[52] The rest of these sums, which were not worth his care, are
stated in his account to be greater than those he was so solicitous (for
some reason which he cannot guess) to cover under bonds: these sums
amount to near 53,000_l._; whereas the others did not much exceed
40,000_l._ For these actions, attended with these explanations, he
ventures to appeal to their (the Directors') breasts for a candid
interpretation, and "he assumes the freedom to add, that he thinks
himself, on _such_ a subject, and on _such_ an occasion, entitled to
it";[53] and then, as if he had performed some laudable exploit, in the
accompanying letter he glories in the integrity of his conduct; and
anticipating his triumph over injustice, and the applauses which at a
future time he seems confident he shall receive, says he,