consequence; but it has produced a situation which with respect
to myself I regard as unfortunate, because it exposes me to the meanest
imputation from the occasion which the late Parliamentary Inquiries have
since furnished, but which were unknown when my letter was written, and
written in the necessary consequence of a promise made to that effect in
a former letter to your Honorable Committee, dated 20th January last.
However, to preclude the possibility of such reflections from affecting
me, I have desired Mr. Larkins, who was privy to the whole transaction,
to affix to the letter his affidavit of the date in which it was
written. I own I feel most sensibly the mortification of being reduced
to the necessity of using such precautions to guard my reputation from
dishonor. If I had at any time possessed that degree of confidence from
my immediate employers which they never withheld from the meanest of my
predecessors, I should have disdained to use these attentions. How I
have drawn on me a different treatment I know not; it is sufficient that
I have not merited it: and in the course of a service of thirty-two
years, and ten of these employed in maintaining the powers and
discharging the duties of the first office of the British government in
India, that Honorable Court ought to know whether I possess the
integrity and honor which are the first requisites of such a station. If
I wanted these, they have afforded me but too powerful incentives to
suppress the information which I now convey to them through you, and to
appropriate to my own use the sums which I have already passed to their
credit, by the unworthy, and, pardon me if I add, dangerous, reflections
which they have passed upon me for the first communication of this kind:
and your own experience will suggest to you, that there are persons who
would profit by such a warning.

Upon the whole of these transactions, which to you, who are accustomed
to view business in an official and regular light, may appear
unprecedented, if not improper, I have but a few short remarks to
suggest to your consideration.

If I appear in any unfavorable light by these transactions, I resign the
common and legal security of those who commit crimes or errors. I am
ready to answer every particular question that may be put against
myself, upon honor or upon oath.

The sources from which these reliefs to the public service have come
would never have yielded them to the Company publicly;