The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke

before the board.

That, nevertheless, the said Hastings, professing not to recollect his said promise, did
neglect to write a formal letter to Lieutenant Anderson in favor of the said Ranna of Gohud,
and that the private letter, the extract of which the said Hastings did lay before the board on
the 21st of October, 1783, so far from directing any effectual interference in favor of the
said Ranna, or commanding his agent, the said James Anderson, to interpose the mediation
of the British government to procure "honorable terms" for the said Ranna, or even "safety
to his person and family," contains the bitterest invectives against him, and is expressive of
the satisfaction which the said Hastings acknowledges himself to have enjoyed in the
distresses of the said Ranna, the ally of the Company.

That the measures therein recommended appear rather to have been designed to satisfy
Mahdajee Sindia, and to justify the conduct of the British government in not having taken a
more active and a more hostile part against the said Ranna, than an intercession on his
behalf.

That, though no consideration of good faith or observance of treaties could induce the said
Hastings to incur the hazard of any hostile exertion of the British force for the defence or
the relief of the allies of the Company, yet in the said private letter he directed, that, in case
his mediation should be accepted, it should be made a specific condition, that, if the said
Ranna should take advantage of Sindia's absence to renew his hostilities, we ought, in that
case, on requisition, to invade the dominions of the Ranna.

That no beneficial effects could have been procured to the said Ranna by an offer of
mediation delayed till Sindia no longer wanted "our assistance to crush so fallen an

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