§ MR. SMOLLETTsaid, he desired to ask the Secretary of State for India, if he will consent to lay upon the Table of the House a Copy of a Despatch from the Governor General of India, dated the 14th day of November, 1855, and Copies of Letters from the Government of Madras, respectively dated the 12th day of October, the 20th day of November, and the 4th day of December, 1855, reporting the death of His Highness the Nawaub of the Carnatic, on the 7th day of October, 1855; and Copy of a Despatch from the Court of Directors of the East India Company replying to these communications, announcing that the dignity of the Nabobs of the Carnatic had expired, and that the treaties which secured the rights and title of the family of the Nabob were at an end? The hon. Gentleman proceeded to say he had an allegation to bring forward, and it was this, that the provisions of the treaty entered into sixty years ago, and scrupulously carried out for fifty-six years, had at length been wantonly violated. The late Nawaub of the Carnatic, having died in 1855, his uncle made application to be permitted to attend the funeral as his recognized successor. To that request a distinct refusal was given, and at the same time a significant intimation was made to him that the Government would take the means to prevent any one from assuming the title and rank of Nawaub. A day or two afterwards a written application was made to know if the Government of Madras intended to allow the provisions of the treaties of 1792 and 1801 to be carried out, and to acknowledge the uncle of the Nawaub. To that application an answer was returned, that the Government were resolved not to acknowledge the uncle; but they said they would send all the facts to England by the next mail, although they never informed the Nawaub what recommendations they intended to make. After a year's delay an answer arrived, the purport of which was that the treaty was personal to the late Nawaub, and that he being dead, the treaties were at an end, but that they might have an allowance of £10,000 a year from the Government. Now he did not hesitate to pronounce that decision arbitrary and tyrannical in the extreme. Who was the dethroned Prince? Why, he was the son of the very sovereign with whom the treaties were made, and who died 733 in 1819. The Governor General had decided on holding the title in abeyance, which he supposed was the diplomatic term for robbery, because the treaties were purely personal, and because the late Nawaub was allowed to hold the throne purely as a matter of grace. Now, a reference to the treaties themselves showed that they were not merely personal, and therefore he had no hesitation in pronouncing the whole transaction as most discreditable to those engaged in it.
§ SIR JAMES FERGUSSONprotested against an attack being thus made upon servants of the State without notice, and on a mere Motion for papers. There was no public man whose acts would bear inspection better than Lord Dalhousie; but for the present he should content himself with denying that there were any treaties in existence which entitled the uncle and heir of the late Nawaub of the Carnatic to succeed to his predecessor as an hereditary dignity.