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Python Programming
for Arduino

Develop practical Internet of Things prototypes

and applications with Arduino and Python

Pratik Desai

BIRMINGHAM - MUMBAI
Python Programming for Arduino

Copyright © 2015 Packt Publishing

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written
permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embedded in
critical articles or reviews.

Every effort has been made in the preparation of this book to ensure the accuracy
of the information presented. However, the information contained in this book is
sold without warranty, either express or implied. Neither the author, nor Packt
Publishing, and its dealers and distributors will be held liable for any damages
caused or alleged to be caused directly or indirectly by this book.

Packt Publishing has endeavored to provide trademark information about all of the
companies and products mentioned in this book by the appropriate use of capitals.
However, Packt Publishing cannot guarantee the accuracy of this information.

First published: February 2015

Production reference: 1230215

Published by Packt Publishing Ltd.

Livery Place
35 Livery Street
Birmingham B3 2PB, UK.

ISBN 978-1-78328-593-8

www.packtpub.com
 Credits

Author Project Coordinator

Pratik Desai Milton Dsouza

Reviewers Proofreaders
Juan Ramón González Safis Editing
Marco Schwartz Maria Gould
Josh VanderLinden Ameesha Green
Paul Hindle
Commissioning Editor
Saleem Ahmed Indexer
Mariammal Chettiyar
Acquisition Editor
James Jones Graphics
Abhinash Sahu
Content Development Editor
Priyanka Shah Production Coordinator
Manu Joseph
Technical Editor
Ankita Thakur Cover Work
Manu Joseph
Copy Editors
Jasmine Nadar
Vikrant Phadke
 About the Author

Pratik Desai, PhD, is the Principal Scientist and cofounder of a connected devices
start-up, Imbue Labs, where he develops scalable and interoperable architecture for
wearable devices and Internet of Things (IoT) platforms during the day. At night, he
leads the development of an open source IoT initiative, the Semantic Repository of
Things. Pratik has 8 years of research and design experience in various layers of the
IoT and its predecessor technologies such as wireless sensor networks, RFID, and
machine-to-machine (M2M) communication. His domains of expertise are the IoT,
Semantic Web, machine learning, robotics, and artificial intelligence.

Pratik completed his MS and PhD from Wright State University, Ohio, and
collaborated with the Ohio Center of Excellence in Knowledge-enabled Computing
(Kno.e.sis) during his doctoral research. His doctoral research was focused on
developing situation awareness frameworks for IoT devices, enabling semantic
web-based reasoning and handling the uncertainty associated with sensor data.

In his personal life, Pratik is an avid DIY junkie and likes to get hands-on experience
on upcoming technologies. He extensively expresses his views on technology and
shares interesting developments on Twitter (@chheplo).

I would like to dedicate the book to my parents, who were responsible

for building the foundation of what I am today. The book would not
have been possible without the patience, support, and encouragement
from my beloved wife, Sachi. I would also like to thank her for landing
her photography skills that were used in development of some of the
important images used in the book. I would also like to extend my
sincere gratitude to the editors for their valuable feedbacks.
 About the Reviewers

Juan Ramón González is a technical engineer of computer systems and lives

in Seville (Andalusia, Spain). For the past 9 years, he has been working on free
software-based projects for the regional Ministry of Education by using Python,
C++, and JavaScript, among other programming languages.

He is one of the main members of the CGA project in Andalusia (Centro de Gestión
Avanzado or Advanced Management Center), which manages a network with more
than 4,000 servers with Debian and 500,000 client computers that run Guadalinex,
a customized Ubuntu-based operating system for Andalusian schools.

As a software developer who has a passion for electronics and astronomy, he started
one of the first projects to control a telescope with the Arduino microcontroller by
using a computer with the Stellarium software and a driver developed with Python
to communicate with the telescope. This project's sources are published on the
collaborative platform GitHub. You can see the whole code and the prototype at
https://github.com/juanrmn/Arduino-Telescope-Control.
Marco Schwartz is an electrical engineer, entrepreneur, and blogger. He has
a master's degree in electrical engineering and computer science from Supélec,
France, and a master's degree in micro engineering from EPFL, Switzerland.

Marco has more than 5 years of experience working in the domain of electrical
engineering. His interests gravitate around electronics, home automation, the
Arduino and the Raspberry Pi platforms, open source hardware projects, and
3D printing.

He runs several websites around Arduino, including the Open Home Automation
website that is dedicated to building home automation systems using open
source hardware.

Marco has written a book on home automation and Arduino called Arduino Home
Automation Projects, Packt Publishing. He has also written a book on how to build
Internet of Things projects with Arduino called Internet of Things with the Arduino
Yun, Packt Publishing.

Josh VanderLinden is a lifelong technology enthusiast who has been programming

since the age of 10. He enjoys learning and becoming proficient with new technologies.
He has designed and built software, ranging from simple shell scripts to scalable
backend server software to interactive web and desktop user interfaces. Josh has been
writing software professionally using Python since 2007, and he has been building
personal Arduino-based projects since 2010.
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 Table of Contents
Preface 1
Chapter 1: Getting Started with Python and Arduino 7
Introduction to Python 7
Why we use Python 8
When do we use other languages 9
Installing Python and Setuptools 10
Installing Python 10
Linux 10
Ubuntu 11
Fedora and Red Hat 11
Windows 11
Mac OS X 14
Installing Setuptools 14
Linux 15
Windows 15
Mac OS X 16
Installing pip 16
Installing Python packages 17
The fundamentals of Python programming 18
Python operators and built-in types 19
Operators 20
Built-in types 20
Data structures 22
Lists 22
Tuples 24
Sets 25
Dictionaries 25
Controlling the flow of your program 25
The if statement 26
The for statement 26
The while statement 26
Table of Contents

Built-in functions 27
Conversions 27
Introduction to Arduino 29
History 29
Why Arduino? 29
Arduino variants 30
The Arduino Uno board 31
Installing the Arduino IDE 32
Linux 33
Mac OS X 33
Windows 33
Getting started with the Arduino IDE 34
What is an Arduino sketch? 34
Working with libraries 36
Using Arduino examples 37
Compiling and uploading sketches 38
Using the Serial Monitor window 40
Introduction to Arduino programming 41
Comments 41
Variables 41
Constants 42
Data types 42
Conversions 44
Functions and statements 44
The setup() function 45
The loop() function 45
The pinMode() function 45
Working with pins 46
Statements 46
Summary 47
Chapter 2: Working with the Firmata Protocol and
the pySerial Library 49
Connecting the Arduino board 50
Linux 50
Mac OS X 51
Windows 52
Troubleshooting 52
Introducing the Firmata protocol 53
What is Firmata? 54
Uploading a Firmata sketch to the Arduino board 54
Testing the Firmata protocol 57

[ ii ]
 Table of Contents

Getting started with pySerial 62

Installing pySerial 62
Playing with a pySerial example 63
Bridging pySerial and Firmata 65
Summary 66
Chapter 3: The First Project – Motion-triggered LEDs 67
Motion-triggered LEDs – the project description 68
The project goal 68
The list of components 69
The software flow design 70
The hardware system design 71
Introducing Fritzing – a hardware prototyping software 72
Working with the breadboard 73
Designing the hardware prototype 74
Testing hardware connections 77
Method 1 – using a standalone Arduino sketch 78
The project setup 78
The Arduino sketch 78
The setup() function 80
The loop() function 80
Working with custom Arduino functions 80
Testing 81
Troubleshooting 82
Method 2 – using Python and Firmata 82
The project setup 82
Working with Python executable files 83
The Python code 84
Working with pyFirmata methods 85
Working with Python functions 86
Testing 87
Troubleshooting 87
Summary 88
Chapter 4: Diving into Python-Arduino Prototyping 89
Prototyping 90
Working with pyFirmata methods 91
Setting up the Arduino board 91
Configuring Arduino pins 93
The direct method 94
Assigning pin modes 95
Working with pins 96
Reporting data 96
Manual operations 97

[ iii ]
Table of Contents

Additional functions 98
Upcoming functions 99
Prototyping templates using Firmata 99
Potentiometer – continuous observation from an analog input 99
Connections 100
The Python code 100
Buzzer – generating sound alarm pattern 102
Connections 102
The Python code 103
DC motor – controlling motor speed using PWM 105
Connections 105
The Python code 106
LED – controlling LED brightness using PWM 107
Connections 107
The Python code 108
Servomotor – moving the motor to a certain angle 109
Connections 110
The Python code 110
Prototyping with the I2C protocol 112
Arduino examples for I2C interfacing 114
Arduino coding for the TMP102 temperature sensor 114
Arduino coding for the BH1750 light sensor 117
PyMata for quick I2C prototyping 119
Interfacing TMP102 using PyMata 120
Interfacing BH1750 using PyMata 121
Useful pySerial commands 122
Connecting with the serial port 122
Reading a line from the port 123
Flushing the port to avoid buffer overflow 123
Closing the port 123
Summary 123
Chapter 5: Working with the Python GUI 125
Learning Tkinter for GUI design 126
Your first Python GUI program 127
The root widget Tk() and the top-level methods 128
The Label() widget 129
The Pack geometry manager 129
The Button() widget – interfacing GUI with Arduino and LEDs 130
The Entry() widget – providing manual user inputs 133
The Scale() widget – adjusting the brightness of an LED 135
The Grid geometry manager 137
The Checkbutton() widget – selecting LEDs 139
The Label() widget – monitoring I/O pins 141

[ iv ]
 Table of Contents

Remaking your first Python-Arduino project with a GUI 144

Summary 146
Chapter 6: Storing and Plotting Arduino Data 147
Working with files in Python 148
The open() method 148
The write() method 149
The close() method 149
The read() method 149
The with statement – Python context manager 150
Using CSV files to store data 151
Storing Arduino data in a CSV file 152
Getting started with matplotlib 155
Configuring matplotlib on Windows 156
Configuring matplotlib on Mac OS X 156
Upgrading matplotlib 157
Troubleshooting installation errors 157
Setting up matplotlib on Ubuntu 158
Plotting random numbers using matplotlib 158
Plotting data from a CSV file 160
Plotting real-time Arduino data 163
Integrating plots in the Tkinter window 166
Summary 168
Chapter 7: The Midterm Project – a Portable DIY Thermostat 169
Thermostat – the project description 169
Project background 170
Project goals and stages 170
The list of required components 171
Hardware design 174
Software flow for user experience design 176
Stage 1 – prototyping the thermostat 178
The Arduino sketch for the thermostat 178
Interfacing the temperature sensor 179
Interfacing the humidity sensor 179
Interfacing the light sensor 180
Using Arduino interrupts 180
Designing the GUI and plot in Python 181
Using pySerial to stream sensor data in your Python program 181
Designing the GUI using Tkinter 182
Plotting percentage humidity using matplotlib 184
Using button interrupts to control the parameters 185
Troubleshooting 186

[v]
Table of Contents

Stage 2 – using a Raspberry Pi for the deployable thermostat 187

What is a Raspberry Pi? 188
Installing the operating system and configuring the Raspberry Pi 189
What do you need to begin using the Raspberry Pi? 189
Preparing an SD card 190
The Raspberry Pi setup process 192
Using a portable TFT LCD display with the Raspberry Pi 194
Connecting the TFT LCD using GPIO 195
Configuring the TFT LCD with the Raspberry Pi OS 196
Optimizing the GUI for the TFT LCD screen 197
Troubleshooting 199
Summary 200
Chapter 8: Introduction to Arduino Networking 201
Arduino and the computer networking 202
Networking fundamentals 202
Obtaining the IP address of your computer 203
Windows 204
Mac OS X 205
Linux 206
Networking extensions for Arduino 208
Arduino Ethernet Shield 208
Arduino WiFi Shield 209
Arduino Yún 210
Arduino Ethernet library 210
The Ethernet class 211
The IPAddress class 212
The Server class 212
The Client class 212
Exercise 1 – a web server, your first Arduino network program 213
Developing web applications using Python 219
Python web framework – web.py 219
Installing web.py 219
Your first Python web application 220
Essential web.py concepts for developing complex web applications 221
Handling URLs 222
The GET and POST methods 222
Templates 223
Forms 224
Exercise 2 – playing with web.py concepts using the Arduino
serial interface 225
RESTful web applications with Arduino and Python 230
Designing REST-based Arduino applications 230
Working with the GET request from Arduino 231
The Arduino code to generate the GET request 231

[ vi ]
 Table of Contents

The HTTP server using web.py to handle the GET request 233
Working with the POST request from Arduino 234
The Arduino code to generate the POST request 234
The HTTP server using web.py to handle the POST request 235
Exercise 3 – a RESTful Arduino web application 236
The Arduino sketch for the exercise 237
The web.py application to support REST requests 238
Why do we need a resource-constrained messaging protocol? 239
MQTT – A lightweight messaging protocol 240
Introduction to MQTT 241
Mosquitto – an open source MQTT broker 242
Setting up Mosquitto 242
Getting familiar with Mosquitto 243
Getting started with MQTT on Arduino and Python 244
MQTT on Arduino using the PubSubClient library 244
Installing the PubSubClient library 245
Developing the Arduino MQTT client 245
MQTT on Python using paho-mqtt 247
Installing paho-mqtt 248
Using the paho-mqtt Python library 248
Exercise 4 – MQTT Gateway for Arduino 251
Developing Arduino as the MQTT client 252
Developing the MQTT Gateway using Mosquitto 254
Extending the MQTT Gateway using web.py 255
Testing your Mosquitto Gateway 256
Summary 258
Chapter 9: Arduino and the Internet of Things 261
Getting started with the IoT 262
Architecture of IoT web applications 263
Hardware design 266
The IoT cloud platforms 267
Xively – a cloud platform for the IoT 268
Setting up an account on Xively 268
Working with Xively 270
Alternative IoT platforms 273
ThingSpeak 273
Carriots 274
Developing cloud applications using Python and Xively 274
Interfacing Arduino with Xively 275
Uploading Arduino data to Xively 275
Downloading data to Arduino from Xively 277
Advanced code to upload and download data using Arduino 280
Python – uploading data to Xively 281
The basic method for sending data 282

[ vii ]
Table of Contents

Uploading data using a web interface based on web.py 283

Python – downloading data from Xively 284
The basic method for retrieving data from Xively 284
Retrieving data from the web.py web interface 285
Triggers – custom notifications from Xively 287
Your own cloud platform for the IoT 288
Getting familiar with the Amazon AWS platform 289
Setting up an account on AWS 290
Creating a virtual instance on the AWS EC2 service 292
Logging into your virtual instance 294
Creating an IoT platform on the EC2 instance 295
Installing the necessary packages on AWS 296
Configuring the security of the virtual instance 297
Testing your cloud platform 299
Summary 303
Chapter 10: The Final Project – a Remote Home
Monitoring System 305
The design methodology for IoT projects 306
Project overview 307
The project goals 307
The project requirements 308
Designing system architecture 309
The monitoring station 311
The control center 311
The cloud services 311
Defining UX flow 311
The list of required components 313
Defining the project development stages 315
Stage 1 – a monitoring station using Arduino 315
Designing the monitoring station 316
The Arduino sketch for the monitoring station 319
Publishing sensor information 319
Subscribing to actuator actions 320
Programming an interrupt to handle the press of a button 321
Testing 321
Stage 2 – a control center using Python and the Raspberry Pi 322
The control center architecture 322
The Python code for the control center 323
Creating the GUI using Tkinter 324
Communicating with the Mosquitto broker 325
Calculating the system's status and situation awareness 326
Communicating with Xively 327
Checking and updating the buzzer's status 328

[ viii ]
 Table of Contents

Testing the control center with the monitoring station 329

Setting up the control center on the Raspberry Pi 330
Stage 3 – a web application using Xively, Python, and
Amazon cloud service 332
Architecture of the cloud services 332
Python web application hosted on Amazon AWS 333
Testing the web application 335
Testing and troubleshooting 336
Extending your remote home monitoring system 338
Utilizing multiple monitoring stations 339
Extending sensory capabilities 339
Improving UX 341
Expanding cloud-based features 341
Improving intelligence for situation awareness 342
Creating an enclosure for hardware components 342
Summary 343
Chapter 11: Tweet-a-PowerStrip 345
Project overview 345
Project requirements 346
System architecture 346
Required hardware components 347
Relays 348
PowerSwitch Tail 349
User experience flow 350
Development and deployment stages 352
Stage 1 – a smart power strip with Arduino and relays 353
Hardware design 353
The Arduino code 354
Stage 2 – the Python code to process tweets 357
Python software flow 357
Setting up the Twitter application 359
The Python code 361
Testing and troubleshooting 363
Extending the project with additional features 364
Summary 365
Index 367

[ ix ]
 Preface
In the era of the Internet of Things (IoT), it has become very important to rapidly
develop and test prototypes of your hardware products while also augmenting them
using software features. The Arduino movement has been the front-runner in this
hardware revolution, and through its simple board designs it has made it convenient
for anyone to develop DIY hardware projects. The great amount of support that
is available through the open source community has made the difficulties that are
associated with the development of a hardware prototype a thing of the past. On
the software front, Python has been the crown jewel of the open source software
community for a significant amount of time. Python is supported by a huge amount
of libraries to develop various features, such as graphical user interfaces, plots,
messaging, and cloud applications.

This book tries to bring you the best of both hardware and software worlds to help you
develop exciting projects using Arduino and Python. The main goal of the book is to
assist the reader to solve the difficult problem of interfacing Arduino hardware with
Python libraries. Meanwhile, as a secondary goal, the book also provides you with
exercises and projects that can be used as blueprints for your future IoT projects.

The book has been designed in such a way that every successive chapter has increasing
complexity in terms of material that is covered and also more practical value. The
book has three conceptual sections (getting started, implementing Python features,
and network connectivity) and each section concludes with a practical project that
integrates the concepts that you learned in that section.

The theoretical concepts and exercises covered in the book are meant to give you
hands-on experience with Python-Arduino programming, while the projects are
designed to teach you hardware prototyping methodologies for your future projects.
However, you will still need extensive expertise in each domain to develop a
commercial product. In the end, I hope to provide you with sufficient knowledge
to jump-start your journey in this novel domain of the IoT.
Other documents randomly have
different content
European and Asiatic enemies, the power of our country in the East
had been greatly augmented. Benares was subjected; the Nabob
Vizier reduced to vassalage. That our influence had been thus
extended, nay, that Fort William and Fort St. George had not been
occupied by hostile armies, was owing, if we may trust the general
voice of the English in India, to the skill and resolution of Hastings.
His internal administration, with all its blemishes, gives him a title
to be considered as one of the most remarkable men in our history.
He dissolved the double government. He transferred the direction of
affairs to English hands. Out of a frightful anarchy, he educed at
least a rude and imperfect order. The whole organization by which
justice was dispensed, revenue collected, peace maintained
throughout a territory not inferior in population to the dominions of
Lewis the Sixteenth or of the Emperor Joseph, was formed and
superintended by him. He boasted that every public office, without
exception, which existed when he left Bengal, was his creation. It is
quite true that this system, after all the improvements suggested by
the experience of sixty years, still needs improvement, and that it
was at first far more defective than it now is. But whoever seriously
considers what it is to construct from the beginning the whole of a
machine so vast and complex as a government, will allow that what
Hastings effected deserves high admiration. To compare the most
celebrated European ministers to him seems to us as unjust as it
would be to compare the best baker in London with Robinson
Crusoe, who, before he could bake a single loaf, had to make his
plough and his harrow, his fences and his scarecrows, his sickle and
his flail, his mill and his oven.
The just fame of Hastings rises still higher, when we reflect that he
was not bred a statesman; that he was sent from school to a
counting-house; and that he was employed during the prime of his
manhood as a commercial agent, far from all intellectual society.
Nor must we forget that all, or almost all, to whom, when placed
at the head of affairs, he could apply for assistance, were persons
who owed as little as himself, or less than himself, to education. A
minister in Europe finds himself, on the first day on which he
commences his functions, surrounded by experienced public
servants, the depositaries of official traditions. Hastings had no such
help. His own reflection, his own energy, were to supply the place of
all Downing Street and Somerset House. Having had no facilities for
learning, he was forced to teach. He had first to form himself, and
then to form his instruments; and this not in a single department,
but in all the departments of the administration.
It must be added that, while engaged in this most arduous task,
he was constantly trammelled by orders from home, and frequently
borne down by a majority in council. The preservation of an Empire
from a formidable combination of foreign enemies, the construction
of a government in all its parts, were accomplished by him, while
every ship brought out bales of censure from his employers, and
while the records of every consultation were filled with acrimonious
minutes by his colleagues. We believe that there never was a public
man whose temper was so severely tried; not Marlborough, when
thwarted by the Dutch Deputies; not Wellington, when he had to
deal at once with the Portuguese Regency, the Spanish Juntas, and
Mr. Percival. But the temper of Hastings was equal to almost any
trial. It was not sweet; but it was calm. Quick and vigorous as his
intellect was, the patience with which He endured the most cruel
vexations, till a remedy could be found, resembled the patience of
stupidity. He seems to have been capable of resentment, bitter and
long-enduring; yet his resentment so seldom hurried him into any
blunder, that it may be doubted whether what appeared to be
revenge was any thing but policy.
The effect of this singular equanimity was that he always had the
full command of all the resources of one of the most fertile minds
that ever existed. Accordingly no complication of perils and
embarrassments could perplex him. For every difficulty he had a
contrivance ready; and, whatever may be thought of the justice and
humanity of some of his contrivances, it is certain that they seldom
failed to serve the purpose for which they were designed.
 Together with this extraordinary talent for devising expedients,
Hastings possessed, in a very high degree, another talent scarcely
less necessary to a man in his situation; we mean the talent for
conducting political controversy. It is as necessary to an English
statesman in the East that he should be able to write, as it is to a
minister in this country that he should be able to speak. It is chiefly
by the oratory of a public man here that the nation judges of his
powers. It is from the letters and reports of a public man in India
that the dispensers of patronage form their estimate of him. In each
case, the talent which receives peculiar encouragement is
developed, perhaps at the expense of the other powers. In this
country, we sometimes hear men speak above their abilities. It is not
very unusual to find gentlemen in the Indian service who write
above their abilities. The English politician is a little too much of a
debater; the Indian politician a little too much of an essayist.
Of the numerous servants of the Company who have distinguished
themselves as framers of minutes and despatches, Hastings stands
at the head. He was indeed the person who gave to the official
writing of the Indian governments the character which it still retains.
He was matched against no common antagonist. But even Francis
was forced to acknowledge, with sullen and resentful candour, that
there was no contending against the pen of Hastings. And, in truth,
the Governor-General’s power of making out a case, of perplexing
what it was inconvenient that people should understand, and of
setting in the clearest point of view whatever would bear the light,
was incomparable. His style must be praised with some reservation.
It was in general forcible, pure, and polished; but it was sometimes,
though not often, turgid, and, on one or two occasions, even
bombastic. Perhaps the fondness of Hastings for Persian literature
may have tended to corrupt his taste.
And, since we have referred to his literary tastes, it would be most
unjust not to praise the judicious encouragement which, as a ruler,
he gave to liberal studies and curious researches. His patronage was
extended, with prudent generosity, to voyages, travels, experiments,
publications. He did little, it is true, towards introducing into India
the learning of the West. To make the young natives of Bengal
familiar with Milton and Adam Smith, to substitute the geography,
astronomy, and surgery of Europe for the dotage of the Brahminical
Superstition, or for the imperfect science of ancient Greece
transfused through Arabian expositions, this was a scheme reserved
to crown the beneficent administration of a far more virtuous rider.
Still it is impossible to refuse high commendation to a man who,
taken from a ledger to govern an empire, overwhelmed by public
business, surrounded by people as busy as himself, and separated
by thousands of leagues from almost all literary society, gave, both
by his example and by his munificence, a great impulse to learning.
In Persian and Arabic literature he was deeply skilled. With the
Sanscrit he was not himself acquainted; but those who first brought
that language to the knowledge of European students owed much to
his encouragement. It was under his protection that the Asiatic
Society commenced its honourable career. That distinguished body
selected him to be its first president; but, with excellent taste and
feeling, he declined the honour in favour of Sir William Jones. But
the chief advantage which the students of Oriental letters derived
from his patronage remains to be mentioned. The Pundits of Bengal
had always looked with great jealousy on the attempts of foreigners
to pry into those mysteries which were locked up in the sacred
dialect. The Brahminical religion had been persecuted by the
Mahommedans. What the Hindoos knew of the spirit of the
Portuguese government might warrant them in apprehending
persecution from Christians. That apprehension, the wisdom and
moderation of Hastings removed. He was the first foreign ruler who
succeeded in gaining the confidence of the hereditary priests of
India, and who induced them to lay open to English scholars the
secrets of the old Brahminical theology and jurisprudence. It is
indeed impossible to deny that, in the great art of inspiring large
masses of human beings with confidence and attachment, no ruler
ever surpassed Hastings. If he had made himself popular with the
English by giving up the Bengalees to extortion and oppression, or if,
on the other hand, he had conciliated the Bengalees and alienated
the English, there would have been no cause for wonder. What is
peculiar to him is that, being the chief of a small band of strangers,
who exercised boundless power over a great indigenous population,
he made himself beloved both by the subject many and by the
dominant few. The affection felt for him by the civil service was
singularly ardent and constant. Through all his disasters and perils,
his brethren stood by him with steadfast loyalty. The army, at the
same time, loved him as armies have seldom loved any but the
greatest chiefs who have led them to victory. Even in his disputes
with distinguished military men, he could always count on the
support of the military profession. While such was his empire over
the hearts of his countrymen, he enjoyed among the natives a
popularity, such as other governors have perhaps better merited, but
such as no other governor has been able to attain, He spoke their
vernacular dialects with facility and precision. He was intimately
acquainted with their feelings and usages. On one or two occasions,
for great ends, he deliberately acted in defiance of their opinion; but
on such occasions he gained more in their respect than he lost in
their love. In general, he carefully avoided all that could shock their
national or religious prejudices. His administration was indeed in
many respects faulty; but the Bengalee standard of good
government was not high. Under the Nabobs, the hurricane of
Mahratta cavalry had passed annually over the rich alluvial plain. But
even the Mahratta shrank from a conflict with the mighty children of
the sea; and the immense rice harvests of the Lower Ganges were
safely withered in, under the protection of the English sword. The
first English conquerors had been more rapacious and merciless
even than the Mahrattas; but that generation had passed away.
Defective as was the police, heavy as were the public burdens, it is
probable that the oldest man in Bengal could not recollect a season
of equal security and prosperity. For the first time within living
memory, the province was placed under a government strong
enough to prevent others from robbing, and not inclined to play the
robber itself. These things inspired good-will. At the same time, the
constant success of Hastings and the manner in which he extricated
himself from every difficulty made him an object of superstitious
admiration; and the more than regal splendour which he sometimes
displayed dazzled a people who have much in common with children.
Even now, alter the lapse of more than fifty years, the natives of
India still talk of him as the greatest of the English: and nurses sing
children to sleep with a jingling ballad about the fleet horses and
richly caparisoned elephants of Sahib Warren Hostein.
The gravest offence of which Hastings was guilty did not affect his
popularity with the people of Bengal; for those offences were
committed against neighbouring states. Those offences, as our
readers must have perceived, we are not disposed to vindicate; yet,
in order that the censure may be justly apportioned to the
transgression, it is fit that the motive of the criminal should be taken
into consideration. The motive which prompted the worst acts of
Hastings was misdirected and ill-regulated public spirit. The rules of
justice, the sentiments of humanity, the plighted faith of treaties,
were in his view as nothing, when opposed to the immediate interest
of the state. This is no justification, according to the principles either
of morality, or of what we believe to be identical with morality,
namely, far-sighted policy. Nevertheless the common sense of
mankind, which in questions of this sort seldom goes far wrong, will
always recognize a distinction between crimes which originate in an
inordinate zeal for the commonwealth, and crimes which originate in
selfish cupidity. To the benefit of this distinction Hastings is fairly
entitled. There is, we conceive, no reason to suspect that the Rohilla
war, the revolution of Benares, or the spoliation of the Princesses of
Oude, added a rupee to his fortune. We will not affirm that, in all
pecuniary dealings, he showed that punctilious integrity, that dread
of the faintest appearance of evil, which is now the glory of the
Indian civil service. But when the school in which he had been
trained and the temptations to which he was exposed are
considered, we are more inclined to praise him for his general
uprightness with respect to money, than rigidly to blame him for a
few transactions which would now be called indelicate and irregular,
but which even now would hardly be designated as corrupt. A
rapacious man he certainly was not. Had he been so, he would
infallibly have returned to his country the richest subject in Europe.
We speak within compass, when we say that, without applying any
extraordinary pressure he might easily have obtained from the
reminders of the Company’s provinces and from neighbouring
princes, in the course of thirteen years, more than three millions
sterling, and might have outshone the splendour of Carlton House
and of the Palais Royal, He brought home a fortune such as a
Governor-General, fond of state, and careless of thrift, might easily,
during so long a tenure of office, save out of his legal salary. Mrs.
Hastings, we are afraid, was less scrupulous. It was generally
believed that she accepted presents with great alacrity, and that she
thus formed, without the connivance of her husband, a private hoard
amounting to several lacs of rupees. We are the more inclined to
give credit to this story, because Mr. Gleig, who cannot but have
heard it, does not, as far as we have observed, notice or contradict
it.
The influence of Mrs. Hastings over her husband was indeed such
that she might easily have obtained much larger sums than she was
ever accused of receiving. At length her health began to give way;
and the Governor-General, much against his mill, was compelled to
send her to England. He seems to have loved her with that love
which is peculiar to men of strong minds, to men whose affection is
not easily won or widely diffused. The talk of Calcutta ran for some
time on the luxurious manner in which he fitted up the round-house
of an Indiaman for her accommodation, on the profusion of sandal-
wood and carved ivory which adorned her cabin, and on the
thousands of rupees which had been expended in order to procure
for her the society of an agreeable female companion during the
voyage. We may remark here that the letters of Hastings to his wife
are exceedingly characteristic. They are tender, and full of
indications of esteem and confidence; but, at the same time, a little
more ceremonious than is usual in so intimate a relation. The
solemn courtesy with which he compliments “his elegant Marian”
reminds us now and then of the dignified air with which Sir Charles
Grandison bowed over Miss Byron’s hand in the cedar parlour.
 After some months, Hastings prepared to follow his wife to
England. When it was announced that he was about to quit his
office, the feeling of the society which he had so long governed
manifested itself by many signs. Addresses poured in from
Europeans and Asiatics, from civil functionaries, soldiers and traders.
On the day on which he delivered up the keys of office, a crowd of
friends and admirers formed a lane to the quay where He embarked.
Several barges escorted him far down the river; and some attached
friends refused to quit him till the low coast of Bengal was fading
from the view, and till the pilot was leaving the ship.
Of his voyage little is known except that he amused himself with
books and with his pen; and that, among the compositions by which
he beguiled the tediousness of that long leisure, was a pleasing
imitation of Horace’s Otiam Divos rogat. This little poem was
inscribed to Mr. Shore, afterwards Lord Teignmouth, a man of whose
integrity, humanity, and honour, it is impossible to speak too highly,
but who, like some other excellent members of the civil service,
extended to the conduct of his friend Hastings an indulgence of
which his own conduct never stood in need.
The voyage was, for those times, very speedy. Hastings was little
more than four months on the sea. In June, 1785, he landed at
Plymouth, posted to London, appeared at Court, paid his respects in
Leadenhall Street, and then retired with his wife to Cheltenham.
He was greatly pleased with his reception. The King treated him
with marked distinction. The Queen, who had already incurred much
censure on account of the favour which, in spite of the ordinary
severity of her virtue, she had shown to the “elegant Marian,” was
not less gracious to Hastings. The Directors received him in a solemn
sitting; and their chairman read to him a vote of thanks which they
had passed without one dissentient voice. “I find myself,” said
Hastings, in a letter written about a quarter of a year after his arrival
in England, “I find myself everywhere, and universally, treated with
evidences, apparent even to my own observation, that I possess the
good opinion of my country.”
 The confident and exulting tone of his correspondence about this
time is the more remarkable, because he had already received ample
notice of the attack which was in preparation. Within a week after he
landed at Plymouth, Burke gave notice in the House of Commons of
a motion seriously affecting a gentleman lately returned from India.
The session, however, was then so far advanced, that it was
impossible to enter on so extensive and important a subject.
Hastings, it is clear, was not sensible of the danger of his position.
Indeed that sagacity, that judgment, that readiness in devising
expedients, which had distinguished him in the East, seemed now to
have forsaken him; not that his abilities were at all impaired; not
that he was not still the same man who had triumphed over Francis
and Nuncomar, who had made the Chief Justice and the Nabob
Vizier his tools, who had deposed Cheyte Sing, and repelled Hyder
Ali. But an oak, as Mr. Grattan finely said, should not be transplanted
at fifty. A man who, having left England when a boy, returns to it
after thirty or forty years passed in India, will find, be his talents
what they may, that he has much both to learn and to unlearn
before he can take a place among English statesmen. The working
of a representative system, the war of parties, the arts of debate,
the influence of the press, are startling novelties to him. Surrounded
on every side by new machines and new tactics, he is as much
bewildered as Hannibal would have been at Waterloo, or
Themistocles at Trafalgar. His very acuteness deludes him. His very
vigour causes him to stumble. The more correct his maxims, when
applied to the state of society to which he is accustomed, the more
certain they are to lead him astray. This was strikingly the case with
Hastings. In India he had a bad band; but he was master of the
game, and he won every stake. In England he held excellent cards,
if he had known how to play them; and it was chiefly by his own
errors that he was brought to the verge of ruin.
Of all his errors the most serious was perhaps the choice of a
champion. Clive, in similar circumstances, had made a singularly
happy selection. He put himself into the bands of Wedderburn,
afterwards Lord Loughborough, one of the few great advocates who
have also been great in the House of Commons. To the defence of
Clive, therefore, nothing was wanting, neither learning nor
knowledge of the world, neither forensic acuteness nor that
eloquence which charms political assemblies. Hastings intrusted his
interests to a very different person, a major in the Bengal army,
named Scott. This gentleman had been sent over from India some
time before as the agent of the Governor-General. It was rumoured
that his services were rewarded with Oriental munificence; and we
believe that He received much more than Hastings could
conveniently spare. The Major obtained a seat in Parliament, and
was there regarded as the organ of his employer. It was evidently
impossible that a gentleman so situated could speak with the
authority which belongs to an independent position. Nor had the
agent of Hastings the talents necessary for obtaining the ear of an
assembly which, accustomed to listen to great orators, had naturally
become fastidious. He was always on his legs; he was very tedious;
and he had only one topic, the merits and wrongs of Hastings.
Everybody who knows the House of Commons will easily guess what
followed. The Major was soon considered as the greatest bore of his
time. His exertions were not confined to Parliament. There was
hardly a day on which the newspapers did not contain some puff
upon Hastings, signed Asiaticus or Bengalensis, but known to be
written by the indefatigable Scott; and hardly a month in which
some bulky pamphlet on the same subject, and from the same pen,
did not pass to the trunkmakers and the pastrycooks. As to this
gentleman’s capacity for conducting a delicate question through
Parliament, our readers will want no evidence beyond that which
they will find in letters preserved in these volumes. We will give a
single specimen of his temper and judgment. He designated the
greatest man then living as “that reptile Mr. Burke.”
In spite, however, of this unfortunate choice, the general aspect of
affairs was favourable to Hastings. The King was on his side. The
Company and its servants were zealous in his cause. Among public
men he had many ardent friends. Such were Lord Mansfield, who
had outlived the vigour of his body, but not that of his mind; and
Lord Lansdowne, who, though unconnected with any party, retained
the importance which belongs to great talents and knowledge. The
ministers were generally believed to be favourable to the late
Governor-General. They owed their power to the clamour which had
been raised against Mr. Fox’s East India Bill. The authors of that bill,
when accused of invading vested rights, and of setting up powers
unknown to the constitution, had defended themselves by pointing
to the crimes of Hastings, and by arguing that abuses so
extraordinary justified extraordinary measures. Those who, by
opposing that bill, had raised themselves to the head of affairs,
would naturally be inclined to extenuate the evils which had been
made the plea for administering so violent a remedy; and such, in
fact, was their general disposition. The Lord Chancellor Thurlow, in
particular, whose great place and force of intellect gave him a weight
in the government inferior only to that of Mr. Pitt, espoused the
cause of Hastings with indecorous violence. Mr. Pitt, though he had
censured many parts of the Indian system, had studiously abstained
from saying a word against the late chief of the Indian government.
To Major Scott, indeed, the young minister had in private extolled
Hastings as a great, a wonderful man, who had the highest claims
on the government. There was only one objection to granting all
that so eminent a servant of the public could ask. The resolution of
censure still remained on the journals of the House of Commons.
That resolution was, indeed, unjust; but, till it was rescinded, could
the minister advise the King to bestow any mark of approbation on
the person censured? If Major Scott is to be trusted, Mr. Pitt declared
that this was the only reason which prevented the advisers of the
Crown from conferring a peerage on the late Governor-General. Mr.
Dundas was the only important member of the administration who
was deeply committed to a different view of the subject. He had
moved the resolution which created the difficulty; but even from him
little was to be apprehended. Since he had presided over the
committee on Eastern affairs, great changes had taken place. He
was surrounded by new allies; he had fixed his hopes on new
objects; and whatever may have been his good qualities,—and he
had many,—flattery itself never reckoned rigid consistency in the
number.
From the Ministry, therefore, Hastings had every reason to expect
support; and the Ministry was very powerful. The Opposition was
loud and vehement against him. But the Opposition, though
formidable from the wealth and influence of some of its members,
and from the admirable talents and eloquence of others, was
outnumbered in parliament, and odious throughout the country. Nor,
as far as we can judge, was the Opposition generally desirous to
engage in so serious an undertaking as the impeachment of an
Indian Governor. Such an impeachment must last for years. It must
impose on the chiefs of the party an immense load of labour. Yet it
could scarcely, in any manner, affect the event of the great political
game. The followers of the coalition were therefore more inclined to
revile Hastings than to prosecute him. They lost no opportunity of
coupling his name with the names of the most hateful tyrants of
whom history makes mention. The wits of Brooks’s aimed their
keenest sarcasms both at his public and at his domestic life. Some
fine diamonds which he had presented, as it was rumoured, to the
royal family, and a certain richly carved ivory bed which the Queen
had done him the honour to accept from him, were favourite
subjects of ridicule. One lively poet proposed, that the great acts of
the fair Marian’s present husband should be immortalized by the
pencil of his predecessor; and that Imhoff should be employed to
embellish the House of Commons with paintings of the bleeding
Rohillas, of Nuncomar swinging, of Cheyte Sing letting himself down
to the Ganges. Another, in an exquisitely humorous parody of Virgil’s
third eclogue, propounded the question, what that mineral could be
of which the rays had power to make the most austere of princesses
the friend of a wanton. A third described, with gay malevolence, the
gorgeous appearance of Mrs. Hastings at St. James’s, the galaxy of
jewels, torn from Indian Begums, which adorned her head dress, her
necklace gleaming with future votes, and the depending questions
that shone upon her ears. Satirical attacks of this description, and
perhaps a motion for a vote of censure, would have satisfied the
great body of the Opposition. But there were two men whose
indignation was not to be so appeased, Philip Francis and Edmund
Burke.
Francis had recently entered the House of Commons, and had
already established a character there for industry and ability. He
laboured indeed under one most unfortunate defect, want of fluency.
But he occasionally expressed himself with a dignity and energy
worthy of the greatest orators. Before he had been many days in
parliament, he incurred the bitter dislike of Pitt, who constantly
treated him with as much asperity as the laws of debate would
allow. Neither lapse of years nor change of scene had mitigated the
enmities which Francis had brought back from the East. After his
usual fashion, he mistook his malevolence for virtue, nursed it, as
preachers tell us that we ought to nurse our good dispositions, and
paraded it, on all occasions, with Pharisaical ostentation.
The zeal of Burke was still fiercer; but it was far purer. Men unable
to understand the elevation of his mind have tried to find out some
discreditable motive for the vehemence and pertinacity which he
showed on this occasion. But they have altogether failed. The idle
story that he had some private slight to revenge has long been given
up, even by the advocates of Hastings. Mr. Gleig supposes that
Burke was actuated by party spirit, that he retained a bitter
remembrance of the fall of the coalition, that he attributed that fall
to the exertions of the East India interest, and that he considered
Hastings as the head and the representative of that interest. This
explanation seems to be sufficiently refuted by a reference to dates.
The hostility of Burke to Hastings commenced long before the
coalition; and lasted long after Burke had become a strenuous
supporter of those by whom the coalition had been defeated. It
began when Burke and Fox, closely allied together, were attacking
the influence of the crown, and calling for peace with the American
republic. It continued till Burke, alienated from Fox, and loaded with
the favours of the crown, died, preaching a crusade against the
French republic. We surely cannot attribute to the events of 1784 an
enmity which began in 1781, and which retained undiminished force
long after persons far more deeply implicated than Hastings in the
events of 1784 had been cordially forgiven. And why should we look
for any other explanation of Burke’s conduct than that which we find
on the surface? The plain truth is that Hastings had committed some
great crimes, and that the thought of those crimes made the blood
of Burke boil in his veins. For Burke was a man in whom compassion
for suffering, and hatred of injustice and tyranny, were as strong as
in Las Casas or Clarkson. And although in him, as in Las Casas and
in Clarkson, these noble feelings were alloyed with the infirmity
which belongs to human nature, he is, like them, entitled to this
great praise, that he devoted years of intense labour to the service
of a people with whom he had neither blood nor language neither
religion nor manners in common, and from whom no requital, no
thanks, no applause could be expected.
His knowledge of India was such as few, even of those Europeans
who have passed many years in that country, have attained, and
such as certainly was never attained by any public man who had not
quitted Europe. He had studied the history, the laws, and the usages
of the East with an industry, such as is seldom found united to so
much genius and so much sensibility. Others have perhaps been
equally laborious, and have collected an equal mass of materials. But
the manner in which Burke brought his higher powers of intellect to
work on statements of facts, and on tables of figures, was peculiar
to himself. In every part of those huge bales of Indian information
which repelled almost all other readers, his mind, at once
philosophical and poetical, found something to instruct or to delight.
His reason analysed and digested those vast and shapeless masses:
his imagination animated and coloured them. Out of darkness and
dulness, and confusion, he formed a multitude of ingenious theories
and vivid pictures. He had, in the highest degree, that noble faculty
whereby man is able to live in the past and in the future, in the
distant and in the unreal. India and its inhabitants were not to him,
as to most Englishmen, mere names and abstractions, but a real
country and a real people. The burning sun, the strange vegetation
of the palm and the cocoa tree, the ricefield, the tank, the huge
trees, older than the Mogul empire, under which the village crowds
assemble, the thatched roof of the peasant’s but, the rich tracery of
the mosque where the imaum prays with his face to Mecca, the
drums, and banners, and gaudy idols, the devotee swinging in the
air, the graceful maiden with the pitcher on her head, descending
the steps to the river-side, the black faces, the long beards, the
yellow streaks of sect, the turbans and the flowing robes, the spears
and the silver maces, the elephants with their canopies of state, the
gorgeous palanquin of the prince, and the close litter of the noble
lady, all these things were to him as the objects amidst which his
own life had been passed, as the objects which lay on the road
between Beaconsfield and St. James’s Street. All India was present
to the eye of his mind, from the halls where suitors laid gold and
perfumes at the feet of sovereigns to the wild moor where the gipsy
camp was pitched, from the bazar, humming like a bee-hive with the
crowd of buyers and sellers, to the jungle where the lonely courier
shakes his bunch of iron rings to scare away the hyænas. He had
just as lively an idea of the insurrection at Benares as of Lord
George Gordon’s riots, and of the execution of Nuncomar as of the
execution of Dr. Dodd. Oppression in Bengal was to him the same
thing as oppression in the streets of London.
He saw that Hastings had been guilty of some most unjustifiable
acts. All that followed was natural and necessary in a mind like
Burke’s. His imagination and his passions, once excited, hurried him
beyond the bounds of justice and good sense. His reason, powerful
as it was, became the slave of feelings which it should have
controlled. His indignation, virtuous in its origin, acquired too much
of the character of personal aversion. He could see no mitigating
circumstance, no redeeming merit. His temper, which, though
generous and affectionate, had always been irritable, had now been
made almost savage by bodily infirmities and mental vexations.
Conscious of great powers and great virtues, he found himself, in
age and poverty, a mark for the hatred of a perfidious court and a
deluded people. In Parliament his eloquence was out of date. A
young generation, which knew him not, had filled the House.
Whenever he rose to speak, his voice was drowned by the unseemly
interruption of lads who were in their cradles when his orations on
the Stamp Act called forth the applause of the great Earl of
Chatham. These things had produced on his proud and sensitive
spirit an effect at which we cannot wonder. He could no longer
discuss any question with calmness, or make allowance for honest
differences of opinion. Those who think that he was more violent
and acrimonious in debates about India than on other occasions are
ill informed respecting the last years of his life. In the discussions on
the Commercial Treaty with the Court of Versailles, on the Regency,
on the French Revolution, he showed even more virulence than in
conducting the impeachment. Indeed it may be remarked that the
very persons who called him a mischievous maniac, for condemning
in burning words the Rohilla war and the spoliation of the Begums,
exalted him into a prophet as soon as he began to declaim, with
greater vehemence, and not with greater reason, against the taking
of the Bastile and the insults offered to Marie Antoinette. To us he
appears to have been neither a maniac in the former case, nor a
prophet in the latter, but in both cases a great and good man, led
into extravagance by a sensibility which domineered over all his
faculties.
It may be doubted whether the personal antipathy of Francis, or
the nobler indignation of Burke, would have led their party to adopt
extreme measures against Hastings, if his own conduct had been
judicious. He should have felt that, great as his public services had
been, he was not faultless, and should have been content to make
his escape, without aspiring to the honours of a triumph. He and his
agent took a different view. They were impatient for the rewards
which, as they conceived, were deferred only till Burke’s attack
should be over. They accordingly resolved to force on a decisive
action with an enemy for whom, if they had been wise, they would
have made a bridge of gold. On the first day of the session of 1780,
Major Scott reminded Burke of the notice given in the preceding
year, and asked whether it was seriously intended to bring any
charge against the late Governor-General. This challenge left no
course open to the Opposition, except to come forward as accusers
or to acknowledge themselves calumniators. The administration of
Hastings had not been so blameless, nor was the great party of Fox
and North so feeble, that it could be prudent to venture on so bold a
defiance. The leaders of the Opposition instantly returned the only
answer which they could with honour return; and the whole party
was irrevocably pledged to a prosecution.
Burke began his operations by applying for Papers. Some of the
documents for which he asked were refused by the ministers, who,
in the debate, held language such as strongly confirmed the
prevailing opinion, that they intended to support Hastings. In April,
the charges were laid on the table. They had been drawn by Burke
with great ability, though in a form too much resembling that of a
pamphlet. Hastings was furnished with a copy of the accusation; and
it was intimated to him that he might, if he thought fit, be heard in
his own defence at the bar of the Commons.
Here again Hastings was pursued by the same fatality which had
attended him ever since the day when he set foot on English
ground. It seemed to be decreed that this man, so politic and so
successful in the East, should commit nothing but blunders in
Europe. Any judicious adviser would have told him that the best
thing which he could do would be to make an eloquent, forcible, and
affecting oration at the bar of the House; but that, if he could not
trust himself to speak, and found it necessary to read, he ought to
be as concise as possible. Audiences accustomed to extemporaneous
debating of the highest excellence are always impatient of long
written compositions. Hastings, however, sat down as he would have
done at the Government-house in Bengal, and prepared a paper of
immense length. That paper, if recorded on the consultations of an
Indian administration, would have been justly praised as a very able
minute. But it was now out of place. It fell flat, as the best written
defence must have fallen flat, on an assembly accustomed to the
animated and strenuous conflicts of Pitt and Fox. The members, as
soon as their curiosity about the face and demeanour of so eminent
a stranger was satis-tied, walked away to dinner, and left Hastings to
tell his story till midnight to the clerks and the Serjeant-at-arms.
All preliminary steps having been duly taken, Burke, in the
beginning of June, brought forward the charge relating to the Rohilla
war. He acted discreetly in placing this accusation in the van; for
Dundas had formerly moved, and the House had adopted, a
resolution condemning, in the most severe terms, the policy followed
by Hastings with regard to Rohileund. Dun-das had little, or rather
nothing, to say in defence of his own consistency; but he put a bold
face on the matter, and opposed the motion. Among other things, he
declared that, though he still thought the Rohilla war unjustifiable,
he considered the services which Hastings had subsequently
rendered to the state as sufficient to atone even for so great an
offence. Pitt did not speak, but voted with Dundas; and Hastings
was absolved by a hundred and nineteen votes against sixty-seven.
Hastings was now confident of victory. It seemed, indeed, that he
had reason to be so. The Rohilla war was, of all his measures, that
which his accusers might with greatest advantage assail. It had been
condemned by the Court of Directors. It had been condemned by
the House of Commons. It had been condemned by Mr. Dundas,
who had since become the chief minister of the Crown for Indian
affairs. Yet Burke, having chosen this strong ground, had been
completely defeated on it. That, having failed here, he should
succeed on any point, was generally thought impossible. It was
rumoured at the clubs and coffee-houses that one or perhaps two
more charges would be brought forward, that if, on those charges,
the sense of the House of Commons should be against
impeachment, the Opposition would let the matter drop, that
Hastings would be immediately raised to the peerage, decorated
with the star of the Bath, sworn of the privy council, and invited to
lend the assistance of his talents and experience to the India board.
Lord Thurlow, indeed, some months before, had spoken with
contempt of the scruples which prevented Pitt from calling Hastings
to the House of Lords; and had even said that, if the Chancellor of
the Exchequer was afraid of the Commons, there was nothing to
prevent the Keeper of the Great Seal from taking the royal pleasure
about a patent of peerage. The very title was chosen. Hastings was
to be Lord Daylesford. For, through all changes of scene and
changes of fortune, remained unchanged his attachment to the spot
which had witnessed the greatness and the fall of his family, and
which had borne so great a part in the first dreams of his young
ambition.
 But in a very few days these fair prospects were overcast. On the
thirteenth of June, Mr. Fox brought forward, with great ability and
eloquence, the charge respecting the treatment of Cheyte Sing.
Francis followed on the same side. The friends of Hastings were in
high spirits when Pitt rose. With his usual abundance and felicity of
language, the Minister gave his opinion on the case. He maintained
that the Governor-General was justified in calling on the Rajah of
Benares for pecuniary assistance, and in imposing a fine when that
assistance was contumaciously withheld. He also thought that the
conduct of the Governor-General during the insurrection had been
distinguished by ability and presence of mind. He censured, with
great bitterness, the conduct of Francis, both in India and in
Parliament, as most dishonest and malignant. The necessary
inference from Pitt’s arguments seemed to be that Hastings ought to
be honourably acquitted; and both the friends and the opponents of
the Minister expected from him a declaration to that effect. To the
astonishment of all parties, he concluded by saying that, though he
thought it right in Hastings to fine Cheyte Sing for contumacy, yet
the amount of the fine was too great for the occasion. On this
ground, and on this ground alone, did Mr. Pitt, applauding every
other part of the conduct of Hastings with regard to Benares, declare
that he should vote in favour of Mr. Fox’s motion.
The House was thunderstruck; and it well might be so. For the
wrong done to Cheyte Sing, even had it been as flagitious as Fox
and Francis contended, was a trifle when compared with the horrors
which had been inflicted on Rohileund. But if Mr. Pitt’s view of the
case of Cheyte Sing were correct, there was no ground for an
impeachment, or even for a vote of censure. If the offence of
Hastings was really no more than this, that, having a right to impose
a mulct, the amount of which mulct was not defined, but was left to
be settled by his discretion, he had, not for his own advantage, but
for that of the state, demanded too much, was this an offence which
required a criminal proceeding of the highest solemnity, a criminal
proceeding, to which, during sixty years, no public functionary had
been subjected? We can see, we think, in what way a man of sense
and integrity might have been induced to take any course respecting
Hastings, except the course which Mr. Pitt took. Such a man might
have thought a great example necessary, for the preventing of
injustice, and for the vindicating of the national honour, and might,
on that ground, have voted for impeachment both on the Rohilla
charge, and on the Benares charge. Such a man might have thought
that the offences of Hastings had been atoned for by great services,
and might, on that ground, have voted against the impeachment on
both charges. With great diffidence we give it as our opinion that the
most correct course would, on the whole, have been to impeach on
the Rohilla charge, and to acquit on the Benares charge. Had the
Benares charge appeared to us in the same light in which it
appeared to Mr. Pitt, we should, without hesitation, have voted for
acquittal on that charge. The one course which it is inconceivable
that any man of a tenth part of Mr. Pitt’s abilities can have honestly
taken was the course which he took. He acquitted Hastings on the
Rohilla charge. He softened down the Benares charge till it became
no charge at all; and then he pronounced that it contained matter
for impeachment.
Nor must it be forgotten that the principal reason assigned by the
ministry for not impeaching Hastings on account of the Rohilla war
was this, that the delinquencies of the early part of his
administration had been atoned for by the excellence of the later
part. Was it not most extraordinary that men who had held this
language could afterwards vote that the later part of his
administration furnished matter for no less than twenty articles of
impeachment? They first represented the conduct of Hastings in
1780 and 1781 as so highly meritorious that, like works of
supererogation in the Catholic theology, it ought to be efficacious for
the cancelling of former offences; and they then prosecuted him for
his conduct in 1780 and 1781.
The general astonishment was the greater, because, only twenty-
four hours before, the members on whom the minister could depend
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