The order, however, arrived in India while the Government was engaged in the Nepaul war, when, of course, it was impossible to carry it into execution; the Pindarrie-Mahratta war immediately followed, and threw a fresh obstacle in its way. When, at last, leisure was found to examine the subject, the Bengal Government, instead of acting upon the orders from home, very properly addressed a representation against them to the Court of Directors, the ground of their remonstrance being the alleged compact previously adverted to. "The Court," they said, "could not have been aware that full batta in Bengal stands on the footing of a compromise, for which the Government stands virtually pledged, in foro conscientiæ, since the order for granting full batta to the whole was contemporaneous with that for withdrawing double batta from a part."
This unanswerable argument was only responded to by the Court of Directors by a fresh order to carry its intentions into effect; but neither Lord Hastings nor Lord Amherst would lend himself to the enforcement of so unjust a retrenchment. At length Lord William Bentinck was so madly anxious for the post of Governor-General that he did not hesitate to pledge himself to a full compliance with the wishes of the Court, and accordingly enforced them by general orders, dated the 29th of November, 1828. The conduct of his lordship, in this respect, was disapproved of by Mr. Bayley and Sir Charles Metcalfe, two distinguished members of the Supreme Council, who were both of opinion that the Company and the British empire in India were not to be served or saved by such sordid economy; and the Commander-in-Chief, Lord Combermere, was so disgusted that he resigned and returned to Europe. Nay, Lord William Bentinck himself was so thoroughly convinced of the injustice and impolicy of the measure that, in a Minute of Council recorded by him in August, 1834, a short time before he quitted India, he thus adverts to the subject – "Trifling, however, as this deduction is upon
