directed that the disallowance of the treaty should be immediately announced to the King of Oudh. But Lord Auckland merely informed His Majesty that the British Government had determined to relieve him of certain onerous conditions respecting the subsidiary force established under the treaty. The formal abrogation of the treaty was never intimated to the king.
Ten years later there was an honest Governor-General of India. Lord Hardinge, in 1847, proceeded in person to Lucknow, and solemnly warned the king that unless His Majesty reformed his administration within two years, 'the British Government would be forced to interfere by assuming the government of Oudh[1].' Lord Hardinge emphasized his personal remonstrances by a declaration in writing that, under the treaty obligations, no other course was open to him. 'The Governor-General is required,' he wrote, 'when gross and systematic abuses prevail, to apply such a remedy as the exigency of the case may require: he has no option in the performance of this duty.' Knowing what we do of Lord Hardinge's soldierly exactitude in keeping his word, there can be little doubt that, had he remained in India, Oudh would have been brought under British management in 1849, at the end of the two years' probation.
- ↑ Aitchison's Treaties and Engagements, etc., vol. ii, p. 63, ed. 1876.
