came so involved as to threaten the whole of that fine province with ruin and depopulation. He refused to pay his contingent for the cavalry supplied him by the British Government. To induce the vizier to introduce some necessary reforms into his administration, and to obtain security for the expenses disbursed in maintaining the power of the Nabob, the Governor-General undertook a journey to Lucknow. The result of the mission was, the acquiescence of the vizier in the additional subsidy of two regiments of cavalry, British and native. Upon the demise of the Nabob, shortly after, a question arose as to the legitimacy of Asoph ul Dowlah, his son. The question of a kingdom was decided against him by the British Government upon evidence, observes Mr. Mill, on which a court of law in England would not have decided a question of a few pounds. By this decision, Asoph ul Dowlah was deposed, and Saadut Ali raised to the musnud, as the eldest surviving son of Sujah ul Dowlah. It is an intricate question of law and of policy, and the limits of this memoir preclude us from entering into it. But even Mr. Mill acknowledges that it is impossible to read the Governor-General's minute, recording the transaction, and not to be impressed with a conviction of his sincerity. And the Court of Directors, in their letter of the 5th of May, 1799, after a long commentary, observe: -" Having taken this general view, with a minute attention to the papers and proceedings before us, we are decidedly of opinion, that the late Governor-General, Lord Teignmouth, in a most arduous situation, and under circumstances of embarrassment and difficulty, conducted himself with great temper, impartiality, ability, and firmness; and that he finished a long career of faithful services by planning and carrying into effect an arrangement, which not only redounds highly to his own honour, but which will also operate to the reciprocal advantage of the Company and the Nabob." * During the administration of Sir John Shore, a dispute,' *Hist. Brit. India, vol. iii. p. 350. 4to. embittered by harsh terms of altercation, took place between the Supreme Board and the Madras Government under Lord Hobart, regarding the Omdut ul Omrah, Nabob of the Carnatic. In October, 1795, Lord Hobart endeavoured to prevail upon the Omdut to cede all his territories on payment of a stipulated sum, a measure in which the Governor-General acquiesced; for, by the mortgage of his territorial possessions to his creditors, and the assignment to that rapacious body of claimants of all their forthcoming produce, the Nabob became unable to pay his annual kists to the Company. But Lord Hobart failed in his object, and proposed to the Supreme Government the forcible occupation of Tinnevelly and the cession of the Carnatic forts as security for the liquidation of the cavalry debt incurred by the Nabob with the Madras government. The Governor-General strongly discounte nanced and protested against such a measure, as an infraction of treaty. In his minute, Lord Hobart urged the necessity of the procedure, on the principle of self-preservation - the decay and depopulation of the Carnatic and the breach of treaty on the part of the Nabob himself, by the assignment of districts to which alone the Company could look for payment. This dispute was aggravated by the awkward circumstance of the subordinate functionary being of higher rank than the supreme. Lord Hobart appealed to the Court of Directors, but their decision was superseded by the return of Lord Hobart, who was succeeded by Lord Clive; and in the beginning of 1798, Sir John Shore, who, a few months before his retirement, was raised, as we have seen, to the peerage* returned to England, having been succeeded by Lord Mornington. - Lord Teignmouth lived in habits of familiar intercourse with Sir William Jones at Calcutta, and succeeded him as president of the Asiatic Society. In that capacity he delivered, on the 22d of May, 1794, a warm and elegant eulogy on his predecessor, and in 1804 published memoirs of his life, writ * His patent was dated October 24th, 1797. ings, and correspondence. It is, upon the whole, a pleasing piece of biography, recording almost every thing interesting in his public and private character, partly in his own familiar correspondence, and transferring to the reader much of the respect and admiration for that extraordinary man with which the writer was himself impressed. The work is closed with a delineation of Sir William Jones's character, which, though it might have exhibited greater force and discrimination, could not well have been presented in chaster and more interesting colours. On the 4th of April, 1807, Lord Teignmouth was appointed a Commissioner for the Affairs of India, and was sworn one of the Privy Council on the 8th of the same month. His activity and zeal in the formation of the Bible Society, in 1804, are prominent features of his life, and strong indications of his sincere convictions and warmth of piety as a Christian believer. He had the honour of being fixed upon as the fittest person to preside over the new institution; the high names of Porteus, Fisher, Burgess, Gambier, Charles Grant, and Wilberforce being associated with his own. Lord Teignmouth presided over the society in a catholic and amiable spirit of good-will and benevolence towards all sects and communities of Christianity. He conducted it through many difficulties and controversies, some of which were unusually stormy and contentious. We must not forget to observe, that Lord Teignmouth was earnestly bent on converting the natives of India to Christianity; and in 1811 he published a tract on that subject, entitled "Considerations on communicating to the Inhabitants of India the Knowledge of Christianity." His recorded opinions concerning the moral character of the Hindus approached the lowest possible estimate that has yet been framed of it. It is probable, therefore, that his earnestness in that important though difficult aim was strengthened by the notions he had imbibed of the Hindu character. They are recorded in a paper he presented to the Governor-General in 1794, and printed in the minutes of evidence on the trial of Mr. Hastings. In 1786 he married Charlotte, only daughter of James Cornish, Esq., a respectable medical practitioner at Teignmouth. By this lady, who did not long survive him, his Lordship had issue three sons and six daughters: 1. the Hon. Charlotte; 2. and 3. Caroline Isabella and Emily, who both died young; 4. the Right Hon. Charles John now Lord Teignmouth, born in 1796, and at present unmarried; 5. the Hon. Anna Maria, married in 1821 to the late Colonel Sir Thomas Noel Hill, and left his widow in 1832; 6. the Hon. Frederick John Shore, Assistant to the Secretary to the Commissioners in the ceded provinces of Bengal,-he married, Jan. 25. 1830, his cousin, Charlotte Mary, second daughter of the late George Cornish, Esq., and has a son, born in 1832; 7. the Hon. Henry Dundas, who died in 1826, when a Cornet in the 11th dragoons, aged twenty-six; 8. the Hon. Caroline Dorothea, married in 1829 to the Rev. Robert Anderson of Brighton; and, 9. the Hon. Ellen Mary, married in 1830 to Capt. Edward C. Fletcher, of the 1st Life Guards. Lord Teignmouth died at the advanced age of 82, on the 14th of February, 1834. For many years he had lived surrounded by every thing that ministers comfort to life, the attachment of a large circle of friends, and the affections of an amiable family; and his death was rendered cheerful and easy by the consolations of religion. Few men have been more eminently useful in their destined spheres of action; few have more amply merited the honours bestowed on them, or better vindicated their rightful claim to elevated rank by their talent and integrity, than Lord Teignmouth. We might enlarge upon his personal and private virtues, but we restrain ourselves, in the language of Tacitus; "Abstinentiam et integritatem hujusce viri referre, injuria fuerit virtutum."ìo - Principally abridged from "The Asiatic Journal."cat 230 No. XVIII. THOMAS STOTHARD, Esq. R.A. LIBRARIAN TO THE ROYAL ACADEMY. THE lives of artists, generally speaking, are best traced in their works. Quiet and sedentary, their days pass with little interruption but from the common casualties to which all are exposed, and over which none can have any control. The disposition of the amiable and highly-gifted individual whose name stands at the head of the present page was philosophical, temperate, and industrious; never seducing him into extraordinary adventure. He appears to have been " held in thrall" by his love of art, and his admiration of the beauties of nature. These constituted his chief enjoyment, and to transfer the latter to his paper or canvass was his sole occupation. Beyond this "His sober wishes never learnt to stray; But through the cool, sequester'd vale of life Of Mr. Stothard's early boyhood the following interesting account was, sometime before his death, related by himself to a friend, who subsequently communicated it to the Athe næum: My father was a native of Stretton near Doncaster.* He came to London while a lad; and, when he married †, took a sort of hotel in Long Acre ‡, which was much fre The property of Mr. Stothard's father was much reduced by the South Sea Of scheme. + Mr. Stothard's mother was the daughter of Elizabeth Reynolds, niece to Anvers Hodges, Esq. of Broadwell, in Gloucestershire, and the heir in entail under his will, dated 1720. The Stothard family, however, have never yet benefited by this bequest. Then, and now, known by the name of The Black Horse. |