than other persons would do. We know that in Constantinople, and in many
other places, these persons enjoy offices of the highest trust, and are
of great rank and dignity; and this dignity and rank they possess for
the purpose of enabling them to fulfil their great trusts more
effectually. The two principal eunuchs of the Begums were Jewar and
Behar Ali Khân, persons of as high rank and estimation as any people in
the country. These persons, however, were seized, not, says Mr.
Hastings, for the purpose of extorting money, as assumed in the charge,
but as agents and principal instruments of exciting the insurrection
before alluded to, &c. Mr. Hastings declares that they were not seized
for the purpose of extorting money, but that they were seized in order
to be punished for their crimes, and, _eo nomine_, for this crime of
rebellion. Now this crime could not have been committed immediately by
[the?] women themselves; for no woman can come forward and head her own
troops. We have not heard that any woman has done so since the time of
Zenobia, in another part of the East; and we know that in Persia no
person can behold the face of a woman of rank, or speak to females of
condition, but through a curtain: therefore they could not go out
themselves, and be active in a rebellion. But, I own, it would be some
sort of presumption against them, if Jewar Ali Khân and Behar Ali Khân
had headed troops, and been concerned in acts of rebellion; and the
prisoner's counsel have taken abundance of pains to show that such
persons do sometimes head armies and command legions in the East. This
we acknowledge that they sometimes do. If these eunuchs had behaved in
this way, if they had headed armies and commanded legions for the
purposes of rebellion, it would have been a fair presumption that their
mistresses were concerned in it. But instead of any proof of such facts,
Mr. Hastings simply says, "We do not arrest them for the purpose of
extorting money, but as a punishment for their crimes." By Mr.
Middleton's account you will see the utter falsity of this assertion.