WHATEVER circumstances we judged it necessary to communicate to you, have been written at great length and distinctly in Hindivy: the perusal of it [i. e. of the Hindivy dispatch] will make you acquainted [with every thing].* You must ascertain its contents by means of a secret and trust-worthy Mûnshy: one in all respects entitled to credit and belief, and who shall be incapable of revealing the secrets [entrusted to him.]

It has been already seen, that Tippoo Sultan occasionally sent his orders in the Hindivy language, even to persons whom he usually addressed in Persian. Here we have another example of this extraordinary and unaccountable practice, but still more striking and embarrassing than the former one; in which we were at liberty to suppose, that the envoys could read a Hindivy as well as a Persian letter, and only left to wonder why the Sultan should, at any time, prefer writing in the Hindivy. But it now appears, that his ambassadors were ignorant of that character; and that, in order to possess themselves of their master’s instructions, it was necessary for them to have recourse to an interpreter. It might have been expected, that under these circumstances, the envoys would, at least, have been spared the trouble and responsibility of procuring such a person, by having one of that description regularly attached to their mission. But this was evidently not the case: nor is it ev enabsolutely certain, that the person to be employed on this occasion was to be found among the servants of the embassy; though we must either assume this as the fact, or adopt the monstrous supposition of the envoys being obliged to seek, in the capital of their master’s enemy, for an interpreter of his most secret and important orders. To conclude, I must acknowledge that there is nothing in the whole correspondence, which appears to me so completely inexplicable as this matter we have been considering: nor can I help regretting, that the difficulty did not occur to me before my departure from India, where I might possibly have been able to obtain a solution of it.