The British never had the intention to destroy either the existence or the independence of a state which was usefully interposed between them and the dependencies of China.Anon (1816), p. 428. Lord Hastings had given up his plan to dismember Nepal from fear of antagonising China – whose vassal Nepal in theory was. In 1815, while British forces were campaigning in far western Nepal, a high-ranking Manchu official advanced with a large
