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course in nepali curzon soas books Manual

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LORD CURZON: THE WISEST FOOL IN HINDUSTAN? - Kindle edition by RODERICK MATTHEWS. Download it once and read it on your Kindle device, PC. Download pdf book by Roderick Matthews - Free eBooks.

Extraordinary contributions were frequent in the last years of the Mahratta rule ; village communities were harassed with unending demands and went largely into debt to meet them ; but even then the unity of village life and the permanence of the land assessments were seldom disturbed. Early Land Settlements under British Rule. In the revenue realised in the newly -acquired territories was eighty lakhs, in it was raised to lakhs, and in a few- years more it came up to lakhs, or a million and a half tens of rupees.

The village community system broke down under this pressure, and the Byotwari system, introduced in Madras by Sir Thomas Munro, suggested the introduction of a similar Byotwari system in Bombay, i. Settlement of Pringle and Gruickskank. But the estimates of produce made were incorrect, the share demanded as revenue was therefore unfair, and the cultivators were reduced to poverty and distress.

The settlement operations, both in the Gujerat and in the Deccan, were stopped in Numbers aban- doned their homes and fled into neighbouring Native States ; large tracts of land were thrown out of cultiva- tion, and in some districts no more than a third of the cultured area remained in occupation. First Regular Settlement from Their Joint "Report, submitted in , pro- posed a new Land Revenue Settlement on an improved plan. The proposal was accepted, and forms the basis of what may be called the first regular Settlement in this Presidency, which commenced in The principles of this Settlement were these: The Settlement, commenced on these principles in , was completed, or nearly com- pleted, by , and showed an increase of land revenue from Rx.

Second Regular Settlement from Out of 27, villages in the Pro- vinces, 13, villages have up to date been resettled, and the total land revenue of these villages has increased from Rx. Third Regidar Settlement from, Seventy-eight villages in the Poona Collectorate have been resettled, and the revenue of these resettled villages has increased from Rx. Undue Enhancements of Land Revenue.

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The produce of the soil does not increase, either in quantity or in value, thirty per cent, every thirty years, and the endeavour to obtain such an in- crease in land revenue necessarily leaves the cultivators in a state of greater helplessness and poverty after each Settlement. Much of the best lands in the Deccan was under cultivation in , i. Settlement have necessarily impoverished the peasantry and made them more resourceless and helpless in years of bad harvests. The late Sir William Hunter, speaking in the Viceregal Council in about the Bombay Settlements, said that " the fundamental difficulty of bringing relief to the Deccan peasantry No Chech on Enhancements provided in the Revenue Law.

The assessment made is not based on estimates of the produce of the fields, but on a scientific but thoroughly unpractical appraisement of the intrinsic value of the land, and an examination of the fiscal history of the Talooka. Enhancements are made not merely on the equitable grounds of extension of cultiva- tion and rise of prices, but also on the vague and in- definite ground of improvements effected by the State.

A new road constructed, a new line of railway opened, and even the general advance of the country in times of peace, may be, and are, included under this third head as a ground of enhancement ; and it will be obvious to Your Lordship that the condition of the Deccan peasantry can never improve so long as the Deccan Settlement Officer is armed with this comprehensive power to raise Bombay 47 the rental with the general advance of the country. So far as the cultivator of the Deccan is considered, the blessings of peace and the benefits of a civilised adminis- tration add to his impoverishment, because improved roads and communications, and the general advance of the country are made a ground of enhancement of his rent.

If such roads and communications have increased the prices of the produce, an enhancement of the rental on this definite ground is just and fair. If the roads and communications have not increased the prices of food grains, wherein is the cultivator benefited? All the real advantage which the cultivator secures from the general advance- ment of the country is shown in the rise of prices, and that is a just and legitimate ground of enhancement of rents.

No EquitahU Limitations on Enhancements, — My Lord, there are no equitable limitations to the enhancements which the Settlement Officer is em- powered to make. The rule is that 1 the increase of revenue in the case of a Talooka, or group of villages, should not exceed thirty-three per cent. I beg that these checks on the powers of the Bombay Settlement Officer may be compared with the limitations prescribed in the Tenancy Act for the Bengal Zemindar. It is undesir- able that the Government should take wider powers of enhancement with respect of cultivators living under the State, than it allows to private landlords in respect of cultivators living under such landlords.

No Judicial Checks on Enhancements. In , an appeal in an assessment suit was preferred in the High Court of Bombay, and the High Court decided the case against the Settlement Officer, and in favour of the plaintiff. Immediately after, a Bill was introduced in the Council to exclude the jurisdiction of the High Court and of all Civil Courts in matters relating to assessments, and the Hon.

Mr Ellis explained the object of the Bill in these memorable words: My Lord, I do not wish to make any reflection against Revenue Officers. I have been a Revenue Officer myself all Bombay 49 through my official career, and I speak from personal knowledge when I state that Revenue Officers en- deavour to perform their difficult and onerous duties as justly and conscientiously as Judicial Officers, or as any other class of officers in India.

But it will appear from a moment's reflection that in the matter of assessment suits the Revenue Officer and the Settle- ment Officer are virtually a 'party to the suit, and it cannot meet the ends of justice if they are made tlie final judges in such suits. The failure of justice which often results from this inequitable system is illustrated by the facts I have mentioned in paragraph 8 of my letter to Your Lordship of the 20th of February last; the cost of cultivation in Madras is underestimated by the revenue authorities ; and the Madras raiyat obtains no redress from this injustice because he cannot ask a Civil Court to determine the actual cost of cultivating his field.

In Bengal, the Tenancy Act of permits the cultivator to take his case to Civil Courts ; all over India the private citizen and the private trader are per- mitted by the British Government and by British laws to seek redress, even against the Government itself, in the impartial Civil Courts of the land. But the cultivators of India, the poorest, the most ignorant, and the most helpless class of the Indian population, are debarred except in Bengal from seeking redress against the assessment of Revenue Officers; and the assessment becomes necessarily unfair and excessive because it is unchecked by an appeal to an independent tribunal.

The check on enhancements which was generously provided by Sir Charles Wood, Secretary of State for India, as far back as , has turned out to be ineffective in practice. In his memorable despatch of that year Sir Charles Wood laid down the principle that as- sessments on lands should not on any account, and under any circumstances, exceed one-half of the net produce of the land, i.

This rule, laid down with the most benevolent intentions, has completely broken down in its application. In Madras the cost of cultivation is underestimated in many cases, and no appeal is allowed to Civil Courts against such under- estimation ; in Bombay the cost of cultivation is not estimated at all, lands being assessed with an eye to their intrinsic value and their fiscal history.

My Lord, it has been a painful task for me to place all these facts and ciucumstances relating to Land Assessments in India before Your Excellency ; and I have done it because I feel convinced that Your Excellency's Government is animated by a sincere desire to materially improve the condition of the Bombay 5 1 Indian cultivator. There is no race of cultivators on earth who are more loyal, more peaceful, more willing to pay their proper contribution to the State, and more provident and capable of helping themselves if they are allowed the chance.

But the continuous enhancement of the rental at each recurring Settle- ment, not merely on just, and equitable, and real grounds, but on vague, shadowy, and unreal grounds, precludes the possibility of any improvement in the condition of the cultivator, and takes away from him all motive and all power to effect permanent improve- ments. It is possible, my Lord, without interfering with the steady increase of the Land Revenue of India, to make that increase commensurate with the improve- ment in the condition of the cultivator ; and I trust and hope Your Excellency's Government will adopt measures to secure this desirable object, viz.

We do not ask for anything that is unreasonable or impracticable ; we ask for those rules and limitations which experience has proved to be practicable and bene- ficial in some parts of India. In Bengal the rent does not generally exceed one-sixth of the average gross pro- duce in any district; in the North- West it is about one-fifth of the average gross produce, according to Sir Antony MacdonnelFs evidence before the Currency Committee.

We beg, my Lord, in ike first place, that this limitation, which is generally observed by private landlords in Northern India, be introduced in the Central Provinces, Madras and Bombay, where Govern- 52 Third Letter to Lord Curzon raent Settlement Officers fix the rental. In the North- Western Provinces again, the Government is satisfied, according to Sir Antony Macdonnell's evidence before the Currency Committee, with forty per cent, of the rents re- ceived by landlords from cultivators.

Thirdly, in the North-West and in Bombay also. Settlements are made for thirty years ; we beg that this rule may be in- variably adhered to in all provinces of India, and that no shorter terms of settlement, involving frequent harass- ment to the people as well as frequent enhancements, be sanctioned under any circumstances. Fourthly, we beg that where the Settlement is made directly with cultivators, the rule proposed by Lord Ripon in with the concurrence of the Madras Government be adopted, and that in districts which have been completely surveyed and settled, no enhancements of rents be made in subsequent Settlements except on the sole ground of a rise in prices.

Fifthly, where water-rates are imposed for irrigation, we beg that the rates be optional, as it is now in all parts of India ; and that it may not be made compulsory until there are stronger grounds for doing so than have yet been shown to exist in the Bill recently introduced in Madras. And, sixthly and lastly, we con- sider it fair, both in the matter of water-rates and of land assessments, to permit the cultivator an appeal to a civil tribunal against the action of the Revenue Officer who is virtually a party to such suits. I do not think Bombay 53 that sucli a permission is likely to foster litigation ; the Indian cultivator is not often likely to question the action of the Revenue Officer unless the Revenue Officer has committed a mistake.

Such an appeal is necessary to guard against unfairness and undue assessments, for the best and most conscientious amongst us are not free from blunders, and it cannot be the desire of the British Government that such blunders should remain unchecked precisely in those cases which affect the interests and the well-being of the helpless and voiceless peasant popula- tion of India. I have passed all my official life in Bengal districts, and among Bengal culti- vators, and I venture to hope that such facts as I am able to lay before Your Lordship about the agricultural condition of the Province will receive Your Lordship's consideration.

I will not enter into any matters of controversy ; I will endeavour to make my letter a brief and clear statement of facts. History of the Bengal Zemindars under the 1 1 Afghan Bute. When the Afghans conquered Bengal, they carved out estates, here and there, for military Commanders and Jaigidars, but left Hindu Zemindars generally in possession of the estates which they had inherited from their fathers. Mahomedan Kazis and Kotwals per- formed judicial and police work in towns, but within their own estates the Hindu Zemindars were left with their old powers. They levied rents, preserved peace and order, settled disputes, and led large armies.

History of the Bengal Zemindars under the Moghal Rule. We read in the Ayeen Ahhari that the Zemindars of Bengal were mostly Kayests by caste, that the militia force in the Province consisted of 23, cavalry, , infantry, elephants, guns, and boats; and that the revenue of Bengal, including Orissa, was Rs. Roughly speaking, the land revenue of Bengal, Behar, and Orissa demanded from the Zemindars by the Government of Akbar, but perhaps never fully collected, was about two Krors. The land revenue of the same Provinces I actually collected in was Rs.

Real Position of the Bengal Zemindars. This is not the fact. Zemindars have not only been de facto landlords, but also de facto rulers within their own estates, since the dawn of his- tory. They performed the same necessary and useful part in the history of Bengal, previous to the British rule, that the barons of Europe performed, or were supposed to perform, in the Middle Ages. They pre- served peace and order within their own estates, re- pressed crime and punished offenders, adjudicated cases and protected labourers and cultivators, and represented and maintained the royal authority and influence.

Their system of administration was no doubt rude, their exercise of power was often arbitrary, and their forces were often engaged in warring with each other, as was the case in Europe down to the eighteenth century. But in spite of all this, the Zemindars of Bengal played a useful and necessary part in the history of those times ; they maintained order in the interior where the King or Subahdar had no means and no agency to preserve the peace ; they settled disputes, adjudicated cases, and punished crime ; and they encouraged learn- ing and arts in their courts.

The literature and tradi- tions of Bengal reflect to this day the position and influence which Zemindars occupied in the political and social economy of the Province. Policy of Warren Hastings.

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Feudalism had died a natural death in Europe, and it was inevitable that such quasi-feudal powers as the Zemindars exercised before should also be withdrawn. Warren Hastings deprived them of their judicial and police powers, and bestowed those powers on newly- created district collectors and police officers.

I will not enter into a discussion as to whether this was wisely or hastily done, but it is obvious that the step was inevitable, for under a modern system of rule the functions of the judge and the police can be exercised only by officers of the Crown.

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But when Warren Hastings imprisoned defaulting Zemindars, sold their estates to outsiders for arrears, or let them out on short leases, he scarcely acted with sufficient regard to the ancient traditions of the Province, or to the position which the hereditary landlords had held for centuries among their people. Policy of Lord Cornwallis. He did not render back to the Zemindars those judicial and police powers of which they had been deprived, but he wisely sought to secure to them that honoured place which they had held for centuries.

With the true instincts of a nobleman, he saw that it was not good for the people, or for the rulers, that the estates of the ancient houses should pass into the hands of shroffs and money-lenders and other auction pur- 58 Fourth Letter to Lord Curzon: All the estates of Bengal were very severely assessed after an elaborate inquiry, but this assessment, made with a strict regard to the interests of the Government, was declared to be permanent, by the famous Regulation of Result of the Permanent Settlement — My Lord, this Permanent Settlement of the land revenues of Bengal is sometimes condemned by writers who merely look upon it as a loss to the Government revenue.

But administrators who have lived and worked in Bengal districts, and have studied the far-reaching and bene- ficial results of Lord Cornwallis's policy, do not share this opinion. In the first place, the placing of a limit to the Government demand in the permanently settled tracts of Bengal has enabled the Government, by sub- sequent legislation, to limit the demand of the Zemin- dars themselves from the actual cultivators ; and the cultivators of Bengal are therefore more prosperous, more resourceful, and better able to help themselves in years of bad harvest, than cultivators in any other part of India.

In the second place, the limitation of the State - demand has fostered agricultural enterprise, extended cultivation, and led to the accumulation of some capital in the hands of private proprietors, a result which far-sighted administrators wish to bring about in other parts of India.

This capital is expended in fostering trades and industries, in supporting schools. Fourthly and lastly, the policy of Lord Cornwallis has confirmed the loyalty of the most substantial classes of the people, and through them of the entire people, towards the ruling power. All who have anything at stake look on the British rule in India, not only as a just and enlightened system of administration, but as a Govern- ment with which their own interests are intimately associated, as a Government whose permanence means the well-being of the people.

In the dark days of the Mutiny of there was no disaffection in Bengal, and in the words of Mr Seton Karr, "the Sepoys took to the villages and the jungles, and then they literally melted away before the impassive demeanour, the want of sympathy, and the silent loyalty of the Zemindars. Bent Laws for the Protection of Cultivators. These rent laws of Bengal have given adequate protection to cultivators ; and it will be found on inquiry that the rents generally realised by Bengal Zemindars are fair and moderate, and permit the cultivators of the soil to save in good years for years of bad harvests.

Proportion of Bent to produce in Bengal Districts. I have, since then, compared the results of my own inquiries with the figures contained in Sir W. Hunter's '' Statistical Accounts of Bengal," published in and subsequent years, and I note below the figures given in Sir William Hunter's work. The "Statistical Accounts" do not, unfortunately, give the average produce and the average rents for all districts in Bengal ; but for almost every district for which figures are available in the work, they have been re- produced by me in the list given in the next paragraph.

I have used the letters a and b to indicate, gener- ally, superior and inferior lands according to their produce. Backtirganj b 1 16 5 8 per cent. Rents for Burd- wan and Eangpur have been overestimated, and rents for Malda underestimated. The average rent for the twenty districts named above is about twenty per cent, of the produce ; and if the value of straw was included in the produce in all districts the proportion of rent would be still less.

My Lord, the figures given in Sir William Hunter's work, and quoted above, were compiled about thirty years ago. Since then the prices of food grains have risen in Bengal higher than the rents of lands, and the Tenancy Act of has given a wider pro- tection to cultivators than existed before.

course in nepali curzon soas books Manual

Bengal 63 produce, includiDg straw, and the average rents of Bengal, the rents now generally realised will be found to be below one-fifth or one-sixth the gross produce in most districts. It will, therefore, appear that the Per- manent Settlement of Bengal and the subsequent Rent Acts have secured all the results which they were in- tended to secure. They have extended cultivation, fostered enterprise and works of public utility, and maintained in Bengal an intelligent, influential, and loyal class of landlords, the strongest supporters of British Rule in India.

They have protected cultiva- tors, moderated rents, and enabled the poorer classes to save something in good years for years of bad har- vest. They have decreased the indebtedness of the cultivatiDg classes, and enabled them to live in better houses, use better utensils, and save more in agricultural stock and in silver jewellery, than their fathers did be- fore. And lastly, moral advancement has kept pace with material advancement, and the Bengal cultivator of the present day is better read, better informed, more self-reliant, more able to defend his own interests, than he was before.

My Lord, these are blessings which have been secured to the Bengal landlord and the Bengal culti- vator by the Permanent Settlement and by the succes- sive Rent Laws of Bengal. But I do not wish to be misunderstood. I do not at the present time ask for the extension of the Bengal system to other parts of India ; I have not made any such suggestion in the three letters which I have had the honour to address to Your Excellency.

Each Province in India has its 64 Fourth Letter to Lord Curzon own land system, under which the people have lived for generations, and with which the people are familiar ; and it is possible, under each land system, to afford adequate protection to the cultivator against frequent reassessments, and undue enhancements. What I have asked, my Lord, is that such protection be granted to the cultivator of each Province under the land system under which he lives.

I have prayed that where the cultivator pays direct to the State, the impracticable rule of realising one-half the net produce or one-third the gross produce be abandoned, and the rule of fixing one- fifth the gross produce as the maximum of rent be adopted. I have prayed that where the revenue is paid by landlords, one-half of their assets be fixed as the Government revenue, as is done in the N.

I have prayed that where no Permanent Settlement has been made, the period of each recurring settlement be fixed at thirty years as in the N. And I have prayed that where districts have been once surveyed and settled, a rise in prices be made the sole ground of enhancement in future settlements, as was proposed by the Marquis of Kipon in I sincerely trust and hope that these proposals, which are moderate and practicable, and which do not in any way modify the principles of the different land systems in the different Provinces, will find acceptance with Your Excellency's Government.

The land system in the N. Provinces differs somewhat from that in Oudh, and these systems again are somewhat different from the Punjab system ; but there is a general resemblance in the systems prevailing in all these three Provinces of Northern India. For in all these Provinces the cultivators generally pay their rents to landlords ; and the revenue payable by landlords to the Governmeiit except where it is permanently settled , is liable to revision and enhancement at each recurring Settlement.

I shall, therefore, with a view not to prolong this correspondence, endeavour to compress my remarks and suggestions with regard to all the three Provinces of Northern India within the limits of this letter. Acquisition of the North- Western Provinces.

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Some less important tracts were added in subsequent years. Early Mistakes in Land Revenue Settlements. It was the custom in the last days of the Mahomedan rule to fix the State-demand at a very high figure, and then to realise as much of the nominal demand as was possible from year to year. The mistake made by British administrators was to ad- here to this high nominal demand, and then to try and realise the whole of it.

Some British administrators saw this mistake, and one collector, Mr Dumbleton, wrote that the Settlement of ''pressed beyond a reason- able demand," and also complained that the severe rates of the Nawab's government were stereotyped by the British rulers, " without the same elasticity in realising. Early Settlements, to But before the expiry of the total period of ten years, the views of the rulers had changed, and the idea of a Permanent Northern India 67 Settlement had been abandoned.

Two fresh Settle- ments were made for five years each, i. Settlements were accordingly made between and , and the country remained in a state of perpetual I poverity. A terrible famine visited the North-Western ' Provinces in , and desolated the whole country from Allahabad to Delhi, though it was most intense in the Doab, and in the neighbourhood of Agra. The Government revenue was permanently decreased in most districts after the famine. When a famine again visited Northern India in , it was less severe than the preceding one ; and Colonel Baird Smith, who inquired into the causes and effects of the famine, declared that its comparative mildness was due to the moderate demands of the State.

Colonel Baird Smith recommended a Permanent Settlement of the land revenue for the improvement of the condition of the 68 Fifth Letter to Lord Cur son: The recommendation received the approval of Lord Canning and of the Secretary of State for India in ; but the proposal was long kept in abeyance, and was, at last, unfortunately abandoned in The assessment of rents, too, which had hitherto been made by Settlement Officers after elaborate calculations and on somewhat theoretical grounds, resulting in much harassment to cultivators and gross inequality of in- cidence, was now much simplified.

The healthy rule was at last adopted, in , that the rents actually received by landlords, as shown in village rent rolls, should be received as the basis of assessment, with necessary corrections. It will thus be seen that though the North-Western Provinces have not obtained a Per- manent Settlement, which would have led to some accumulation of capital and promotion of industries in the country, yet the worst blunders of the early land- settlements have been rectified one by one.

Northern India 69 the revenue was fixed at one-half the rental; in the Land Revenue Act was simplified; and in the harassing process of settling rents on theoretical grounds, which still unfortunately prevails in some other parts of India, was abandoned, and the actual rental of the country was accepted, with necessary corrections, as the basis of assessment. Provinces, and it therefore escaped some of the worst blunders made in earlier years. The landlords of Oudh were called Talukdars, and out of 23, villages in Oudh, 13, were settled, in , with Talukdars, and with Village Proprietors.

Settlement after the Mutiny of The assessment of the estates of six reduced to five loyal Talukdars had been made permanent ; the other estates were settled between and for thirty years.

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Acquisition of the Punjab. The remainder was annexed after the second Sikh war in And 70 Fifth Letter to Lord Ctirzon: Delhi and some other districts were transferred from the North-Western Provinces to the Punjab after the Mutiny in A Board of Administration was formed for the Punjab in ; it gave place to a Chief Commissioner a few years later ; and after the Mutiny, and after the transference of Delhi and other districts into the Punjab, a Lieutenant-Governor was appointed for the Punjab in Settlements in the Punjab; Rates of Assess- ment — Mistakes, similar to those which had been made in the early Settlements in the N.

Provinces were made in the Punjab, and British administrators endeavoured to realise the rates at which lands were assessed under the Sikhs. Major Wace said, in his evidence before the Famine Commission of , that "commencing, in , with a standard of one-third of the produce, a period of low prices, combined with other considerations affecting the welfare of a newly- conquered and previously much -oppressed country, com- pelled us to reduce that standard successively to a fourth and a sixth.

There are a large number of petty land- lords in the Punjab, who cultivate their own lands ; and in the Famine Commission's Report it is stated Northern India yi that fifty-four per cent, of the cultivated area is held by cultivating landlords, and forty-four per cent, by tenants. In the Punjab the usual rent is accepted as the net produce, and the revenue is therefore about half the rental, as in the North-West Provinces. In Madras the net produce is calculated by an elaborate process which is inaccurate in results, and is unjust and oppressive to the cultivators.

I will not, in the present letter, recommend the exten- sion of the Bengal system of Permanent settlement to Northern India; I will merely suggest improvements which are consistent with the systems prevailing in Northern India, and which will not in any way affect the principle of those systems. Fair Bents and Secure Tenures for Cultivators. Macdonnell said before the Currency Committee: Some years ago the British Indian Association of Calcutta, repre- senting the large landholders of Bengal, proposed to accept twenty-five per cent, of the gross produce as the landlord's share, as appears from Mr Dampier's evidence before the Famine Commission of Appendix II.

And when the Bengal Tenancy Bill was framed in , it was proposed to lay down one-fifth the gross produce as the maximum rent. Again, in the Punjab Northern India n Administration Report of I find that ''over two thousand notices to eject tenants were issued in Hissar. Most of these were in Sirsa ; they show that the people are preparing for the coming Settlement by ejectment of such tenants as might claim to be occu- pancy tenants. Fair Revenue and Long Settlements. It is desirable that these rules should be made universal in their application in all parts of India, to prevent frequent harassment of the people.

Each Settlement generally secures a large enhancement on the revenue, as will be seen from the figures given below, and it is necessary Increase of District. Revenue due to resettlement. Garhwal Unao Partapgarh. Increase- of Revenue due to resettlement. There is always the risk of landlords try- ing to obtain such enhancements of the rental, after they have submitted to an enhancement of the revenue at a new Settlement.

The Imposition of Cesses. In Bengal, cesses are levied from landlords and cultivators for roads, and for public works ; in Northern India cesses are levied for Roads, Schools, Post Office, Dispensary, Famines, Patwaris, and Chowkidars, amounting to eight and a quarter per cent. These cesses are assessed on the rent, and paid by land- holders with the land revenue ; and when the land revenue is enhanced at settlements, the cesses advance automatically. It will be clear to Your Excellency that the object of fixing the revenue at fifty per cent, of the rental is entirely lost if another eight or twelve per cent, on the rental is added under the name of cesses.

The " Saharanpur Eules," which reduced the land revenue from sixty-six and two-thirds per cent, to fifty per cent, of the rental, are thus reduced to a dead letter, and the object of fixing a moderate land revenue is defeated, if the land is once more assessed with various cesses.

There may be some reason for assessing the land for works which directly benefit the land, like roads and Northern India 75 wells, but there is no reason or justice in assessing the land for schools and dispensaries. The total of cesses in Bengal is one anna in the rupee, or six and a quarter per cent, of the rental, and this rate should be fixed as the maximum total of all cesses imposed on land, leviable only for works benefiting the land. If a moderate as- sessment of the land be essentially necessary for the well-being of a nation of cultivators, it is absolutely necessary to guard against indirectly raising that assess- ment to a material extent, or for purposes not directly calculated to benefit the land.

In the last place, I desire, my Lord, to say only one word about the Land Alienation Bill, now under the consideration of the Indian Government. I shall not anticipate the decision of the experienced administrators who are giving their attention to the matter, nor shall I venture to express an opinion how far some provisions of the nature may be needed in some localities as a temporary measure of relief. All that I wish to urge is that no permanent relief can be given to the cultivators of India by taking away from the marketable value of about the only property which they possess.

In Bengal such proposals were under consideration in and again in , but it was wisely decided that good rent laws and light rental were the soundest means to save the cultivators from the grasp of money-lenders, and within my experience, good rent laws and light rental have to a great extent freed the cultivators of Bengal from indebtedness within the last thirty years.

Bengal cultivators, and the same result which has been achieved in Bengal can be produced elsewhere through the same means, viz. For the sake of convenience I desire briefly to summarise the proposals which I have made in the five letters, of which this is the last ; and as these proposals embody the views of my countrymen generally, I feel convinced they will receive Your Excellency's considera- tion. Having regard to the rates of rent and revenue in all Provinces of India, we ask that the old rule of demanding one-half the net produce be supplemented by a rule limiting the revenue to one-fifth the gross produce, wherever revenue is paid to the State direct by cultivators.

The average land revenue for a whole district, including wet and dry lands, should be limited to one-tenth the produce, as in Northern India. Northern India 77 c Where the State receives land revenue direct from cultivators, we ask that the rule laid down by Lord Eipon, of making an increase of prices the sole ground of enhancement at the time of re-settlements, be uni- versally applied. New taxes were imposed ; the annual famine grant was fixed at Ex. To the extent to which in any year the amount was not spent on relief, it was to be spent solely on reduction of debt, or rather upon avoidance of debt which is the same thing.

Such avoidance was to be effected by spending the money on productive public works, the cost of which would otherwise have been met by loans. In the budget of the grant was made; but in the budget of it was suspended. There was a strong protest from the public in India ; and the Secretary of State in his despatch of 23rd December took exception to Sir John Strachey's argument that, whether the public accounts showed surplus, equilibrium or deficit, the new taxes must prevent 1 Report of the Famine Commission of , p.

The merging of the proceeds of taxes, imposed under a distinct pledge, in the general revenues of India, was felt to be a violation of the pledge ; and it was decided in that the full grant of one and a half crores Rx. It will thus appear that "the original policy of devoting the whole of the grant, less actual cost of famine relief, to reduction or avoidance of debt had been changed by the acceptance of the view that a large part of the grant might be better applied to what are called Famine Protective, as distinct from Produc- tive Public Works.

In fifteen years down to the famine grant, at a crore and a half annually, was 22 J crores Rx. Spent on actual famine relief. On protective irrigation works.

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Reduction and avoidance of debt. Excluding that sum, the total money spent in fifteen years fell short of the grant by over eight millions of tens of rupees. The history of the Famine Relief and Insurance Grant is an illustra- tion of the truth that the interests of the people are but imperfectly safeguarded under the present system of administration. With the best of intentions, British administrators in India have repeatedly drifted into errors or forgotten their pledges, because the people themselves have been carefully debarred from any real share in the administra- tion.

So true is the maxim laid down by John Stuart Mill that '' it is an inherent condition of human affairs that no intention, however sincere, of protecting the interests of others, can make it safe or salutary to tie up their own hands. Railways and Irrigation 8i upon the Midland and Bengal Nagpur Eailways should not be charged to the famine grant, and the sanction given by Lord Eandolph Churchill, Secretary of State for India, to this irregular proceeding in should now be revoked.

When there is no famine, a million tens of rupees should be spent annually on protective irrigation works, and the remaining half a million should be used as a sinking fund to reduce the enormous public debt of India. The total length of railways in India up to the end of was 26,i miles, of which 22, miles were open for traffic. In the cool of the day, after 5 o'clock, everybody who owns or can hire a carriage goes out to drive, and usually stops at the Gymkhana in the country or at the Yacht Club in the city for chotohazree.

It is a good custom to admit women to clubs as they do here. The wives and daughters of members have every privilege, and can give tea parties and luncheons in the clubhouses, while on certain evenings of the week a band is brought from the military barracks and everybody of any account in European society is expected to be present. Tables are spread over the lawn, and are engaged in advance by ladies, who sit behind them, receive visits and pour tea just as they would do in their own houses. It is a very pleasant custom. All visitors who intend to remain in Bombay for any length of time are expected to call upon the governor and his wife, but it is not necessary for them to drive out to Malabar Point for such a purpose.

On a table in the reception room of the government building down-town are two books in which you write your name and address, and that is considered equivalent to a formal visit. One book is intended exclusively for those who have been "presented" and by signing it they are reminding his excellency and her excellency of their continued existence and notifying them where invitations to dinners and balls can reach them. The other book is designed for strangers and travelers, who inscribe their names and professions, where they live when they are at home, how long they expect to be in Bombay and where they are stopping.

Anybody who desires can sign this book and the act is considered equivalent to a call upon the governor. If the caller has a letter of introduction to His Excellency he can leave it, with a card, in charge of the clerk who looks after the visitors' book, and if he desires to see the governor personally for business or social reasons he can express that desire upon a sheet of note paper, which will be attached to the letter of introduction and delivered some time during the day.

The latter, if he is so disposed will then give the necessary instructions and an aide-de-camp will send a "chit," as they call a note over here, inviting the traveler to call at an hour named. There is a great deal of formality in official and social life. The ceremonies and etiquette are modeled upon those of the royal palaces in England, and the governor of each province, as well as the viceroy of India in Calcutta, has his little court.

A different code of etiquette must be followed in social relations with natives, because they do not usually open their houses to strangers. Letters of introduction should be sent with cards by messengers or through the mails. Then, if the gentleman to whom they are addressed desires, he will call at your hotel. Many of the wealthier natives, and especially the Parsees, are adopting European customs, but the more conservative Hindus still adhere to their traditional exclusive habits, their families are invisible and never mentioned, and strangers are never admitted to their homes.

Natives are not admitted to the European clubs. There is no mingling of the races in society, except in a few isolated cases of wealthy families, who have been educated in Europe and have adopted European customs. While the same prejudice does not exist theoretically, there is actually a social gulf as wide and as deep as that which lies between white and black families in Savannah or New Orleans. Occasionally there is a marriage between a European and a native, but the social consequences have not encouraged others to imitate the example. Such unions are not approved by public sentiment in either race, and are not usually attended with happiness.

Some of the Parsees, who are always excepted, and are treated as a distinct race and community, mingle with Europeans to a certain degree, but even in their case the line is sharply drawn. The native district of Bombay is not so dirty nor so densely populated as in most other Indian cities. The streets are wider and some of them will admit of a carriage, although the cross-streets are nearly all too narrow. The houses are from three to five stories in height, built of brick or stone, with overhanging balconies and broad eaves.

Sometimes the entire front and rear are of lattice work, the side walls being solid. Few of them are plastered, ceilings are unknown and partitions, for the sake of promoting circulation, seldom go more than half way to the top of a room. No glass is used, but every window has heavy blinds as a protection from the hot air and the rays of the sun. While our taste does not approve the arrangements in many cases, experience has taught the people of India how to live through the hot summers with the greatest degree of comfort, and anyone who attempts to introduce innovations is apt to make mistakes.

The fronts of many of the houses are handsomely carved and decorated, the columns and pillars and brackets which support the balconies, the railings, the door frames, the eaves and architraves, are often beautiful examples of the carvers' skill, and the exterior walls are usually painted in gay colors and fanciful designs. Within doors the houses look very bare to us, and contain few comforts. The lower floor of the house is commonly used for a shop, and different lines of business are classified and gathered in the same neighborhood.

The food market, the grocery and provision dealers, the dealers in cotton goods and other fabrics, the silk merchants, the shoe and leather men, the workers in copper and brass, the goldsmiths, jewelers and dealers in precious stones each have their street or quarter, which is a great convenience to purchasers, and scattered among them are frequent cook-shops and eating places, which do not resemble our restaurants in any way, but have a large patronage.

A considerable portion of the population of Bombay, and the same is true of all other Indian cities, depends upon these cook-shops for food as a measure of economy and convenience. People can send out for dinner, lunch, or breakfast at any hour, and have it served by their own servants without being troubled to keep up a kitchen or buy fuel.

There are said to be 6, dealers in jewelry and precious stones in the city of Bombay, and they all seem to be doing a flourishing business, chiefly with the natives, who are very fond of display and invest their money in precious stones and personal adornments of gold and silver, which are safer and give more satisfaction than banks.

You can see specimens of every race and nation in the native city, nearly always in their own distinctive costumes, and they are the source of never-ending interest—Arabs, Persians, Afghans, Rajputs, Parsees, Chinese, Japanese, Malays, Lascars, Negroes from Zanzibar, Madagascar and the Congo, Abyssinians. Nubians, Sikhs, Thibetans, Burmese, Singalese, Siamese and Bengalis mingle with Jews, Greeks and Europeans on common terms, and, unlike the population of most eastern cities, the people of Bombay always seem to be busy. Many enterprises usually left for the municipal authorities of a city to carry on cannot be undertaken by the government of India because of the laws of caste, religious customs and fanatical prejudices of the people.

The Hindu allows no man to enter his home; the women of a Mohammedan household are kept in seclusion, the teachings of the priests are contrary to modern sanitary regulations, and if the municipal authorities should condemn a block of buildings and tear it down, or discover a nuisance and attempt to remove it, they might easily provoke a riot and perhaps a revolution. This has happened frequently. During the last plague a public tumult had to be quelled by soldiers at a large cost of life because of the efforts of the government to isolate and quarantine infected persons and houses.

These peculiar conditions suggested in Bombay the advantage of a semi-public body called "The Improvement Trust," which was organized a few years ago by Lord Sandhurst, then governor. The original object was to clear out the slums and infected places after the last plague, to tear down blocks of rotten and filthy tenement-houses and erect new buildings on the ground; to widen the streets, to let air and light into moldering, festering sink holes of poverty, vice and wretchedness; to lay sewers and furnish a water supply, and to redeem and regenerate certain portions of the city that were a menace to the public health and morals.

This work was intrusted to twelve eminent citizens, representing each of the races and all of the large interests in Bombay, who commanded the respect and enjoyed the confidence of the fanatical element of the people, and would be permitted to do many things and introduce innovations that would not be tolerated if suggested by foreigners, or the government. After the special duty which they were organized to perform had been accomplished The Improvement Trust was made permanent as a useful agency to undertake works of public utility of a similar character which the government could not carry on.

The twelve trustees serve without pay or allowances; not one of them receives a penny of compensation for his time or trouble, or even the reimbursement of incidental expenses made necessary in the performance of his duties. This is an exhibition of unusual patriotism, but it is considered perfectly natural in Bombay. To carry out the plans of the Trust, salaried officials are employed, and a large force is necessary. The trustees have assumed great responsibilities, and supply the place of a board of public works, with larger powers than are usually granted to such officials.

The municipality has turned over to them large tracts of real estate, some of which has been improved with great profit; it has secured funds by borrowing from banks upon the personal credit of its members, and by issuing bonds which sell at a high premium, and the money has been used in the improvement of the city, in the introduction of sanitary reforms, in building model tenements for the poor, in creating institutions of public necessity or advantage and by serving the people in various other ways.

The street car system of Bombay belongs to an American company, having been organized by a Mr. Kittridge, who came over here as consul during President Lincoln's administration.

Cindy Blackman - Vashkar (2010)

Recognizing the advantage of street cars, in he interested some American capitalists in the enterprise, got a franchise, laid rails on a few of the principal streets and has been running horse cars ever since. The introduction of electricity and the extension of the street railway system is imperatively needed. Distances are very great in the foreign section, and during the hot months, from March to November, it is impossible for white men to walk in the sun, so that everybody is compelled to keep or hire a carriage; while on the other hand the density of the population in other sections is so great as to be a continual and increasing public peril.

Bombay has more than , inhabitants, two-thirds of whom are packed into very narrow limits, and in the native quarters it is estimated that there is one human being to every ten square yards of space. It will be realized that this is a dangerous condition of affairs for a city that is constantly afflicted with epidemics and in which contagious diseases always prevail. The extension of the street car service would do something to relieve this congestion and scatter many of the people out among the suburbs, but the Orientals always swarm together and pack themselves away in most uncomfortable and unhealthful limits, and it will always be a great danger when the plagues or the cholera come around.

Multitudes have no homes at all. They have no property except the one or two strips of dirty cotton which the police require them to wear for clothing. They lie down to sleep anywhere, in the parks, on the sidewalks, in hallways, and drawing their robes over their faces are utterly indifferent to what happens. They get their meals at the cook shops for a few farthings, eat when they are hungry, sleep when they are sleepy and go through life without a fixed abode.

Other American firms of merchants and manufacturers have resident agents, but they are mostly Englishmen or Germans. There is, however, very little demand in India for agricultural implements, although three-fourths of the people are employed in tilling the soil. Each farmer owns or rents a very small piece of ground, hardly big enough to justify the use of anything but the simple, primitive tools that have been handed down to him through long lines of ancestors for 3, years.

Nearly all his implements are home-made, or come from the village blacksmith shop, and are of the rudest, most awkward description. They plow with a crooked stick, they dig ditches with their fingers, and carry everything that has to be moved in little baskets on their heads. The harvesting is done with a primitive-looking sickle, and root crops are taken out of the ground with a two-tined fork with a handle only a foot long.

The Hindu does everything in a squatting posture, hence he uses only short-handled tools. Fifty or seventy-five cents each would easily replace the outfit of three-fourths of the farmers in the empire. Occasionally there is a rajah with large estates under cultivation upon which modern machinery is used, but even there its introduction is discouraged; first, because the natives are very conservative and disinclined to adopt new means and new methods; and, second, and what is more important, every labor-saving implement and machine that comes into the country deprives hundreds of poor coolies of employment.

The development of the material resources of India is slowly going on, and mechanical industries are being gradually established, with the encouragement of the government, for the purpose of attracting the surplus labor from the farms and villages and employing it in factories and mills, and in the mines of southern India, which are supposed to be very rich. These enterprises offer limited possibilities for the sale of machinery, and American-made machines are recognized as superior to all others. There is also a demand for everything that can be used by the foreign population, which in India is numbered somewhere about a million people, but the trade is controlled largely by British merchants who have life-long connections at home, and it is difficult to remove their prejudices or persuade them to see the superiority of American goods.

Nevertheless, our manufactories, on their merits, are gradually getting a footing in the market. When Mark Twain was in Bombay, a few years ago, he met with an unusual experience for a mortal. He was a guest of the late Mr. Tata, a famous Parsee merchant, and received a great deal of attention. All the foreigners in the city knew him, and had read his books, and there are in Bombay hundreds of highly cultivated and educated natives.

He hired a servant, as every stranger does, and was delighted when he discovered a native by the name of Satan among the numerous applicants. He engaged him instantly on his name; no other recommendation was necessary. To have a servant by the name of Satan was a privilege no humorist had ever before enjoyed, and the possibilities to his imagination were without limit. And it so happened that on the very day Satan was employed, Prince Aga Khan, the head of a Persian sect of Mohammedans, who is supposed to have a divine origin and will be worshiped as a god when he dies, came to call on Mr.

Satan was in attendance, and when he appeared with the card upon a tray, Mr. Clemens asked if he knew anything about the caller; if he could give him some idea who he was, because, when a prince calls in person upon an American tourist, it is considered a distinguished honor. Aga Khan is well known to everybody in Bombay, and one of the most conspicuous men in the city. He is a great favorite in the foreign colony, and is as able a scholar as he is a charming gentleman. Satan, with all the reverence of his race, appreciated the religious aspect of the visitor more highly than any other, and in reply to the question of his new master explained that Aga Khan was a god.

It was a very gratifying meeting for both gentlemen, who found each other entirely congenial. Aga Khan has a keen sense of humor and had read everything Mark Twain had written, while, on the other hand, the latter was distinctly impressed with the personality of his caller. That evening, when he came down to dinner, his host asked how he had passed the day: I have hired Satan for a servant, and a God called to tell me how much he liked Huck Finn.

It is said to be impossible to do without one and I am inclined to think that is true, for it is a fixed custom of the country, and when a stranger attempts to resist, or avoid or reform the customs of a country his trouble begins. Many of the Indian hotels expect guests to bring their own servants—to furnish their own chambermaids and waiters—hence are short-handed, and the traveler who hasn't provided himself with that indispensable piece of baggage has to look after himself. On the railways a native servant is even more important, for travelers are required to carry their own bedding, make their own beds and furnish their own towels.

The company provides a bench for them to sleep on, similar to those we have in freight cabooses at home, a wash room and sometimes water. But if you want to wash your face and hands in the morning it is always better to send your servant to the station master before the trains starts to see that the tank is filled.

Then a naked Hindu with a goat-skin of water comes along, fills the tank and stands around touching his forehead respectfully every time you look his way until you give him a penny. The eating houses along the railway lines also expect travelers to bring their own servants, who raid their shelves and tables for food and drink and take it out to the cars. That is another of the customs of the country.

For these reasons a special occupation has been created, peculiar to India—that of travelers' servants, or "bearers" as they are called. I have never been able to satisfy myself as to the derivation of the name. Some wise men say that formerly, before the days of railroads, people were carried about in sedan chairs, as they are still in China, and the men who carried them were called "bearers;" others contend that the name is due to the circumstance that these servants bear the white man's burden, which is not at all likely. They certainly do not bear his baggage.

They hire coolies to do it. A self-respecting "bearer" will employ somebody at your expense to do everything he can avoid doing and will never demean himself by carrying a trunk, or a bag, or even a parcel. You give him money to pay incidental expenses, for you don't want him bothering you all the time, and he hires other natives to do the work. But his wages are small. He gets his board for nothing at the hotels for waiting on his master, and on the pretext that he induced him to come there. He never buys it, because he does not need it, but that's another custom of the country.

Then again, at the end of the engagement he expects a present—a little backsheesh—two or three dollars, and a certificate that you are pleased with his services. But they are not only worthless; they actually imperil your soul because of their exasperating ways and general cussedness. One Swede girl will do as much work as a dozen Hindus, and do it much better than they, and, what is even more important to the housewife, can be relied upon. High-priced servants usually are an economy—good things always cost money, but give better satisfaction.

Another common mistake is that Indian hotel prices are low. They are just as high as anywhere else in the world for the accommodations. I have noticed that wherever you go the same amount of luxury and comfort costs about the same amount of money. You pay for all you get in an Indian hotel.

The service is bad because travelers are expected to bring their own servants to answer their calls, to look after their rooms and make their beds, and in some places to wait on them in the dining-room. There are no women about the houses. Men do everything, and if they have been well trained as cleaners the hotel is neat.

If they have been badly trained the contrary may be expected. The same may be said of the cooking. The landlord and his guest are entirely at the mercy of the cook, and the food is prepared according to his ability and education. You get very little beef because cows are sacred and steers are too valuable to kill. The mutton is excellent, and there is plenty of it. You cannot get better anywhere, and at places near the sea they serve an abundance of fish. Vegetables are plenty and are usually well cooked.

The coffee is poor and almost everybody drinks tea. You seldom sit down to a hotel table in India without finding chickens cooked in a palatable way for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and eggs are equally good and plenty. The bread is usually bad, and everybody calls for toast. The deserts are usually quite good. It takes a stranger some time to become accustomed to barefooted servants, but few of the natives in India of whatever class wear shoes.

Rich people, business men, merchants, bankers and others who come in contact on equal terms with the foreign population usually wear them in the streets, but kick them off and go around barefooted as soon as they reach their own offices or their homes. Although a servant may be dressed in elaborate livery, he never wears shoes. The butlers, footmen, ushers and other servants at the government house in Calcutta, at the viceregal lodge at Simla, at the palace of the governor of Bombay, and the residences of the other high officials, are all barefooted.

Everybody with experience agrees that well-trained Hindu servants are quick, attentive and respectful and ingenious. Marion Crawford in "Mr. You say to your man, 'Go there and wait for me,' and you arrive and find him waiting; though how he transferred himself thither, with his queer-looking bundle, and his lota and cooking utensils and your best teapot wrapped up in a newspaper and ready for use, and with all the hundred and one things that a native servant contrives to carry about without breaking or losing one of them, is an unsolved puzzle.

Yet there he is, clean and grinning as ever, and if he were not clean and grinning and provided with tea and cheroots, you would not keep him in your service a day, though you would be incapable of looking half so spotless and pleased under the same circumstances yourself.

A butler will not wash dishes or dust or sweep. He will go to market and wait on the table, but nothing more. A cook must have a coolie to wash the kitchen utensils, and wait on him. He will do nothing but prepare the food for the table. A coachman will do nothing but drive.

He must have a coolie to take care of the horse, and if there are two horses the owner must hire another stable man, for no Hindu hostler can take care of more than one, at least he is not willing to do so. An American friend has told me of his experience trying to break down one of the customs of the East, and compelling one native to groom two horses. It is too long and tearful to relate here, for he was finally compelled to give in and hire a man for every horse and prove the truth of Kipling's poem: A fool lies here, Who tried to hustle the East.

And so we hired a "bearer. They appeared in swarms before our trunks had come up from the steamer, and continued to come by ones and twos until we had made a selection. They camped outside our rooms and watched every movement we made. They sprang up in our way from behind columns and gate-posts whenever we left the hotel or returned to it. They accosted us in the street with insinuating smiles and politely opened the carriage door as we returned from our drives. They were of all sizes and ages, castes and religions, and, strange to say, most of them had become Christians and Protestants from their strong desire to please.

Each had a bunch of "chits," as they call them—recommendations from previous employers, testifying to their intelligence, honesty and fidelity, and insisted upon our reading them. Finally, in self-defense, we engaged a stalwart Mohammedan wearing a snow-white robe, a monstrous turban and a big bushy beard. He is an imposing spectacle; he moves like an emperor; his poses are as dignified as those of the Sheik el Islam when he lifts his hands to bestow a blessing.

And we engaged Ram Zon Abdullet Mutmammet on his shape. It was a mistake. Beauty is skin deep. No one can judge merit by outside appearances, as many persons can ascertain by glancing in a mirror. Ram Zon, and that was what we called him for short, was a splendid illusion. It turned out that he could not scrape together enough English to keep an account of his expenditures and had to trust to his memory, which is very defective in money matters. He cannot read or write, he cannot carry a message or receive one; he is no use as a guide, for, although information and ideas may be bulging from his noble brow, he lacks the power to communicate them, and, worse than all, he is surly, lazy and a constitutional kicker.

He was always hanging around when we didn't want him, and when we did want him he was never to be found. Ram had not been engaged two hours before he appeared in our sitting room, enveloped in a dignity that permeated the entire hotel, stood erect like a soldier, brought his hand to his forehead and held it there for a long time—the salute of great respect—and gave me a sealed note, which I opened and found to read as follows: He will make your mind buzzling and will steal your properties, and can run away with you midway.

In proof you please touch his right hand shoulder and see what and how big charm he has. Such a bad temperature man you have in your service. Besides he only grown up taller and looks like a dandee as it true but he is not fit to act in case not to disappeared. I beg of you kindly consult about those matters and select and choose much experienced man than him otherwise certainly you could be put in to great danger by his conjuring and into troubles. We did not feel of his right arm and he did not try to conjure us, but his temperature is certainly very bad, and he soon became a nuisance, which we abated by paying him a month's wages and sending him off.

Then, upon the recommendation of the consul we got a treasure, although he does not show it in his looks. The hotels of India have a very bad name. There are several good ones in the empire, however, and every experienced traveler and every clubman you meet can tell you the names of all of them. Hence it is not impossible to keep a good hotel in India with profit. The best are at Lucknow and Darjeeling. Those at Caucutta are the worst, although one would think that the vice-regal capital would have pride enough to entertain its many visitors decently.

Bombay at last has such a hotel as ought to be found in Calcutta and all the other large cities, an architectural monument, and an ornament to the country. It is due to the enterprise of the late Mr. Tata, a Parsee merchant and manufacturer, and it is to be hoped that its success will be sufficient to stimulate similar enterprises elsewhere.

It would be much better for the people of India to coax tourists over here by offering them comforts, luxuries and pleasures than to allow the few who do come, to go away grumbling. The thousands who visit Cairo every winter are attracted there by the hotels, for no city has better ones, and no hotels give more for the money. Hence they pay big profits, and are a source of prosperity to the city, as well as a pleasure to the idle public. The most interesting study in Bombay is the people, but there are several excursions into the country around well worth making, particularly those that take you to the cave temples of the Hindus, which have been excavated with infinite labor and pains out of the solid rock.

With their primitive tools the people of ancient times chiseled great caverns in the sides of rocky cliffs and hills and fashioned them after the conventional designs of temples, with columns, pillars, vaulted ceilings, platforms for their idols and pulpits for their priests. The nearest of these wonderful examples of stone cutting is on an island in the harbor of Bombay, called Elephanta, because at one time a colossal stone elephant stood on the slope near the landing place, but it was destroyed by the Portuguese several centuries ago.

The island rises about feet above the water, its summit is crowned with a glorious growth of forest, its sides are covered with dense jungles, and the beach is skirted by mangrove swamps. Or if you prefer a sail you can hire one of the native boats with a peculiar rigging and usually get a good breeze in the morning, although it is apt to die down in the afternoon, and you have to take your chances of staying out all night.

The only landing place at Elephanta Island is a wall of concrete which has been built out across the beach into four or five feet of water, and you have to step gingerly lest you slip on the slime. At the end of the wall a solid stairway cut in the hillside leads up to the temple. It was formerly used daily by thousands of worshipers, but in this degenerate age nobody but tourists ever climb it.

Every boat load that lands is greeted by a group of bright-eyed children, who follow the sahibs gentlemen and mem-sahibs ladies up the stairs, begging for backsheesh and offering for sale curios beetles and other insects of brilliant hues that abound on the island. Coolies are waiting at the foot of the stairs with chairs fastened to poles, in which they will carry a person up the steep stairway to the temple for 10 cents. Reaching the top you find a solid fence with a gateway, which is opened by a retired army officer who has been appointed custodian of the place and collects small fees, which are devoted to keeping the temples clean and in repair.

The island is dedicated to Siva, the demon god of the Hindus, and it is therefore appropriate that its swamps and jungles should abound with poisonous reptiles and insects. The largest of the several temples is feet square and from 32 to 58 feet high, an artificial cave chiseled out of the granite mountain side. The roof is sustained by sixteen pilasters and twenty-six massive fluted pillars.

In a recess in the center is a gigantic figure of Siva in his character as The Destroyer. His face is turned to the east and wears a stern, commanding expression. His head-dress is elaborate and crowned by a tiara beautifully carved. In one hand he holds a citron and in the other the head of a cobra, which is twisted around his arm and is reaching towards his face. His neck is adorned with strings of pearls, from which hangs a pendant in the form of a heart. Another necklace supports a human skull, the peculiar symbol of Siva, with twisted snakes growing from the head instead of hair.

This is the great image of the temple and represents the most cruel and revengeful of all the Hindu gods. Ten centuries ago he wore altogether a different character, but human sacrifices have always been made to propitiate him. Around the walls of the cave are other gods of smaller stature representing several of the most prominent and powerful of the Hindu pantheon, all of them chiseled from the solid granite.

There are several chambers or chapels also for different forms of worship, and a well which receives its water from some mysterious source, and is said to be very deep. The Portuguese did great damage here several centuries ago in a war with India, for they fired several cannon balls straight into the mouth of the cave, which carried away several of the columns and destroyed the ornamentation of others, but the Royal Asiatic Society has taken the trouble to make careful and accurate repairs.

Although the caves at Elephanta are wonderful, they are greatly inferior in size and beauty to a larger group at Ellora, a day's journey by train from Bombay, and after that a carriage or horseback ride of two hours. There are cave temples, carved out of the solid rock between the second and the tenth centuries.

They are scattered along the base of a range of beautifully wooded hills about feet above the plain, and the amount of labor and patience expended in their construction is appalling, especially when one considers that the men who made them were without the appliances and tools of modern times, knew nothing of explosives and were dependent solely upon chisels of flint and other stones. The greatest and finest of them is as perfect in its details and as elaborate in its ornamentations as the cathedrals at Milan or Toledo, except that it has been cut out of a single piece of stone instead of being built up of many small pieces.

The architect made his plans with the most prodigal detail and executed them with the greatest perfection. He took a solid rock, an absolute monolith, and chiseled out of it a cathedral feet long, feet wide and 96 feet high, with four rows of mighty columns sustaining a vaulted roof that is covered with pictures in relief illustrating the power and the adventures and the achievements of his gods. It would accommodate 5, worshippers. Around the walls he left rough projections, which were afterward carved into symbolical figures and images, eight, ten and twelve feet high, of elephants lions, tigers, oxen, rams, swans and eagles, larger than life.

Corner niches and recesses have been enriched with the most intricate ornamentation, and in them, still of the same rock, without the introduction of an atom of outside material, the sculptors chiseled the figures of forty or more of the principal Hindu deities. And on each of the four sides is a massive altar carved out of the side of the cliff with the most ornate and elaborate traceries and other embellishment.

Indeed, my pen is not capable of describing these most wonderful achievements of human genius and patience. But all of them have been described in great detail and with copious illustrations in books that refer to nothing else. I can only say that they are the most wonderful of all the human monuments in India. The smallest of the principal group is 90 feet long, 40 feet wide, with a roof 40 feet high sustained by thirty-four columns. They are all alike in one particular. No mortar was used in their construction or any outside material. Every atom of the walls and ceilings, the columns, the altars and the images and ornaments stands exactly where the Creator placed it at the birth of the universe.

There are several groups of cave temples in the same neighborhood. Some of them were made by the Buddhists, for it seems to have been fashionable in those days to chisel places of worship out of the rocky hillsides instead of erecting them in the open air, according to the ordinary rules of architecture. There are not less than in western India which are believed to have been made within a period of a thousand years. Archaeologists dispute over their ages, just as they disagree about everything else.

Some claim that the first of the cave temples antedates the Christian era; others declare that the oldest was not begun for years after Christ, but to the ordinary citizen these are questions of little significance. It is not so important for us to know when this great work was done, but it would be extremely gratifying if somebody could tell us who did it—what genius first conceived the idea of carving a magnificent house of worship out of the heart of a mountain, and what means he used to accomplish the amazing results.

We would like to know for example, who made the designs of the Vishwa Karma, or carpenter's cave, one of the most exquisite in India, a single excavation 85 by 45 feet in area and 35 feet high, which has an arched roof similar to the Gothic chapels of England and a balcony or gallery over a richly sculptured gateway very similar to the organ loft of a modern church.

At the upper end, sitting cross-legged in a niche, is a figure four feet high, with a serene and contemplative expression upon its face. Because it has none of the usual signs and symbols and ornaments that appertain to the different gods, archaeologists have pronounced it a figure of the founder of the temple, who, according to a popular legend, carved it all with his own hands, but there is nothing to indicate for whom the statue was intended, and the various stories told of it are pure conjectures that only exasperate one who studies the details.

Each stroke of the chisel upon the surface of the interior was as delicate and exact as if a jewel instead of a granite mountain was being carved. There are temples to all of the great gods in the Hindu catalogue; there are several in honor of Buddha, and others for Jain, all more or less of the same design and the same style of execution. Those who care to know more about them can find full descriptions in Fergusson's "Indian Architecture.

You will be surprised to know that there are four or five of these colonies belonging to other European governments within the limits of British India, entirely independent of the viceroy and the authority of Edward VII. The French have two towns of limited area in Bengal, one of them only an hour's ride from Calcutta. They are entirely outside of the British jurisdiction and under the authority of the French Republic, which has always been respected. The Dutch have two colonies in India also, and Goa, the most important of all, is subject to Portugal.

The territory is sixty-two miles long by forty miles wide, and has a population of , The inhabitants are nearly all Roman Catholics, and the archbishop of Goa is primate of the East, having jurisdiction over all Roman Catholics between Cairo and Hong-Kong. More than half of the population are converted Hindus, descendants of the original occupants of the place, who were overcome by the Duke of Albuquerque in , and after seventy or eighty years of fighting were converted by the celebrated and saintly Jesuit missionary, St.

He lived and preached and died in Goa, and was buried in the Church of the Good Jesus, which was erected by him during the golden age of Portugal—for at one time that little kingdom exercised a military, political, ecclesiastical and commercial influence throughout the world quite as great, comparatively speaking, as that of Great Britain to-day. Goa was then the most important city in the East, for its wealth and commerce rivaled that of Genoa or Venice. It was as large as Paris or London, and the viceroy lived in a palace as fine as that occupied by the king.

But very little evidence of its former magnificence remains. Its grandeur was soon exhausted when the Dutch and the East India Company came into competition with the Portuguese. The Latin race has never been tenacious either in politics or commerce. Like the Spaniards, the Portuguese have no staying power, and after a struggle lasting seventy years, all of the wide Portuguese possessions in the East fell into the hands of the Dutch and the British, and nothing is now left but Goa, with its ruins and reminiscences and the beautiful shrine of marble and jasper, which the Grand Duke of Tuscany erected in honor of the first great missionary to the East.

It extends from a region of perpetual snow in the Himalayas, almost to the equator. The superficial area is 1,, square miles, and you can understand better what that means when I tell you that the United States has an area of 2,, square miles, without counting Alaska or Hawaii. India is about as large as that portion of the United States lying east of a line drawn southward along the western boundary of the Dakotas, Kansas and Texas. The population of India in was ,, or about one-fifth of the human race, and it comprises more than distinct nations and peoples in every grade of civilization from absolute savages to the most complete and complex commercial and social organizations.

It has every variety of climate from the tropical humidity along the southern coast to the frigid cold of the mountains; peaks of ice, reefs of coral, impenetrable jungles and bleak, treeless plains. One portion of its territory records the greatest rainfall of any spot on earth; another, of several hundred thousand square miles, is seldom watered with a drop of rain and is entirely dependent for moisture upon the melting snows of the mountains.

Twelve thousands different kinds of animals are enumerated in its fauna, 28, plants in its flora, and the statistical survey prepared by the government fills volumes of the size of our census reports. One hundred and eighteen distinct languages are spoken in various parts of India and fifty-nine of these languages are spoken by more than , people each. A large number of other languages and dialects are spoken by different tribes and clans of less than , population.

The British Bible Society has published the whole or parts of the Holy Scriptures in forty-two languages which reach ,, people, but leave 74,, without the Holy Word. In order to give the Bible to the remainder of the population of India it would be necessary to publish additional translations, which the society has no money and no men to prepare. From this little statement some conception of the variety of the people of India may be obtained, because each of the tribes and clans has its own distinct organization and individuality, and each is practically a separate nation.

Spoken by Hindi 85,, Malayalam 5,, Bengali 41,, Masalmani 3,, Telugu 19,, Sindhi 2,, Marathi 18,, Santhal 1,, Punjabi 17,, Western Pahari 1,, Tamil 15,, Assamese 1,, Gujarathi 10,, Gond 1,, Kanarese 9,, Central Pahari 1,, Uriya 9,, Marwadi 1,, Burmese 5,, Pashtu 1,, The Province of Bengal, for example, is nearly as large as all our North Atlantic states combined, and contains an area of , square miles. The Province of Rajputana is even larger, and has a population of 74,,, almost as great as that of the entire United States. Madras has a population of 38,,, and the central provinces 47,,, while several of the different states into which India is divided have more than 10,, each.

The population is divided according to religions as follows: Hindus ,, Sikhs 2,, Mohammedans 62,, Jains 1,, Buddhists 9,, Parsees 94, Animistic 8,, Jews 18, Christians 2,, It will be interesting to know that of the Christians enumerated at the last census 1,, were Roman Catholics, , belonged to the established Church of England, , were orthodox Greeks, , were Baptists, , Lutherans, 53, Presbyterians and , put themselves down as Protestants without giving the sect to which they adhere.

The foreign population of India is very small. The British-born number only 96,; , were born on the continent of Europe, and only , out of nearly ,, were born outside the boundaries of India. India consists of four separate and well-defined regions: This is the scene of periodical famine, but the government is pushing the irrigation system so rapidly that before many years the danger from that source will be much diminished. The whole of southern India, according to the geologists, was once covered by a great forest, and indeed there are still 66,, acres in trees which are carefully protected.

The black soil of that region is proverbial for its fertility and produces cotton, sugar cane, rice and other tropical and semi-tropical plants with an abundance surpassed by no other region. The fruit-bearing palms require a chapter to themselves in the botanies, and are a source of surprising wealth.