THE INDIAN FAMINE.

Manawatu Times, Volume II, Issue 109, 3 November 1877, Page 3

THE INDIAN FAMINE.

(From tho " European Mail.") There seems some risk lest the British public should fail at the moment to realise all that is meant by the accounts now reaching us from day to day respecting the^ Famine m India. Like all accounts of distant realities, they demand thought and attention, and it is difficult for many of us to divert thought ' and attention from the war now raging m Eastern Europe. As a correspondent from Madras observes,' the misery at this moment . m > Bulgaria , does not v approach that ny southern India ; but the former makes a more violent and vivid appeal to the ..imagination, and has, moreover, the 1 advantage of 'being m prior possession of our minds. The editor of the " Madras Times " estimates, m a vivid letter, tnat the famine has already caused, directly or indirectly, the death of half a million natives^ . and ho does not recoil from an estimate of at least tenfold that mortality, or tho death of five million natives, within the next few months. "We may" shrink from so ghastly a calculation, 'and it may be hoped we shall be able to avert some of this destruction of life ; but if we take into account the indirect as well as , the direct influence of the famine, even this estimate may be none too high. Behind and besides the actual deaths from starvation come a vast number from its after effects — f rom . the disease^ the constitutional feebleness, the undermining of the whole strength jof ' the population which < such a ' famine entails. Oneof the members of - the ' Mysore Bevenue s Survey Btated that m Bangalore there was ! a regular service organised, m addition .to the police, to keep the streets clear of the dead and dying. Outside the municipal limits, dead bodies, tie ,says, are lying m all ' directions; "the lower castes are cooking and eating, the bodies. . . . Two'days 'ago, when riding paßt the Hussar stables, I saw a crowd of wretched women and children routing m the dung-heap, and picking out the undigested grains of corn to eat." The people "who are reduced to these miserable expedients are, as another correspondent describes them,- ordinarily apathetic m the presence of death. ; but it seems to come upon 1 them now m too portentous' and'eruel a 4 form for even their, powers of endurance. There are horrible and miserable scenes enough in <the world, no doubt; but we question whether anything so terrible could be witnessed at this moment as this spectacle of the population of half a,, continent thus

perishingin the agonies of starvation. The Editor if the " Madras Times " says ; — " If the inhabitants of Madras are too poor to give much m aid of the distress, the burden upon Government is a grievious one, as a very few figures will show. In the course of his speech m the House of Commons, when introducing the ; Indian Budget, Lord George Hamilton said that the cost of the famine m Bombay and Madras would be £3,300,000. — a statement at which we m India marvelled greatly. This is how the matter stands at present for Madras alone, the figures being roughly given, but they are approximately correct : — Amount expended on direct relief to end of July 1877 (about), £3,000,000 ; probable expenditure to January next (may be very much more), £2,500,000; loss of land revenue next year through non-cultivation (about), £3,000;000 total for Madras alone, £8,500,000 Then; owing to the deaths of .cultivators — two millions at the very least — f or- many years to come the revenue from the land (the great stand-by of the State chest m India) will be very short. It is therefore hoped — and, as a member of the Central Committee, I trust I may be permitted . to say this — that the 1 generosity of the people of England, known' the wide world over, may not be wanting to aid their fellow-subjects of Her Majesty the Queen-Empress of India. The problem which the Duke of , Buckingham and Chandos and his council have to solve is, how to feed an uncertain number of people on imported- food 'for half a year at least. The Government .think, that from 3,500 to '4,000 tons of 'grain per -diem will be required during the next six , months, and the calculation' is. based upon 10,000,000 ; people having to Bubsist on imported 1 food ;■ but >f or aught we know to the ! contrary, the local stocks ,may be so denuded that the authorities may have to consider how 15 or more millions may. 'be fed. The critical state of affairs will .be seen wHen it is stated that the railways connected with the Presidency are not at present carrying more than- 2,500 tous a day,' and that it is extremely doubtful if they can work up to a much higher figure without new and powerful engines, which it -will take months to build and supply. Mysore, J from its' inland situation and dis--1 tance from railways, is already beginning to feel the prossure. The Commissioner m charge of that Province will 'want I,ooo' tons of grain a day, which is about equal to the food supply of 50 per cent, of the population.' In the distant part of the district there is," no doubt, much starvation going on at this moment. - We may look for the firsts big tragedy m that Province. [Indeed, information has reached I me, from Bangalore of two cases of I cannibalism ; but .until \ they, are authenticated beyond doubt I_ will not give details.] Not only Mysore, which is under the direct control of the Government of India,* but our own distant Provinces of Bellarv, Kurnool, and Cudd apah, will be m great' danger ' also. - A million of people all found require about 400 tons of grain a day, reckoning rather less than 1 lb.;. a head for all ages. To secure this "amount requires the importation of about, four hundred "and fifty tons (the loss m transit* iif more than ten per cent.). The area' of* the famine is 1 extending every day. " Formerly, including Mysore, it embraced a population of twenty million ; but now those • best acquainted with the actual state of things put it at nearly twenty-five million. t ■ .