INDIA.

Colonist, Volume IV, Issue 366, 26 April 1861, Page 3

INDIA.

(From tlie Friend of India, Feb. 26.) , GREAT FAMINE IN THE NORTH-WEST AND THE PUNJAB. The' circle of suffering widens, as we had led our readers to expect it must widen, with the mere lapse of time. To the districts in the North-Western provinces before indicated must now be added that of Agra and tho whole of the Delhi territory There are grounds for the gravest anxiety, regarding the prospects of the Cis-Sutlej districts, and unless the rain we have lately had here has extended beyond the Sutlej, the spring crop even up to the .west of the Indus will be in jeopardy. Wo have looked to the vast wheat field of the punjalas one of the great granaries for the districts east of the Sutlej, but if failure pi rain there too should destroy the hope ot a present harvest, it will prove a deplorable aggravation of the.general misery. It i 3 as yet, however, only possible that such a result may have to be met; it will not be matter of certainty till ten or twelve days hence. ' ' ; What is certain at this moment, however, is that to the number of people previously stated asP the population of the famine-struck districts must now be added about 3£ millions more, making the whole in round numbers about 7i millions. And of these we believe we may take about 2i millions as representing the proportion at present wholly incapable of self-support, either from want of means to purchase food or from physical incapaci ty. When once the grip of the famine has laid hold firmly of a district, the rapidity with which its influence spreads is startling and terrible. Some of the details laid before the public meeting in Calcutta on the 21st iustant, and the accounts which appear from time to time in the north-west journals, illustrate this very strikingly. Many there were quite unprepared to Icain that in the Delhi districts crowds of human beings were living on the raw berries of the jungle; that thousands had lost all ability to move near to the means of subsistence, and were perishing in their desolate villages, that the village accountants who were able to keep up their records, recorded little else than the deaths of their people from lack of food. Yet these facts were supported by the highest local authority and confirmed to the meeting by the testimony of an earnest and intelligent eyewitness. ■The ; raising of the curtain, on such scenes of miseiy must quicken sympathy and .tt mulate action, while it brings into clear view the swift march of the calahiity with which we have to contend. The demands of the sufferers have grown of course with the growth of their numbers. To feed the whole at famine rates will require about 3.750,000 maunds of grain, the cost of whic v» would be about 12,250,00.6 6f rupees 0r.^1,250,000.