and (3) the distribution of gratuitous relief to those who cannot be brought to poor-houses, and who are unable or unwilling, for sufficient reason, to work for wages on the public relief works.

In accordance with the regulations of the famine codes, full lists are maintained for all districts at all times of the projected works which can be utilized as famine relief works in case of necessity. These consist almost exclusively of earthworks, either the excavation of tanks, the digging of canals, the construction of embankments for roads and railways or the like. Careful instructions are given to secure that all labour shall be utilized in the most profitable way consistent with the chief object of the works in relieving distress. The principles on which tasks should be fixed, the system on which gangs of workers should be organized, families being kept together as much as possible, the method of payment, the arrangements to be made for the sale of grain near the works, the provision of hospital accommodation for the sick, and all the innumerable details required for the organization of these works are all laid down in these codes and have to be most carefully followed.

At the same time each district is formed into circles, each containing a few agricultural villages, and covering an area of about 10 square miles, and over each circle an officer is placed whose duty it is to carefully watch and inspect each village, to report on the relief measures required as distress deepens, to pass on beggars to the poor-houses, to distribute gratuitous relief to the women, sick persons, high caste sufferers and the like, who cannot be brought to the relief works, and to provide work for the weavers and such classes who can be specially dealt with in their homes. These circle officers are supervised by inspectors of circles, who are again subordinate to the district officer, who is in command of all relief operations carried on within his district, an area of some 2,500 or 3,000 square miles.

The codes provide for the careful keeping of all the accounts connected with these works and the professional supervision of all engineering details, and further deal with the distribution of gratuitous relief, either in poor-houses and state kitchens, or by

means of doles in the houses of the sufferers. And in addition to these matters they prescribe rules of a miscellaneous nature for the protection of cattle-always great sufferers in a drought -the utilization of forest reserves, and the preparation of statistics and reports relating to the relief prescribed.

The codes are in fact almost complete in their instructions for dealing with the emergencies that have been known to occur in previous famines, and as they are kept constantly under revision, and are being continually added to and amended, they may be considered to contain all the suggestions for famine work made by our famine officers from time to time that have been tried and proved successful in actual practice.

The unprofessional reader may, however, notice with surprise. that the main object of all the work organized by the codes is not to provide the sufferers from famine with food, but only with the means of buying it, and that little or no provision is made for cases in which the food supply gives out altogether. The fact is that all the food required is practically always obtainable if there is money to purchase it, and that the energy of private trade, stimulated by the high prices that prevail, can be relied upon to meet any emergency so long as government undertakes to provide the people with the means of buying the food supplied.

And the whole question of the advisability of government entering the market as a purchaser, either by importing grain on its own account, or by subsidizing importers, has been discussed from all points of view by the government of India, with the result that definite orders have been issued forbidding any form of interference with private trade in the matter of the importation and sale of foodstuffs.

It is perhaps natural that the first remedy generally suggested for the relief of distress caused by a failure of crops should be the importation of food grains by government to keep down prices and ensure the people against a failure of food stocks, and whenever any apprehensions of famine are entertained this is the measure urgently pressed on government by the press and the public. But, after a most careful consideration of the very difficult problems involved in such action, those responsible for

the government of the country came to the definite conclusion that, save in exceptional cases in isolated districts where communications are defective, "the only wise course was for government to rigorously abstain from any attempt to intervene directly in, or in any way to supersede, the operations of private trade." The chief reason which influenced government in coming to this decision was the fact that, as remarked by Lord Northbrook when Viceroy of India, "although government may be able to do more than one trader, it cannot do as much as all the traders of a country taken together, while the fact that it can do so much more than any one trader must render every trader unwilling to cope with so powerful a rival." Our administrators are of opinion that the diversity of climate in different parts of our Indian empire is such that we can safely depend on the surplus produce of some provinces to supply the deficiency caused by a failure of crops in others, and that a simultaneous famine throughout the whole grain-producing area of the empire is a contingency for which it is scarcely necessary to provide. And even in such a case the operations of private trade would probably be more effective in securing speedy importation than the efforts of the most energetic government. With the best possible agencies for obtaining full information as to stocks, with the command of the means of transport from every food-producing country in the world, and with largely increased facilities for distributing grain within the peninsula itself, the commercial community wields a power that no government can readily acquire, and practical experience has shown that, as recently stated in an instruction issued by the present viceroy, "the inevitable effect of any attempt on the part of government to enter the market as a purchaser or importer on its own account is to gravely discourage, if it does not wholly paralyze, mercantile activity: and the evil thus done is great, out of all proportion to the actual magnitude of the government operations, since the uncertainty as to the possible nature and extent creates an apprehension which is fatal to enterprise and initiative in these matters. The Governor General in council believes that the intervention of government as a purchaser or importer would do infinitely

more harm than good, as it would cripple and discourage the agency which is best able to gauge the need, which is impelled by self-interest to anticipate it, and which alone is able to supply it effectually." And as a natural corollary to this decision to abstain from all action likely to interfere with the operations of private trade, it has been declared to be the function of government to assist that trade in every possible way by supplying all information relative to the prospects of the growing crops, the food stocks in hand and the probable extent of the distress, as fully and as promptly as possible, by guaranteeing that all classes shall be provided with the means of purchasing the grain brought in for sale, and by facilitating importation by means of favorable railway rates, protection of grain stores and the like.

Another serious question which has required decision during the recent trouble in India is the sphere of private charity in relieving distress. The calamity is so vast and its effects so widespread that while on the one hand the government has to exert itself to prevent any pauperization of the community, so as to defend its scanty resources from needless waste, it has, on the other hand, to exercise the utmost care and vigilance to secure to the sufferers in the vast areas affected the means of a bare subsistence. It is clear that in such circumstances there is enormous scope for the exertions of private charity, to supplement the work of government which is solely directed to the preservation of life, and it is equally clear that such charitable exertions should be guided in lines of agreement with the relief operations conducted by government, and not in conflict with them. In accordance with these principles the large sums subscribed by the public for the relief of suffering in India, amounting to £750,000 in 1877-8, and to one million pounds sterling on the present occasion, have been, and are being spent to the utmost advantage of the sufferers, and at the same time are proving of great value in assisting the very extensive operations of government. While the official organizations for relief purposes are made use of by the committees and voluntary workers employed in distributing charitable relief, these committees and workers form an addition to the army of enquirers and

reporters which is necessary for the vigilant watch and ward of every square mile of the distressed area, and the money distributed by them for hospital comforts, the maintenance of orphanages, the clothing of the destitute, and the restoration of ruined households to something of their ante-famine independence, is of the utmost political and practical value.

The above brief summary of the chief measures taken to protect India from famine or to relieve it when famine-stricken cannot but be bald and inadequate. It must be borne in mind that our government in India rules over nearly one-fifth of the human race, and that its rule is complicated by many dangers and difficulties. Of these the dangers and difficulties inseparable from the contest with famine are almost the most serious to be encountered, and the administrators of that country can only hope that impartial criticism will confirm the belief of their fellow-countrymen, that in the present great conflict with that calamity they are doing their duty by the great populations entrusted to their charge.

Indian Civil Service.

P. C. LYON.