Some Account of the Famine in Guzeraty ^-c. 267 



Guzerat, named Puttun, and from thence scoured Kattiwar ; 

 on one occasion only, appearing as far south as the city of Ba- 

 roach on the Nerbudda. Beyond this point the locusts were 

 not known to extend ; and by the commencement of the mon- 

 soon of 1812, this plague vanished from the face of the country. 

 The destruction committed by these insects in the western 

 parts of Guzerat was deplorable. During the circuit of the 

 subsidiary force at the latter end of 1811, extensive tracts were 

 covered with cultivation ; and, until examined, the spectator 

 would have considered the harvest as being in a most flourish- 

 ing condition. The locusts, however, had devoured the grain, 

 and the stalks were left as unworthy of being cleared from the 

 ground. The failure of grain in Marwar, and the ruin by the 

 locusts of the products of the land during the preceding year, 

 drove the inhabitants of that unfortunate country into the bosom 

 of Guzerat, where their condition was comparatively improved, 

 though one of the causes which compelled them to seek refuge 

 at a distance from home, had begun to operate also in that pro- 

 vince. Miseries seemed to follow the footsteps of the Marwa- 

 rees, and to mingle their neighbours in their untoward destiny ; 

 for it was in the year 1812 that Guzerat also experienced a fail- 

 ure of rain, when the demands on its resources had augmented 

 in a twofold degree. The enhanced price of grain, added to the 

 apprehensions of the inhabitants, which impelled them to store 

 their individual resources in times of such danger, and the villanies 

 practised by the higher classes to derive pecuniary advantage 

 from the pressing wants of the people, soon reduced the half- 

 famished emigrants to the greatest privations : the endurance of 

 hunger was supported, however, by the Marwaree people with 

 unaccountable pertinacity, which in some degree blunted the 

 natural feelings of sympathy in their lot. Whether the ready 

 assistance rendered to these people on their first entrance into 

 Guzerat, had induced them to imagine, that under no circum- 

 stances the hand of charity would be withdrawn ; or whether it 

 was from the innate indolence of their character, or the infatua- 

 tion which often accompanies the extremes of misfortune, — that 

 they rejected the certain means of subsistence by labour, — ^it is 

 notorious, that in all cases when the benevolent tendered em- 

 ployment to these people, it was uniformly declined, even with 



