374 



INDIA. 



ceipts for the past year, including a balance of 

 1,243 3s. 2d., were 4,621 17s. 6d., and the ex- 

 penditure was 3,542 Is. 9d., leaving a bal- 

 ance of 1,079 15s. 9d., of which 336 3s. 

 2d. would be appropriated to the reserved 

 fund. 



The Government Director's report upon 

 Indian railways for the year ending the 1st of 

 May, 1868, states that 349 miles^ of new rail- 

 way have been opened for traffic during the 

 year, making the total extent of lines now 

 open 3,943 miles; the length remaining to be 

 finished is 1,665 miles. Almost all the prin- 

 cipal cotton-fields of India are now connected 

 by the railways with ports of shipment. The 

 Great Indian Peninsula Eailway brings to the 

 port of Bombay the cotton of Oandeish and 

 Berar and of Barsee and Sholapore. The 

 Bombay and Baroda Railway brings also to 

 Bombay the produce of Guzerat ; the Madras 

 Railway brings to Madras the cotton of Dhar- 

 war and Bellary by its northern line, and of 

 Ooimbatore and Salem by its southern; the 

 East Indian conveys to Calcutta the cotton 

 grown in the valleys of the Ganges and Jumna; 

 the Punjab Railway, with the help of the 

 Indus flotilla and Scinde Railway, brings to 

 Kurrachee the produce of the Punjab and 

 northwest. The cotton-field of Tinnevelly is 

 at present unprovided with a railway, but the 

 extension of the Great Southern Railway into 

 this district is in contemplation, and surveys 

 are being made to ascertain the best route. 

 The cotton districts of Kattiawar also require 

 a short branch to bring them into communica- 

 tion with Bombay. Railways are beginning 

 to tell upon the cotton cultivation of India in 

 other ways than merely providing a more 

 rapid and less costly mode of conveyance than 

 formerly. Steam factories for cleaning cotton 

 are springing up, machines for half pressing 

 are established in many places, and in others 

 steam presses for packing the bales for ship- 

 ment have been constructed. The Indian rail- 

 ways employ 39,000 persons, of whom 36,000 

 are natives. Measures have been extensively 

 adopted to improve the position of the Euro- 

 pean servant, and among other means have an 

 organized plan of assisting (to the extent of 

 half the passage-money) married mechanics to 

 take their wives and families to India. The 

 capital accounts of the companies show that 

 upward of 9,000,00y have been added to the 

 capital of the railways, making the whole 

 amount that has been raised, up to the 31st of 

 March last, 76,579,000, of which 75,071,600 

 have been expended. 



The Post-Office Department had, in 1866, 

 2,070 post-offices and receiving-houses, the 

 total strength of the establishment consisted 

 of 24,197 persons, the mails were conveyed 

 over 46,997 miles, and 59,931,904 covers 

 (i. e., letters, newspapers, etc.) were conveyed 

 through the post-office. A comparison of the 

 statistics of 1866 with the eight preceding 

 years shows that since 1858 the number of 



letters, etc., conveyed through the post-offices 

 of British India has increased by nearly 

 17,500,000. 



The total strength of the army in British 

 India during the year 1866 consisted of 66,814 

 Europeans, and 117,095 natives. The staff and 

 staff-corps consisted of 1,366 Europeans ; the 

 engineers, sappers and miners, 378 Europeans 

 and 2,794 natives; the artillery, horse and 

 foot, of 12,299 Europeans and 1,891 natives ; 

 the cavalry, of 6,050 Europeans and 18,776 

 natives; the infantry of 45,916 Europeans and 

 93,631 natives; and the invalids, veterans, and 

 warrant officers, of 810 Europeans; the medi- 

 cal establishment being included in each arm 

 of the service. Of these total numbers, 38,992 

 Europeans and 43,394 natives were stationed 

 in Bengal, 14,184 Europeans and 46,435 na- 

 tives in Madras, and 13,638 Europeans and 

 27,268 natives in Bombay ; those stationed in 

 the northwest provinces and Punjab being 

 included in the presidency of Bengal. 



Sir John Lawrence, the Governor-General 

 of India, was recalled in 1868, and Lord Mayo, 

 heretofore a member of the Tory Cabinet, ap- 

 pointed in his place. 



Among the remarkable features of the ad- 

 ministration of Sir John Lawrence, is generally 

 counted the execution of a grand scheme of 

 great military barracks and fortifications. Just 

 before Sir John Lawrence's arrival, Lord Elgin's 

 government had determined to provide bar- 

 racks after the most approved sanitary fashion 

 for the English troops, and strategical build- 

 ings and appliances, such as might be required 

 in an emergency, thus saving soldiers' lives and 

 rendering it possible to hold the country with 

 a smaller number than the 90,000 of 1859. 

 The development and maturing of his policy 

 fell to his successor, and Colonel Crommelin, 

 the first of military engineers, was placed at 

 the head of a special department for this pur- 

 pose. Some time was necessarily spent in 

 agreeing upon model plans for the housing of 

 soldiers. As in the course of 1864 and 1865 

 the scheme gradually assumed shape, it was 

 found that its cost would be not under ten 

 millions sterling. It is now expected that 

 the whole of India will be supplied with new 

 barracks and forts on the best plan and of the 

 most durable character by the close of 1871, 

 by which time, too, the Great Trunk railway 

 system of Lord Dalhousie will be completed, 

 besides several extensions. Forts and fortified 

 posts are being constructed at almost every 

 military station, and especially near every great 

 railway station a place of refuge, for women and 

 children and non-combatants, is to be provided 

 against an emergency. These posts take the 

 form of a four, five, or six-sided enclosure, 

 flanked by bastions at the angles, and of which 

 the hospitals and two or more barracks consti- 

 tute the curtains. Such posts are to be formed 

 at Nowgong, Sealkote, Jullundhur, Umballa, 

 and Hyderabad, in the Deccan. Where there 

 are magazines and positions exposed to hostile 



