12 LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL SESSION, 1909 



heavy deficit ; I had to frame my Budget at short 

 notice and try to make two ends meet without 

 adding to taxation. 



We are told that you cannot make bricks without 

 straw, but the bricks were made, and so was my 

 Budget. 



I introduced my Financial Statement for 1909- 

 10 on March 22nd, 1909, and a very unpleasant 

 Statement it devolved on me to make. 



I explained to a sleepy Assembly (the heat was 

 unbearable) that the past year had been an un- 

 fortunate one. It had begun with famine in four 

 provinces and a partial famine in the three others. 

 That excessive malaria and bad trade had accom- 

 panied a very poor harvest, and that the net result 

 of the year's finance (for which I was not respon- 

 sible) was a deficit of no less than 3,700,000 the 

 first deficit since the year 1897-8. 



I managed to frame a Budget for the coming 

 year which showed a small surplus without any 

 additional taxation. 



After me followed every member of the Council 

 endowed with ideas or the lack thereof. Also the 

 grievance-mongers . 



The Indians are impatient of the large allotments 

 to the Army and the railways. They would like 

 to see the money spent on irrigation and education. 



But the Morley reforms have put them in good- 

 humour, and they accorded me marked courtesy 

 and consideration, and, I think, general approval. 



The Gladstone of debate is quite evidently Mr. 

 Gokhale. A severe critic, a somewhat habitual 

 fault-finder, he is none the less as fair as he is 

 forcible. 



