INDIA. 



he empire or possibly introduced a 



.lit of danger. Instead of treating 



lies ,<{ tin- native princes as a 



, , ilie atlitude "f hostile watchfulness has 



net!, and these armies, making an ag- 

 "iii men. are being I rained and 

 I b\ the British in the expectation that 

 in in- utilized as fighting foroe for the dd- 

 !' India, in the event of a war with Russia. 

 .f picked men iii many of the states, heredi- 

 Idiers commanded ley native princes and 

 numbering in the a ^ rebate 25,00(1. are 

 iied with modern weapon- and instructed 

 British otlicers as a reserve force to co-oper- 

 with the Indian army in war. A scheme to 

 or for the native chiefs and nobles of 

 Lay. i he Punjab, and other provinces of 

 ti-h India by educating them in military 

 regarded as a political necessity ; but 

 lerick Kob'Tts has resisted the proposal, 

 ii-c British soldiers will not serve under 

 native ollicers, and the Sepoys, who are recruited 

 from the military races, would lose in efficiency 

 young native officers from military schools 

 placed over them and their native officers 

 have won promotion by service. In June, 

 1. (ien. Mracke'nbury succeeded Sir George 

 Cliesney as military member of the Council, and 

 in October, Sir Frederick Roberts retired, and 

 .i vcded by Mai.-Gen. Sir George White, 

 who commanded the held force in Burmah from 

 1886 to 1889, and has since been in command in 

 Belnchistaii. 



he established strength of the European army 

 the year 1890-'91 was 3,527 officers and 69,843 

 r'in all 73,370, comprising 12,723 artillery, 

 :>.r.7'.i cavalry. 254 engineers, 53,701 infantry, 793 

 on the slatf, and 220 unemployed officers, etc. 

 The native army numbered 1.576 European offi- 

 .'.7(50 native officers, and 140,369 rank and 

 file, making 144,705 altogether, comprising 3,757 

 artillery. 23.547 cavalry, 3.872 sappers and miners, 

 and 113,529 infantry. "The total present strength 

 of the army was thus 218,075. Of the European 

 troops, 46.322 were in the army of the Governor- 

 General. 1:5.096 in the Bombay army, and 13,949 

 in t he army of Madras. The Eurasian volunteers 

 reported as efficient in 1889 numbered 17,500. 

 The exact -trcnsjth of the feudatory armies in 

 1884 wa- :; 19,835 men, with 4,237 guns. Of the 

 nativeaiixiliaries in the feudatory mid independ- 

 ent states placed at the disposal of the Indian 

 Government for war purposes and inspected by 

 British officers, 4.000 belong to Cashmere, 600 

 faviilry and 1,000 infantry to Patiala, 150 cav- 

 alry and 300 infantry to Bahawulpur, 150 cavalry 

 and (iOO infantry to Jhind, 150 cavalry and 600 

 infantry to Kapurthala. 50 cavalry and 150 in- 

 fantry to Faridkot, 50 cavalry and 150 infantry 

 to Maler Kotla, 800 cavalry and 600 infantry to 

 Bhnrtpore. a camel corps of 500 men to Bikanir, 

 1.000 cavalry and 600 infantry to Ulwar, and 

 l.'jno cavalry to Jodhpore. The two armored 

 turret ships belonging to the Indian Government 

 arc the - Abyssinia," of 2,908 tons, armed with 

 f"iir guns, and the " Magdala," of 3,344 tons, 

 carrying the same number of guns. The British 

 naval force in East India numbered 14 ships of 

 war in 1SIIO. besides 18 on the China station. 



Production. More than 90 per cent, of the 

 inhabitants of India are dependent on agricult- 

 VOL. xxxi. 24 A 



nrc. The land belongs to the Government, and 

 is leased either to , //,///. far* or village commnni- 



tie- lor the Whole period of the hcttlement or 



directl) to the ryots or cultivators, who may va- 

 cate their land after notice given at the en'd of 

 any \.ar. In Bengal the zemindars were made 

 virtual proprietors of the soil by permanent 

 settlement made by Lord Cornwallis. In other 

 parts of India there is a resettlement of the land 

 n nt or tax every thirty years, and consequently 

 the cultivators are N-mpi.-d to exhaii-t. rather 

 than to improve, the land, because their im- 

 provements are made the basis of a higher as- 

 scs-mcnt. There is an agricultural department 

 established by the Government in every province 

 to instruct and advise the farming class regard- 

 ing rotation of crops, new staples, breeding of 

 animals, implements, fertilizing, etc. The area 

 under wheat in 1889 was 19,170,018acres, of which 

 over 7,000,000 acres were in the Punjab, 3,500,- 

 000 in the Central Provinces, nearly the same in 

 the Northwest Provinces, and large areas in 

 Bombay, Oudh, and Berar. The rice area was 

 26,810,806 acres,scattered over Madras.the North- 

 west Provinces, Lower Burmah, the Central 

 Provinces, Oudh, Bombay, and other provinces. 

 The area devoted to other food grains was 76,- 

 178,925 acres, exclusive of Bengal, which made 

 no returns. The tea plantations covered 241,077 

 acres, of which 216,676 were in Assam. Cotton 

 was raised on 9,215,464 acres in Bombay, Berar, 

 Madras, the Northwest Provinces, and other dis- 

 tricts. There were 7,381,811 acres devoted to oil 

 seeds, 998,217 to indigo, chiefly in Bombay and 

 the Northwest Provinces, and 347,769 to tobacco. 



The forest reservations in 1889 covered 19,712 

 square miles in the Central Provinces, 10,236 in 

 Bombay, 5,111 in Lower Burmah, 4,998 in Ben- 

 gal, 3,727 in Madras, 3.727 in the Northwest 

 Provinces and Oudh, 3,447 in Assam, 1,535 in 

 the Punjab, and 1,059 in Berar. There were 108 

 cotton mills in 1889, with 22,156 looms and 2,669,- 

 922 spindles, employing 92,126 persons. The 

 jute mills employed 59,722 persons. 



The area under food grains during the six 

 years ending with 1890 increased from 112,085,- 

 401 to 119,600,465 acres, equal to 6'7 per cent., 

 while the exports of food grains increased 8'8 

 per cent. J. E. O'Connor, the Government stat is- 

 tician,in his report on. foreign trade for 1890-'91, 

 takes pains to refute the opinion conceived by 

 friends of India that the country by its large ex- 

 portation of rice and wheat denudes itself of 

 food supplies. The exports of food grains in 

 1890-'91 were 51.049,000 hundred-weight, against 

 42,416,000 hundred-weight in 1888-'89. Still, 

 they were only a small fraction more than in 

 1887, and very little greater than in 1886, 1884, 

 and 1882, and they would not have exceeded the 

 average except for an extraordinary demand for 

 Burmah rice to supplement a deficient crop in 

 Japan. The rice area in the six years ending 

 with 1890 increased 2<> per cent, and the exports 

 23 per cent. In the same period there was a 

 decrease of 13 per cent, in the wheat exports and 

 of 6'6 per cent, in the acreage. The exports in 

 1886 were the largest ever known. In 1891 the 

 area in wheat was 1,651,000 acres more than 

 in 1890, and in the first five months of 1891-'2 

 the shipments from Bombay, brought out by 

 high prices consequent on the failure of the 



