47 



marriages in order that the standard of living may not deteri- 

 orate. In India, on the contrary, with the classes correspond- 

 ing to middle-classes in England, early marriage of girls is a 

 religious obligation, and their example in this respect is the 

 reverse of beneficial. These considerations will bring home 

 to our mmds the futility of the expectation that great changes 

 can be produced in the condition of the masses, within the 

 periods of time which are insufficient for effecting a trans- 

 formation in deep-rooted national habits, and will enable us to 

 estimate rightly the value of the advance made under such 

 difficulties. 



24. We have next to consider whether the increase in 

 agricultural production has kept pace with 

 ^increi^u in the a.;re- ^^^ increase of population. According to the 

 calculations already referred to, the popu- 

 lation in 1856 must have amounted to 26^ millions, and as 

 there was a famine in 1854, the population in 1852 may be 

 taken at about this figure. Between 1852 and 1891 the popu- 

 lation has increased from 26^- to 35^- millions or by 30 per 

 cent. Statistics of acreage of cultivation arc not available for 

 zemindaris and inam villages, and therefore it is not possible to 

 calculate the increase in production with any very great ac- 

 curacy. Nevertheless an analysis of the statistics of acreage 

 available in regard to ryotwar lands serves to show roughly 

 that the increase in the cultivated area, making allowance for 

 the increased productiveness of irrigated as compared with 

 unirrigated lands, is quite on a par with it if it does not exceed 

 the increase in population. Excluding South Canara and 

 Malabar, for which districts, owing to the absence of a survey, 

 statistics of acreage are not available, the ryotwar cultivation 

 was in 1852, 12-2 million acres, of which 9*5 million acres 

 were unirrigated, 2*3 million acres were irrigated from Govern- 

 ment sources of irrigation and "4 million of acres irrigated by 

 private sources, but were taxed at specially high rates on ac- 

 count of the valuable crops grown. These areas require a 

 double correction to be applied to them, first, because they 

 include portions of fields left waste which were charged for, 

 though not cultivated, and which are excluded from cultivation 

 statistics for later years, and secondly, because the areas given 

 in the old surveys have been found, by the recent surveys, to 

 be somewhat below the truth. On this account, on a rough 

 calculation, it is found that |- million of acres has to be added 

 to the acreage of 1852, to admit of its being compared with the 

 acreage of more recent years in districts which have been sur- 

 veyed. In 1890 the area of cultivated lands classed as dry, i.e., 

 not irrigated by Government sources of irrigation, was 13*64 



