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or 14 per cent. The increase in the area of holdings, allowing 'for the 

 superior productiveness of irrigated as compared with unirrigated land, 

 and taking into account the survey excess, may be estimated, as we 

 have already seen, at 5 per cent. Is the inference to be drawn (as the 

 reviewer has done) that the income per head of the population is about 

 10 per cent, less than what it was in 1870, and that the established 

 standard of living has to that extent deteriorated ? A little consider- 

 ation will show that such an inference is opposed to fact. As I have 

 already stated, prices fell from the inflated level they had attained in 

 the sixties so that for the five years preceding the famine of 1876-78 

 they were 30 per cent, less than the average of the previous decade. 

 Prices now, excluding the last 2 years in which a drought prevailed 

 over considerable portions of the Presidency, are not much above that 

 level. In the year preceding the famine of 1876-78, or, in other words, 

 before 1874, the rate of exchange was at par. Of late years the rate 

 of exchange, that is the value of silver expressed in terms of gold, has 

 fallen by as much as 35 per cent. This divergence in the values of 

 gold and silver is known to be, in the main, due to the fall in the 

 general purchasing power of silver ; and taking the latter to be even 

 as low as 20 per cent., the prices in this country, other things being 

 equal, should have risen at least in a corresponding ratio. Prices have 

 not risen appreciably and certainly not in anything lij^e a ratio of 

 20 per cent. Increased pressure of population means increased demand 

 for food and the rise in prices in consequence ; and a consideration of 

 prices, therefore, shows that the pressure has not increased, but, on the 

 contrary, has been lightened. Another gauge of the pressure of the 

 population is the change in the standard of living of the higher and 

 middle classes of the population and also the change in the real wages 

 of the labouring classes as estimated by the quantity of food-grains 

 which the wages, when paid in money, would purchase. No one who 

 has had the least experience of the country will deny that the standard 

 of living has considerably risen during the last 20 years. I have 

 collected together in my Memorandum a large body of evidence on this 

 subject, and my subsequent inquiries only go to show that I under- 

 stated the real position in this respect. As regards wages of labouring 

 classes, since I wrote my Memorandum, I have obtained information 

 from all parts of the country. Nearly 8,000 contracts for labour 

 registered in the various Registration offices of the Presidency have 

 been examined, and the result goes to show that in no instances have the 

 old customary rates suffered reduction ; that in tracts where custom 

 is persistent, the perquisites and extras now given are considerably 

 higher than they were ; that in some places grain wages for harvest 

 work have almost doubled, and daily wages have increased, though not 

 to the same extent ; that notwithstanding the depressed state of the 

 weaving industry, there is no redundancy of labour as compared with 

 past years ; that the complaint among landholders is that it is difficult 

 to get labourers either to work with zeal, or full time for the old rates 

 of grain wages, which is proof of the fact that there is a struggle going 

 on for the re-adjustment and enhancement of the old customary rates 

 of wages ; that during the off season when agricultural work is sus- 

 pended, labourers find other employment to a greater extent than was 

 the case in the past, and that the condition of labourers, except in 

 remote and secluded parts, is owe of decided improvement. I have 

 heard it sometimes asserted that while the higher classes and the lowest 



