CCCIV 



adjustment of social usages and institutions that conduce to the increase 

 of population beyond the limits imposed by such standard. It may 

 be that there is no prospect of such a transformation taking place in 

 the near future, but as, at the same time, there is no immediate danger 

 of the increase of production not keeping pace with the increase of 

 population, there is, so far as I can see, no reason to despair that the 

 transformation will take place in due time. Meanwhile, the Govern- 

 ment will, b}^ educational agencies — -both for the richer and the poorer 

 classes — have to make unremitting efforts to quicken the intelligence 

 and promote habits of enterprise and forethought among the people. 



V. The remedial measures proposed bi/ the revieicer. — The reviewer, 

 however, does not consider that the remedies for the evils of the present 

 economic position lie either in the institution of Agricultural Banks, 

 or in spreading a knowledge of agricultural principles broadcast 

 through the land. He believes in tlie necessity for intensive farming, 

 and to render progress in this direction possible in the near future, he 

 considers it necessary, in the first instance, to attack certain problems 

 of rural economy. The particular remedies he recommends are the 

 following : First, to check the inordinate increase in the number of 

 pauper ryots and to endeavour to turn the tide the other way, so that 

 the pobuper ryot may become a solvent labourer ; secondly, to encourage 

 and enforce the consolidation and enclosure of all holdings, so that 

 cultivation may become economical, and the individual may reap the 

 fruits of his labour ; thirdly, to teach the ryot to be self-dependent for 

 the support of his cattle and thus gradually to lead up to the improve- 

 ment of the tilling power by the rejection of the worthless ; fourthly, 

 to encourage the capitalist, instead of the speculative pauper, to embark 

 in agricultural pursuits ; and fifthly, to check the export of the raw as 

 contrasted with the manufactured or half-worked produce of the land. 

 I have given the suggestions in the reviewer's own words, as it is very 

 difficult to attach any definite meaning to them. What precise mea- 

 sures Grovernment should take to secure the first of the objects aimed 

 at the reviewer does not explain, but the suggestions sometimes put 

 forward in this connection are that an upset price of say not less 

 than ten times the Government revenue payable should be put upon the 

 land taken up for cultivation, to prevent its being worked in a racking 

 manner and thrown up when exhausted, and that sub-division of hold- 

 ings below a certain minimum limit should be prevented by legislation. 

 The futility of the proposed restrictions will be apparent on the slightest 

 consideration. Waste lands are now sold in the Bombay Presidency, 

 but no remarkable results have beeu achieved and no capitalists full of 

 the spirit of agricultural enterprise have come forward to bid for them. 

 In the dry districts, there are lands of little or no value and nobody 

 would pay for them ten times the Government assessment ; and capital- 

 ists can have no difficulty in getting any quantity of land if they 

 want it. The occupation of the poorer lands has, to some extent, been 

 discouraged by the imposition of substantial assessments on the lowest 

 classes of lands, and large extents of lands in a great many districts 

 have been taken up for fodder and fuel reserves under the Forest Act. 

 The objection to raising the assessments of the lowest classes of lands is 

 the great distress and impoverishment it would cause to existing holders 

 of lands. For instance, if a cultivator owns 80 acres of lands assessed 

 at 4 annas per acre, and if the assessment be raised to Re. 1 per acre he 



