138 HAPPY INDIA 



are going to get the necessaries, comforts and reason- 

 able pleasures of life for themselves and their children. 

 The alternative to the limitation of marriages and 

 children is continual hardship, desperate poverty, 

 debilitating and fatal diseases rampant, and every 

 ten years a great desolating famine. Wars, unless 

 accompanied by famine and disease, would not 

 suffice to check the increase of population. 



No doubt the Indian statesmen will consider 

 that question, and consider how far it is their duty 

 to try and influence the habits and customs of the 

 people with regard to marriage, otherwise it certainly 

 may happen that in the course of a generation the 

 population of India may become too great. But 

 at the present time there is a great deal of land now 

 uncultivated which might be cultivated, and if the 

 production per acre is increased in the way I have 

 suggested, the land will give food enough for a 

 greatly increased population. 



"It is the pace that kills." India can carry a 

 greatly increased population with comfort and happi- 

 ness for all if the rate of increase of population is 

 less rapid than the increase of food, clothing, housing, 

 and other forms of wealth ; but if the order is re- 

 versed and the numbers to be fed and clothed and 

 housed increase faster than the food, clothing and 

 housing, then the result will be starvation, disease, 

 misery. 



One reason why the Australians refuse admittance 

 to Indians as settlers is because they have noticed 

 the terrible poverty of the Indians, partly resulting 



