BENGAL FAMINE 247 



The first famine of which we have evidence of this 

 kind is the great Bengal famine of 1769-70. As this 

 famine occurred only twelve years after the Battle of 

 Plassey, it may reasonably be accepted as typical of 

 the famines which occurred before British rule had 

 materially altered the condition of India. It has, 

 moreover, special points of interest. Bengal is the 

 one province of India which has a natural system 

 of inland navigation ; it is also traversed by the 

 Ganges, which forms a great waterway between 

 Lower Bengal and Upper India. Bengal has, there- 

 fore, always had facilities for the transport of grain 

 which were denied to other provinces until the intro- 

 duction of railways. If, therefore, the grain could not 

 be imported into Bengal in 1770 in quantities sufficient 

 to avert a terrible mortality, we may be sure that the 

 same difficulties were experienced in an even greater 

 degree in other provinces. For this reason — although 

 the economic development of Bengal forms no part of 

 the scheme of this book — I have given below a short 

 summary of the contemporary evidence regarding this 

 historic calamity. Incidentally, this summary will 

 reveal the great superiority, as economic evidence, of 

 letters and reports over the narrative of the pro- 

 fessional historian. The author of the ' Seir Muta- 

 qherin' refers to the famine of 1769-70 in the following 

 stately generalities : 



' It was under the latter's administration that a 

 famine made its appearance all over the country. 

 It made its approaches with all its terrors, added to 

 a severe mortality, and to a small-pox that spared no 

 age or sex. Seif-ud-dowlah himself fell sick of that 

 distemper, and succumbed under its violence. . . . 

 The famine and the small-pox having made their 

 appearance at one and the same time in Muharrem 

 — that is, at the commencement of the year one 

 thousand one hundred and eighty-four — they both 

 rose to such a height and raged so violently for full 



