28o THE RELIEF OF THE UNEMPLOYED 



ness of the numbers in receipt of relief to any expansion 

 of the demand for field labour. The spring harvest 

 and the monsoon ploughing and sowing are indicated 

 by the numbers upon the relief works as faithfully as 

 in an agricultural almanack. As soon as the weather 

 permitted it the people resumed their suspended in- 

 dustry with vigour. Agriculture, instead of being, as 

 in the past, crippled for several years after the famine, 

 was resumed upon the same scale as before it was 

 interrupted, and, in fact, the area sown in 1897 was 

 actually 3-3 per cent, above the normal. This single 

 fact is sufficient proof that State aid did not hamper 

 the resumption of private industry. 



But the other principle which Sir Anthony Mac- 

 Donnell had formulated at the beginning of the famine 

 — viz., that the only limitation to the relief should be 

 the necessities of the people — was no less faithfully 

 observed. So successful were the measures of relief 

 that the mortality in the provinces was only very 

 slightly raised by a famine which was spread over 

 72,500 square miles and involved 34^ millions of 

 people. The following figures show more eloquently 

 than any description how efficient was the administra- 

 tion of relief. 



' The normal mortality in the provinces for the 

 decennial period previous to 1896 was 33*04 per 

 thousand. During the twelve months of famine 



price of grain, as sufficient to purchase a day's ration only. As 

 soon as there was a demand for labour in the fields, the attractive- 

 ness of the relief works was diminished by enhancing the daily task. 

 As the wages paid were calculated at a day's ration they could not 

 be reduced, but the same result was obtained by increasing the 

 labour by which this ration could be earned. Those who in England 

 demand that in the relief of the unemployed the Government 

 should not pay less than the ' standard wage ' should notice that in 

 the only case in which the State has undertaken to provide work 

 for all the unemployed success was due to the fact that the Govern- 

 ment steadily kept relief pay below the ' standard wage ' of the 

 country. 



