100 Transactions.—Muüscellaneous. 
system of operations of survey in India go on concurrently, side by side, 
with the most rude and inaccurate. The former system, we need not say, 
is in the great triangulation ; the latter, which may be known to few here, isthe 
Khusrah survey, i.c.,in the ** property ” or “field measurements" of the native 
officials. And so general is this latter system, that if considered as applied 
to the wants of the population of India, it is the rule, not the exception. 
Nor can it be avoided. So much so is this the case that in government 
hand-books Khusrah survey has been admitted to authoritative description, 
together with modes of distributing its errors for fitting into the minor 
circuits of village areas. The error of Khusrah survey extends from three 
to seven per cent. of the area measured,* and no wonder. As I observed 
it 80 years ago, in the territory of Malaeca, the native surveyor was seen to 
be armed with only a twisted rattan of one-quarter orlong (60 feet) in length, 
which expanded in drought and contracted in wet one to four feet. He had 
no compass. With this he measured the length and breadth of the rice 
grounds, and estimated and plotted the divisions without regard to irregu- 
larities of boundary ; but in orchards and fruit plantations, in which this 
country excells, the operation was even more inaccurate, for here the 
Khusrah surveyor, or penukur as he was called, simply measured round the 
&rea, caleulating and plotting the contents from the periphery, whether the 
shape was round, square, oblong, or polygonal. Hence the fertile crops of 
lawsuits and internecine wars between neighbours, for by measurement 
under this rude process it is evident when once obliterated there could be 
no authoritative re-establishment of boundaries by actual survey. 
And while I mention this professionally humiliating state of things, I 
must guard myself against any assumption that this is the fault of the 
responsible heads of the survey department there. In so vast a population 
as the empire of India contains, the influence of the Europeans on the 
internal economy of native habits and associations is as a drop in a bucket. 
The native is jealous and tenacious of his own immemorial ways, hence 
amelioration ean only be by slow degrees; and that simple yet effective 
improvements have been brought about in a primitive mode of survey, 
handed down from ages, since I left the country, I am also aware, though 
io what extent I am unable to say. 
This leads me to the remarks that we often hear from the lips of 
Europeans, viz., how fond the natives are of litigation. Indeed, they add, 
so fond are they of this that they fight till the last inch of land has been 
parted with, nay more till they have pawned their jewels, wives, and 
children, stripping themselves of their household gods, till little remains. 
Now India while it is the land of contrast of condition, so also is it the land 
* Report on Indian Surveys, 1872-3. 
