184 INDIAN POVERTY 



problem. Having laden their women and children 

 with ornaments, and decked them out in expensive 

 sarees, they launched into the wildest extravagance 

 in the matter of carts and trotting bullocks, going 

 even as far as silver-plated yokes and harness 

 studded with silver mountings. Even silver tyres 

 to the wheels became the fashion. Twelve and 

 fifteen rupees were eagerly paid for a pair of trotting 

 bullocks. Trotting matches for large stakes were 

 common ; and the whole rural population appeared 

 with expensive red silk umbrellas, which an enter- 

 prising English firm imported as likely to gratify the 

 general taste for display. Many took to drink, not 

 country liquors such as had satisfied them pre- 

 viously, but British brandy, rum, gin, and even 

 champagne." 



A few pages further on the author tells us of the 

 ruin by debt and drunkenness of the families which 

 had indulged in these extravagances. The fact is 

 that to keep for to-morrow what is in the hand to-day 

 demands imagination, purpose and self-discipline, 

 which the Hindu working man has not. He is the 

 product of centuries, during which his rulers made 

 the fife of to-morrow too uncertain, while his climate 

 made the fife of to-day too easy. No outward 

 applications will alone cure his poverty, because it 

 is a symptom of an inward disease. 



When a healthier state of mind shall awaken an 

 appetite for comforts and conveniences, and create 

 necessities unknown to his fathers, then degrading 



