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have entered the stage of current discussion, but it appears to be too 

 early to express an opinion on the matter here, especially because full 

 particulars are still wanting. 



According to a Report by the German Consul-General at Calcutta, 

 dated at the beginning of August, the monsoon which, this season, had 

 commenced unusually early, at the beginning of June, was suddenly 

 interrupted, to the general consternation of the people, by a drought 

 which lasted four weeks. At the end of that period, just when in many 

 districts the greatest fears of an impending famine were beginning to make 

 themselves felt, the monsoon broke again with renewed intensity. Since 

 their recurrence, the rains have been fairly equally distributed over the 

 whole of British India; hence the prospects of a good crop throughout the 

 country, with the exception of a few small districts of very minor im- 

 portance, are extremely promising, and as a result an early business 

 revival may be looked for. As is well known, the weal or woe of the 

 population of this country depends solely upon the result of the season's 

 rainfall. If the rains are wanting throughout the months of June, July, 

 August and September, or the fall is only scanty, severe famines in many 

 districts must always be reckoned with. In other words, the purchasing 

 power of the population is depressed to such a low level that almost all 

 trade stagnates. The rainy season is therefore looked forward to every 

 year with the greatest possible anxiety, not only by owners and culti- 

 vators of the soil, but also by the entire commercial community, and 

 the months of June, July, August and September are justly regarded as 

 the time of gravest anxiety of the whole people of India. At present, 

 therefore, the prospects in this important market are very favourable 

 indeed. 



Since our last Report there has been a radical change in the political 

 situation in Spain. The democratic Prime Minister, Sr. Canalejas, whose 

 accession to office was at first regarded as a clever move on the political 

 chess-board by the clerical party, has quickly shown public opinion how 

 mistaken was that belief. For the present he is energetically engaged in 

 realising his far-reaching programme, of which the following are the 

 principal items: — regulation by law of the Roman Catholic Religious 

 Orders and Convents, a radical educational reform by the establishment 

 of schools conducted by lay-teachers in lieu of the monastic schools which 

 have been the rule up to the present, and in which the youth of Spain 

 was trained entirely under the incubus of clerical ideas, to the suppression 

 of all independent thought; next, the introduction of a system of general 

 personal military service, which the people very properly demand shall 

 take the place of that now in vogue, under which a conscript may supply 

 a substitute; abolition of the local octroi duties, which impede trade and 

 traffic in an extraordinary degree; and, finally, separation of Church and 

 State. 



