19 AUGUST 1882, Page 2

On Monday, Lord Harlington explained to the House Major Baring's

Indian Budget, the general features of which we mentioned at the time it was brought forward in India. Lord Hartington had to add the very satisfactory intelli- gence that the reduction of the salt duties by 30 per cent. in Bengal, and 20 per cent. in the other Provinces, would not entail a loss so heavy as Major Baring had estimated, the in- creased consumption having in the four months amounted to 10 per cent.; and also the rather unsatisfactory intelligence that the Indian cost of the Egyptian expedition would be 21,800,000, which so greatly exceeded his own anticipations, that he was not prepared at present to go into the point. Another unsatisfac- tory piece of intelligence was that the local authorities in India differ radically from the military authorities at home on the subject of military reform, and cannot convert the Indian Couna oil at home to their plan for the reorganisation of the Indian Army into four commands, not co-extensive with the different Presidencies,