We deeply regret to perceive that the monsoon has again
partially failed in India. It is now officially admitted in a telegram from the Viceroy that, although there has been a full supply of rain in Bengal, the North-West Provinces, and Oude, the fall has been "very deficient" in Madras, Bombay, Berar, the Central Provinces, and the Nizam's territory. This means that there is reason to apprehend scarcity throughout a third of India, rising in large districts—in the Central Provinces, for example—to actual famine. The official arrangements are now so perfect that mortality can be kept within bounds, but the blow to the Revenue will be severe, and in India a blow to the Revenue means the suspension of all improvement. We do not know that the misfortune is worse than the sudden appeal to the Poor-law which has occasionally marked our own economic history—for example, daring the Cotton Famine—but it excites the imagination more. The excitement, too, has this justification, that a tropical famine may get out of hand and sweep away whole populations. While the residuum suffer Government can manage it ; but if it once became so severe as to reach the whole people of any province, human energy would be almost worthless.
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