The Viceroy of India has forwarded a telegram to the
Secre- tary of State, in which he states that the area of severe distress covers parts of Tirhoot, Sarun, Chumparun, Bhagulpore, Burmah, and Dinajpore, and the area of distress, nine other counties. There will be 3,000,000 of persons on the hands of Government from end of May to beginning of August—they are dying now— and he has ordered 420,000 tons of rice. Private trade is bringing 1,600 tons of grain a day from the North, which peasants with- out a crop Cannot buy, and he considers the 70,000 carts contracted for north of the Ganges a fair supply. (Mr. Forbes acknowledges the contracts, but says only half are executed). In the worst districts the relief is given by villages (thus showing that the India-House chatter about impossibility is chatter only), but the Viceroy remarks on "the difficulty of getting the people to apply for relief" (a difficulty which would occur in England, if women and children were set to cart manure), and "will not guarantee that cases of starvation may not occur." The famine expenditure to the end of February—that is, up to the time when famine began, —is £.2,500,000, a statement which indicates that by October, the earliest date of relief, even if the spring crop is good—for the Viceroy, who names August, has forgotten that you cannot eat new rice—it will be at least £15,000,000 sterling. The labour- test is only avoided in the worst.districts.
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