ent
had to step in again to palliate the distress which it had wrought. It
constituted itself quartermaster-general to the community, and doled
out stinted rations alike to rich and poor, with that stern democratic
impartiality peculiar to times of mortal peril. But this served only,
like most artificial palliatives, to lengthen out the misery. At the
time of the surrender, not a loaf of bread could be obtained for love or
money.

In this way a bungling act of legislation helped to decide for the worse
a campaign which involved the territorial integrity and future welfare
of what might have become a great nation performing a valuable function
in the system of European communities.

The striking character of this instructive example must be our excuse
for presenting it at such length. At the beginning of the famine in
Bengal the authorities legislated in very much the same spirit as the
burghers who had to defend Antwerp against Parma.

"By interdicting what it was pleased to term the monopoly of grain,
it prevented prices from rising at once to their natural rates. The
Province had a certain amount of food in it, and this food had to last
about nine months. Private enterprise if left to itself would have
stored up the general supply at the harvest, with a view to realizing
a larger profit at a later period in the scarcity. Prices would in
consequence have immediately risen, compelling the population to reduce
their consumption from the very beginning of the dearth. The general
stock would thus have been husbanded, and the pressure equally spread
over the whole nine months, instead of being concentrated upon the last
six. The price of grain, in place of promptly rising to three half-pence
a pound as in 1865-66, continued at three farthings during the earlier
months of the famine. During the latter ones it advanced to twopence,
and in certain localities reached fourpence."

The course taken by the great famine of 1866 well illustrates the
above views. This famine, also, was caused by the total failure of the
December rice-crop, and it was brought to a close by an abundant harvest
in the succeeding year.

"Even as regards the maximum price reached, the analogy holds good,
in each case rice having risen in general to nearly twopence, and in
particular places to fourpence, a pound; and in each the quoted rates
being for a brief period in several isolated localities merely nominal,
no food existing in the market, and mo