pel capital and injure credit? And is it not equally
evident that if the gold value of the rupee can be forced up in the manner
proposed, the first effect of this will be shown in a large decline in the
demand for labour? Now, as pointed out in the chapters previously alluded
to, the results of an increased employment of labour are quite different
from what they would be in England, where an increase of employment given
to labourers merely means an increase of comfort amongst the working
classes, and of the profits of the shopkeepers with whom they deal. For in
India, the introduction of capital to be spent in labour in the rural
districts means a social revolution, as large numbers of the labourers set
up as cultivators the moment they have saved enough capital to do so. In
some cases they give up working for Europeans, in others they combine
agriculture with occasional months of work on the plantations, or other
sources of employment; the whole lower classes of the people are thus
elevated, and this tells at once on the finances, enabling (1) rents to be
more easily paid, and (2) because the finances improve as more land is
brought under cultivation. Now, not only would a large diminution of
employment take place in connection with coffee-planting were exchange
forced up, but the same cause would act on the growers of pepper,
cardamoms, and other products, and the prosperity of the province would be
thrown back, and the same kind of result would obviously occur in any part
of India which grows articles for export.

But there is yet another result from this truly far-reaching measure, as
Sir David Barbour justly calls it, which to my mind is the most important
of all--the bearing of it on famines; for we all know that the population
is rapidly increasing, and that of all apprehensions which haunt the minds
of those responsible for the safety of India, those as regard famines are
by far the greatest. And here I must ask the reader to turn back to my
Introductory Chapter, and consider the facts relating to famines--facts
which show how constantly the fear of famine lies before the Indian
administrator, both from a financial and humane point of view. I ask him
carefully to survey these facts, and then consider what effect the forcing
up of the gold value of the rupee is likely to have on famine-producing
causes. And is it not evident that the effect of the measure in
diminishing the demand for labour must be enormous; that