in
for the city and cantonments at Sagar, since no good seemed to result
from those hitherto pursued at Elichpur. He told him in reply that
these things had hitherto been regulated at Sagar as he thought 'they
ought to be regulated everywhere else, by being left entirely to the
discretion of the corn-dealers themselves, whose self-interest will
always prompt them to have a sufficient supply, as long as they may
feel secure of being permitted to do what they please with what they
collect. The commanding officer, in his anxiety to secure food for
the people, had hitherto been continually interfering to coerce sales
and regulate prices, and continually aggravating the evils of the
dearth by so doing'. On the receipt of the Sagar magistrate's letter
a different course was adopted; the same assurances were given to the
corn-dealers, the same ability and inclination to enforce them
manifested, and the same result followed. The people and the troops
were steadily supplied; and all were astonished that so very simple a
remedy had not before been thought of.

The ignorance of the first principles of political economy among
European gentlemen of otherwise first-rate education and abilities in
India is quite lamentable, for there are really few public officers,
even in the army, who are not occasionally liable to be placed in the
situations where they may, by false measures, arising out of such
ignorance, aggravate the evils of dearth among great bodies of their
fellow men. A soldier may, however, find some excuse for such
ignorance, because a knowledge of these principles is not generally
considered to form any indispensable part of a soldier's education;
but no excuse can be admitted for a civil functionary who is so
ignorant, since a thorough acquaintance with the principles of
political economy must be, and, indeed, always is considered as an
essential branch of that knowledge which is to fit him for public
employment in India.[15]

In India unfavourable seasons produce much more disastrous
consequences than in Europe. In England not more than one-fourth of
the population derive their incomes from the cultivation of the lands
around them. Three-fourths of the people have incomes independent of
the annual returns from those lands; and with these incomes they can
purchase agricultural produce from other lands when the crops upon
them fail. The farmers, who form so large a portion of the fourth
class, have stock equal in value