The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1861-04-23 00:00:00

lotrigs anb Colonial intelligence.

INDIA .—THE FAMINE.
ie Bombay journals of March 27 and Calcutta
journals of March IS, received this morning, contain
further afflicting accounts of the famine. In the
Delhi district thousands are dying. It is stated that
many who manage to escape from starvation fall
victims to crime. Frequent and terrible murders
are occurring daily. From l'inlialla we hear (Nlarch
10) that there had been a good fall of rain which
Listed three days. There had also been a little rain
at Rowel Pilule° and Bareilly. Throughout the
!,titral Doab the distress was universal. A Delhi
eontemporary makes the following observations :
The pressure of the prev.ilmg &stress, and the op-
prehension pretty widely fen by natives of the coutine-
' eitoret- the famine, sad s subsequeut visitation of a
pestilence or epidemic, low given rise to a sentiment
to say the least, if nothing else, poetic. It is,
that the souls of the Innocents who were murdered at
. Cewripore, Shahjelmopore, and other plates,
during the mutiny, have been crying eat for vengeance
em their murderers, sad their oriel have at last been
hived in the mart of Reaven, frmu which the fiat has
moue forth for the levy of that retribution from the
Waehitained land which no Inman arm has yet
• talus.
Those among the natives who are given to reflect on
events. cannot fail to be struck with the ',resent
ee_pect of affairs. la most of the places in the Yorth-
We,t where three yeas ago English blood was treacher-
ously and mercilessly shed, the poor of the land are fed
end supported iii thousands at the expenditure of lees
Ci ri by the survivors of the very race whose ea-
ves attempted by trescbery sod maamina-
tion so short a time ago. From this they may leatn a
lesson in the tenets of the Christian faith.
• While contributions sic pouring in from all parts
of the country to relieve the sufferings of the people
In the- Punjab and the Northwest Provinces, we
have the mad tidings of the same dreadful calamity
destroying hundreds of human beings in South
Travancore. lii letters dated between the 20th of
February and the 4th instant, published by • Madras
contenipomry, we observe it 'toted that the whole of
the cultivation this year has failed in consequence of
• the drought, while there is not a paddy field in
which the people could find employment. It ap-
pears that in Octobor last, a fair quantity of rain fell
n that part of the country, but whole fields of paddy
were destroyed by caterpillars, and cholera carried
off hundreds, thus adding to the distress by the
•mine. Hundreds at chiltiren,it is stated, are 'eft
orphans, and many a widow had to sell everything
to save herself and infants from starvation. The
Rev. J. Cos thus describes the state of the people.
This district is shoat 35 miles long and 20 wide, eon.
leining, according to a former census. 150,000 people.
Thu (mine is more felt in the southern parts of this
di-trict. Great numbers of the people there are so
week•as to be scarcely able to walk. They are so thin
that their bones project. They have been subsisting i)n
roots and leaves till these have failed, and they have
sold little things they had about their houses, and parts
of their houses and trees trona their gardens till these
were rxhatuded ; and many have even sold chil-
dren for such a sum as a quarter of • rupee and less.
Many whom I knew penis months ago are now so
thrunk that I can scarcely recognise them.
The oonnniasioner of the Agra division had re-
potted to Government that the distress there was
not on the increase • that there has by no means
been anything like a iota] failure of spring or rubboe
crops in Agra or NI uttra ; that a considerable yield
of grain would be the produce of this year ; that
larfslmports of grain from the eastward were daily
arriving ; that th.ge had been rain in some of the
• diet:acts, besides the Agra division, whose harvests
were in jeopardy three weeks previously • and that
iteamataneas would probably prevent a previously;
rim)
in the price of food, and might be expected to lower
it considerably.