The Express.
London, England, 1861-04-06 00:00:00

SEVERITY OF THE FAMINE.

By the arrival of the overland mail we receive
letters and papers from Bombay to March 12, Cal-
cutta, rid Bombay, to March 3. The Governor-
General had returned to his seat of government,
and the Governor of Bombay had returned from
his tour through Guzerat and Scinde. The ac-
counts of the famine are as bad as ever. The
Bombay Gazette says :

An eye-witness declares that the statements which have
been published of the extent and severity of the suffering
are in no wise exaggerated. Extensive districts throughout
the North-West, which in times of prosperity are like the
" garden of the Lord," are now uncultivated and ileser)..
The oared* have not been sown, in most mass, for want
of rain ; in other mass, for want of seed, the seed having
been consumed fur food, and the Bunneas refusing to
advance, as there is no prospect of a remunerative re-
turn. The prospects for the future are as dark and
gloomy, therefore, as the present distress is grievous. The
people throughout the country have contributed lib-crally
for the relief of the sufferers. Bombay has given one lac
and thirty-thousand rupees. Calcutta has given an equal
sum. Aid from Madras is yet to be realised. What would
such an amount of money do, even under the most fa our-
able circumstances, to save three millions of people from
perishing fur lack of bread I A more gigantic effort west
yet be made throughout India. It is most vexing to find,
that owing to the want of facilities for inter-communication
throughout the country generally, the money contributed is
consumed in
, earriage more than in grain. The Oue(4
Oetzelk writes: 'For three months this province has been
supplying the North-West with corn of evert description;
but instead of the Zanteendare transporting it themselves,
traders end dealers from across the Ganges have to bring
their own conveyances to carry it away. This at best most
be • most awkward and unsatisfactory process, since the
cost of transit (for conveyances miming and returning) must
be as much if not Ilion) than that of the groin itself ' • so
that when food is even brought to the doors of the starving,
dear at the original purchase, it must sell at famine prices.
This want of free and easy modes of transit—that is, sim-
ply, of made roads—is general throughout the country, and
Is the greatest obstacle in the way of relieving the sufferers.
England's bounty is expected to flow in ere long, in answer
to the appeals that have been made."

The .lifofesseilite, of Feb. 26, gives the following
account of the relief asylums that have been esta-
blished at Delhi :
Sir Robert Montgomery visited the relief asylums at
Delhi on Friday at mid-day, accompanied by the members
of his staff, all the civil ollicen, and nearly all the mem.
bent of the General Relief Committee. 'The Lieutenant-
Governor proceeded to visit the asylums, and learn with his
own eves the confirmation of the reports be had received of
the deep distress abroad. There are three groat asylums at
Delhi outside the city—one at the Kboodoes Bagh, the
original relief house, which admits only the most aged,
infirm, and feeblest objects of compassion, as well as the
latest arrivals, who are committed to the civil surgeon for
treatment. In this there were some eight hundred. The
amend place is the great enclosure of the Eedgab, in
which from six to eight thousand receive a meal a day.
The third refuge is outside the Delhi Gate, where from
three to four thousand meemble daily. This was visi.ed
first. Almost, if not entirely, middle-aged women with
sickly young children formel the assemblage, of whom half
were widows. The last piochesi of want were not discernible
here, as timely relief had been afforded, and bad began to
tell. Brigadier Brown had formed the groups into regi-
mental dispositions with great precision. No hurry, or
noise, or confusion. All received their tickets, presented
them at the door. obtained their meal,' flour and salt, sod
went on their way, poor things, into thkir looely unfriended
homes to eke out their scanty day me3l, the next morning
again to congregate at the .1110 poordinuse. If these
people were not fed, in three days they would infallibly fall
into the condition of the secoudclass of sufferers, which we
will hereafter describe. . .

After minutely inquiring into all details connected with
the first section, so excellently organised and superintended
by the Brigndier, the Lieutenant-tioveruor proceeded to the
Eedgah. As he came to the gates n crowd of miserable objects
yelled outside for admittance within the precincts. These
had been excluded as being fit for work. The yell outside
subsided as the gates were closed, and • melancholy scene
presented itself. One-half the enormous anis was com-
pletely covered by wasted tiles of human beings. In every
direction and in every posture of apathy, disease, des air
and prostration, were lying about the hollow-eyed wretched
victims of the dreadful visitation, almost too far gone even
to care to creep among the long rows of rap, squalor, and
half nakedness. . .

Sir Robert laced slowly down the lines amid almost
unbroken and 'Knife' silence, pausing now and then before
some gaunt and wan figure to ask whence be came, to be
answered only by mute gesture or exhausted effort at articu-
Latino. Out of more than mix thenand not one could be
pointed out as fit for a quarter of au hour's ordinary work.
It was painful enough to reflect, after viewing the
remnants of human beings whom charity lead reached,
open the thousands who must hove been and must
he perishing in the highways and hyeesys
The distribution of chuppatties and dall to this gather-
ing takes four hours a day. Lally, Idahesh Las aide
largely nut of his own purse in the support of these
people, and Mr. 0. Wood. Assistant Commissioner, aids
zealously in the charitable, but painful business of
superintending the alleviation of so much human suffer-
big. Each of the homeless beings, as they receive into
their tattered shreds of garments their food, peas out through
the wicket to lie about and nestle among the rocks and
stases until the next morning—not a few perhaps to die iu
the interim. Lich has a wooden ticket hound round his
right wrist, which lie I. sot to remove. The men's tickets
are oblong, the women's square, and the children's hexagon.
Thus, nu one can present a stolen ticket and get double food.
'Nor ciao he possess more than one, an it is tied to his
wrist, and by tio other way of presentation, and at no other
than at the appointed time, will the bearer be entitled to
food that day. They enter until 12 a.m., doors are then
shut ; they are 'mustered and inspected at 1 p.m, and
food is distributed until all here received. Thud°
fit for work are daily eliminated, and sent off to
work with passes. Hie Honour expressed himself com-
pletely satisfied with the arrangements, sad after desiring
that the rule should be relaxed, this aloe, oo the
occasion of his visit in favour of the vociferous crowd
outeide, passed on to the third and last wand asylum.
This is enlarged from the original poor house which has
always been as existence at Delhi. The peculiarity of

the last+nentionod asylum at the Eedgah is, that
hope is afforded that many will recover after a week or
a fortnight, and pan out again fit to earn sustenance
by daily labour. But at the Koodseah High it is almost
past hope. Here death steps in and relieves daily from
eight to nine of their sufferings. The coming spectacle of
human woe hero exhibited surpassed all that mu be
written about it, and adequately justified the earuest ups
peals for aid, as well as the munificent responses to they
appeals. With their skeleton shapes just covered by skis
hanging in thick wrinkles, the famished are brought in,
some to struggle into life, most to die from the mere effort
at eating. The hideous and repulsive aspect of these cases
is utterly lost in the unbounded sympathy felt, as well as
the regret that more cannot be done to arrest the scythe of
the destroyer. All the arrangements are admirably roe,
ducted by the respected assistant of the treasury, Mr. De
! tiruyther• Many hundred imploring beings owe their lives
to the humane arid disinterested exertions of one who had to
flee from the infuriated mob at the first mutiny, and for
weeks suffered every privation aud misery with his family
in the jungles. Is there any sense of shame or gratitude
among the Asiatics! Will the spectacle of returning good
for evil in this, sod many other instances, on the part of the
British community, and a government, though only a few
years after a city and district were doomed to retributive
justice and confiscation for the %greatest crimes, cuing
forward with sympathy and aid in the cause of common
humanity, to rescue its inhabitant+ from misery and
death, leave no lesson upon their minds?
The news from Sikkim is unsatisfactory. Our
troops are represented as being in the heart of the
country, and finding' it abandoned by the inhabi-
tants. The Englishman has letters from Sikkim
stating that the envoy, the lion. Mr. Eden, had
issued proclamations calling on all the sirdars to
come in to him. Some basse replied by asking him
how they would be treated, and the answer has
always been, "In a friendly manner."

The Bombay Telegraph speaks of • revival of
Thuggism in Oudh :
In many of our Indian provinces the people appear to be
rapidly retrograding. Old customs of a ba-Mirous character
have been revived, and it is said that the Thugs have once
more commenced their nefarious operations. Only a short
time ago, some 17 persons were found murdered at Oonao in
Oudh; and from circumstances observed, it was thought by
Thug& Notwithstanding the efforts of the police soul the
special agency of the Thuggee department, no trace of the
murderers has yet been discovered. Oudb, it will be re-
membered, was a great resort of Thug gangs, in the good
old times, when the profession flourished, and before Colonel.
Shemin rooted out the system ; it is, therefore, more than
probable that many of the fraternity still linger about the
scenes of their former exploits. It is the nature of this
crime to revive whenever a state of anarchy and confusion
arises, such as Oudh was in during the revolt, or when-
ever the special measures organised for its suppression
may be relaxed. It does not speak much for the Oudh
police, that such a wholesale murder should pass undisco-
vered while it points to the inference that Thuggee la
beginning to "look up" in the province. Side by side with
the rumoured intentions of government to reduce the
Thuggee and Dacoity departments as being " no longer
needed," we read in an upcountry paper of dead bodies
being lately found in the district of Cawnpore bearing
marks of strangulation ; and also is other districts of Oudh,
The ordinary police are wholly inadequate to deal with
organised gams of Thugs, and It is due to the people of
the districts where the system shows signs of revival, that
the measures that have hitherto proved effectual for Urn
suppression should not be disturbed.
Sir Patrick Grant, Commander-in-Chief of the
Madras army, Lea resigned his command and
taken his departure for Bngland. The death of
Dr. Dealtry, Bishop of Madras, is announced.