The Sun.
London, England, 1857-12-07 00:00:00

and Mahommedans quiet at the cost of supporting
idolatry itself, and ignoring the honour due to
their own faith ; to govern through a large cheap
native army, and therefore, to indulge the
men into whose bands they put the sword ;
to squeeze the utmost amount of revenue
from the labor non-military population)
without bestowing a thought on how to enrich
their subjects—such have been some of the in-
herited features of East India Company
Government—features which can be got rid
of only by placing a new dynasty in
power. India must be governed on the larger
view of modern times—a view shared even by
the very Czars of Russia—that rich, not drained
and exhausted subjects, are the strength and glory
of a State.

We think that now is the time to bring into
prominence the simple yet great principles of Col.
CorroN's book. It ought to be in the hands of
every Indian reformer. If the Company and its an-
tiquated traditions are extinguished, we know of
no class which could object to his views. They
must be the basis of Indian Financial Reform.
Not all the Rothschilds in the world could replenish
the Indian Exchequer, and cause the income to
exceed the expenditure, except by first creating
income in the hands of those whose contributions
supply the State. The proverbial impossibility of
getting more than its skin from a certain
domestic animal has never been better illus-
trated than in the case of the East India Com-
pany's Ryots. Under each of the three
systems, they, poor wretches, let who will get
get something, aro almost flayed alive. More,
they cannot pay, either to a zemindar, a Govern-
ment collector, or the headmen of villages. These
poor, naked, and almost houseless cottiers, the
actual payers of the enormous land-tax of India—
a tax of about 18s. in the pound—these unfortu-
nates must first have something more put into
their hands before they can pay more. Colonel
COTTON proposes to get them more than double
produce from mother earth herself ; to leave them
part of the gain, take part as our own fair toll for
expenditure, and thus to enrich both Government
and people.

We have adverted once or twice to the irriga-
tion proposals of Colonel COTTON, but his plans
for increased and cheap communication are
equally urgent and important. Indeed, the
two must go together ; for the benefits of irriga-
tion would be but local, eertainlyof little advantage
to commerce and revenue, unless the vast in-
crease of produce could find easy means of
export to other district 4, whence it could
purchase commercial articles in exchange not
produced at home. The great question is,
whether a cheap system of transit for the
whole of India, capable of being completed in five
or six years, shall be at once begun ; or whether
our own costly and rapid system shall have the
preference.

It is not denied that railways, judiciously ar-
ranged, will be a great gain to the military and
political administration of the country ; but in
the first place, they can onlybe constructed very
slowly ; at least those now in progress seem to
have crept along only at the rate_ of some ten
miles a year, or so. The capital required is com-
paratively enormous, and the building of works
for rapid transit, like our twn, must always oc-
cupy much time. Cheap slow traffic railways, on
the contrary, like those of America, and still
more, the improvement of river channels, and
construction of canals, serving at once for
traffic and irrigation, can be, in India, exe-
cuted with great rapidity, and marvel-
lous economy. Writing from experience,
gathered in his own operations as well as
those of others, Colonel COTTON tells us that
" Improved river navigation, canals, and cheap
railways could be formed to the extent of 20,000
miles, at the average rate of 3501. a mile."
" That these oanals and cheap railways might be
begun at once in every district of India, and be
easily completed in five years." Nor can—we too
often repeat, that any one who will but read the
Colonel's book, and the accounts of what has been
done, must be satisfied that his statements are
not conjecture. He can say what so few pro-
jectors can—" I have done the thing," and
therefore may add, "I can do it all over India'
for the conditions are almost identical.

Colonel CorroN's great principle of the primary
necessity of cheap conveyance, is, we conceive, the
paramount one for India. By all means let us
have fast conveyance, as quickly as we can get it ;
but for a country, nearly 411 of whose exports con-
sist of raw material, the first requisite is carriage
at a rate which the articles will bear.
Rapid carriage may pay well on costly
articles, when the value makes time a
serious object ; but cotton, earn, sugar, rice, and
even indigo—indeed, most of the annual products
of agriculture—will not afford the same tariff of
charges as articles manufactured from any of
them. Time is not the object, so much as a cheap
rata of conveyance to the port of exportation. In
Thngland canals and roads preceded and continue
with our railway system. They generated a state
of internal traffic, which enabled railways to take
up the portion of it adapted to high speed, and
still to leave canals more work than ever. India
can do better agriculturally and commercially
without fast railways than without canals or other
water carriage.

The average distance which goods have to be
carried in England is about 40 miles—in India
about 250. The actual difference of charge, allow-
ing for the different value of money, is eight times
higher in India than in England ; but, taking dis-
tance into account, the difference is at least as
thirty six to one against India 1 If we imagine
what the state of trade in Eagland would bo with
the cost of transit advanced thirty-six fold, we
may easily understand why India exports so little,
and why its exchequer is bankrupt.