The National tribune., 1900-07-05
RELIGION MAKES THEM sTARyE.
Starving Natives of India, With Millions
Cattle at Hand, Dare Not Eat Beef.

In large districts of India to-day
millions of cattle could not be sold for 80
cents a head. The country, yellow and
parched, has been turned into desert by
he failure Of the Monsun rains. There
are grass lands and fodder in other parts
IF India, but the poor animals are too
weak to be driven to them, even il there
we're cattle buyers to take them away; so
they die like flies, succumbing to starva-
ton far more quickly than their owners.
The thought has never. occurred to the
81. .O00, 600 Indian peasantry now suffering
rom hunger that the cattle would have
been a food resource to tide them over
the months OF crop failure. They have
plenty OF cattle. Among all the animals
" India the various breeds of horned and
bumped cattle hold the first place. They
are the draft animals in the little field of
he poorest peasant. All the transporta-
lion of the inland roads depends upon
them. The household that has not its COW
is IL the direst poverty.
Suppose these natives, when the signs
pointed Enthusiastically to season of crop
failure, had cured under their hot sun
many thousand tons of beef by sun-dry-
ing, as jerked beef is prepared in South
America. undesirable suffering and
thousands of lives would have been saved; /;
but the very idea of making such pro-
vision as this against the horrors of fam
me would be inexpressibly shocking to the
i50,000.000 people of India, who base their
religious beliefs upon the Vedas. They
would never dream of such a proclamation
VI the teachings of Brahminism. They
would rather swallow dirt and gnaw roots
than eat beef, and yet they are not strict
vegetarians, for all eat butter and milk,
and also fish and mutton when they can
procure them.
The Hindus and those who share with
them their religious beliefs are just what
history tells US their fathers were, three
and twenty centuries ago. The highest
law that concerns the Hindu is to eat cor
reetly, and beef is one of the prescribed
foods; SO with this food resource in every
farmyard, priced highly, as it is, by most
Of the world, the Hindu dies of hunger
rather than partake of it. These facts
are perhaps as impressive an illustration
as can be given of the profound influence
which religious injunction and custom
have upon the habits, tastes and preju-
dices, and consequently upon the COM
merce of whole nations.
The value of East Indian cattle for food
has been amply demonstrated. The ST.
100000 Mahometans living in India have
no qualms or scruples about beef eating.
Some years ago we read almost daily for
Il time of bloodshed between the Mahome-
tans and Hindus of Northwest India. Beef
was the cause of the incipient warfare.
The Hindu neighbors of the Moslems de-
cided that their feelings had been out
ragged too long by the repugnant spectacle
Of cattle shambles and beef eating. They
resolved to put an end to them, but the
undertaking was too large for the com
paratiyely small number of zealots who en-
gagged in it.
In this vast region, so densely peopled
that the specter of famine is not far away
even in years of plenty, no meats are inn
ported except for European consumption.
II there is partial failure of rice, wheat,
maize, barley, or the indigenous grains on
which the laborer lives, starvation begins
at once; and so while India sells to the
world every year from 250.000,00O to
$3.50, 100000 worth of products. and buys
about three-fourths as much as she sells,
her purchases are almost wholly textiles,
machinery, railroad material and coal.
even when hunger stalks abroad; and the
main reason why the great evil of famine
is not averted or mitigated by food inn
ports is because the religious tenets of
most of the people confine them to the few
cereals they raise themselves as the main-
stay of life. In one respect, however,
ligious prejudice is a blessing to the eoun.
try. 1t Is to the lasting shame of some
modern nations that they destroy thou
sands of barbarous or semi-civilized MEG
and women by selling them poison In the
form of the purest qualities of alcoholic
liquors; but they find no market for their
fiery gin and forty rod among the hun