BOOK II. Public land revenue. at a loss. If this continued, they were obliged to throw up their lands, and seek other means of living. As the highest proportion claimed by the King, which at the time of Menu's Code was one sixth, is now one half, it is easy to account for the anni hilation of many village communities, and the shattered condition of others. The lands abandoned by the landholders reverted to the state. But though this progress may have been very general, it need not have been universal; conquered lands already cultivated would become the property of the Prince, and might be cultivated on his account by the old proprietors reduced to serfs. Even at this day, the state constantly grants lands to speculators, for the purpose of founding villages, without recognising a body of landholders. The terms of these grants are various; in general, they provide for total or partial exemption from revenue for a certain number of years; after which the payment is to be the same as in neighbouring vil lages. Other processes must also have taken place, as we perceive from the results, though we cannot trace their progress. In Canara, Malabar, and Travancore, the land is held in absolute property by single individuals, subject to a fixed payment to the state. The Sovereign's full share is now reckoned at one half; and a country is reckoned moderately assessed where he only takes one third. II. This increase has been made, not so much by CHAP. openly raising the King's proportion of the crop, as by means of various taxes and cesses, some falling directly on the land, and others more or less circuitously affecting the cultivator. Of the first sort are taxes on ploughs, on cattle, and others of the same description: of the second, taxes on the use of music at certain ceremonies, on marriages with widows, &c., and new taxes on consumption, Besides these, there are arbitrary cesses of both descriptions, which were professedly laid on for temporary purposes, but have been rendered permanent in practice. Of this kind are a cess on all occupants of land, proportioned to their previous payments, and a cess on the emoluments of village and district functionaries. As there is no limit to these demands but the ability of those on whom they fall to satisfy them, the only defence of the villagers lies in endeavouring to conceal their income. For this purpose they understate the amount of produce, and contrive to abstract part without the knowledge of the collector: more frequently they conceal the quantity of land cultivated, falsifying their records, so as to render detection impossible, without a troublesome and expensive scrutiny, involving a survey of the land. The landholders, where there are such, possess other indirect advantages, the extent of which the government is seldom able to ascertain. Some degree of connivance on the collector's part is obtained by bribes, which are BOOK levied as part of the internal expenses, and charged II. as "secret service;" an item into which it is a point of honour, both with the villagers and with future collectors and auditors, never to inquire. It is only by the existence of such abuses, counterbalancing those on the part of the government, that we can account for land yielding a rent and being saleable when apparently assessed to the utmost of its powers of bearing.* In the confusion produced by these irregularities on both sides, the principle of proportions of the produce is lost sight of; and in most parts of India the revenue is annually settled by a reference to that paid in former years, with such alterations as the peculiarity of the season, or the occurrence of any temporary advantage or calamity, may render expedient. When the parties cannot agree by this mode of settlement, they have recourse to a particular inquiry into the absolute ability of the village for the year. The land being classed (as has been mentioned) according to its fertility, and the facilities it possesses for cultivation, the surplus remaining after the expense of production can be conjectured: a sufficient proportion is set aside for As in the village described by Mr. Hodgson (Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society, vol. ii. p. 77.), where the landholders pay 57 per cent. of their produce. See also Mr. Chaplin and the Deckan collectors, and Mr. Elphinstone, for Guzerát, both in the selections published by the East India Company; Mr. Hamilton Buchanan, for Deinajpúr, and other districts under Bengal, in his separate reports. the maintenance of the cultivator; and the rest, after deducting village expenses, &c., goes to the government. As a final resource, when all other amicable means fail, an appeal is made to an actual division of the crops: but this mode of adjustment is so open to frauds that it is generally avoided by both parties; except, indeed, in places where long connection between the representative of the government and the people has established mutual confidence, in which case the division of the crop is the most popular of all settlements. If the result of the contest with the government officers is the imposition of a burden beyond the patience of the cultivators, the whole body by common consent abandon their lands, leave their village, and refuse to enter into any engagement with the government. The public officers then have recourse to conciliation and intimidation, and, when necessary, to concession: force would be reckoned very oppressive, and, if used, would be ineffectual: the most it could do would be to disperse the villagers, and drive them into other jurisdictions. It may easily be supposed that such modes of settlement cannot be carried on without much interference with the internal constitution of the township. In general the government officer carries on his exactions through the headman, but interferes when necessary to support him against individuals; and he sometimes suspends the headman from his duties, and takes the details of im CHAP. II. II. BOOK posing and collecting the public revenue for the time into his own hands. Appeals and complaints are also incited to afford pretences for extortion in matters connected with justice and police; so that under a bad government the privileges of the townships are often reduced to insignificance. All these evils are aggravated in many parts of India by the system of farming the revenue. The governments of provinces in such cases are conferred on the person who engages to give security for the largest annual payment to the treasury. This contractor in like manner farms his subdivisions to the highest bidder; and these last, in their turn, contract with the headmen for fixed payments from the villages, leaving each of them to make what profit he can for himself. By these means the natural defender of the cultivators becomes himself their principal oppressor; and, if the headman refuses the terms offered to him, the case is made worse by the transfer of his office to any stranger who is willing to accept the contract. It is by such exactions that village landholders have in many cases been reduced from masters of the township to mere tenants of the crown, and in some have been obliged to fly from their lands, to avoid being compelled to cultivate them under terms which it was impossible for them to bear. Hitherto each sharer in the village has been supposed to be acting on his own rights; but the King and the landholders are each entitled to alienate their share in the advantages derived from |