Show i i description of alic terrible famine that desolated india the telegrams speaking of the now raging in cashmere call vividly to the mind of the writer similar scenes of unhappiness which afflicted in abo years 1877 78 many 11 fair province of india scenes which can hardly be pictured by the most lively imagination in this fruitful country scenes which in their grim gaunt misery the most of horrors endured by any people in the world which sink into insignificance the terrors faced by the unhappy populace of jerusalem during its terrible siege by titus of the three great afflictions the litany tho devout pray tobo delivered sword pestilence and famine lamine is perhaps the greatest by the first death comes speedily and often without pain by the second alic wasted frame becomes insensible to feeling and then the agony 0 death is passed by the third the body weakened and emaciated through continuous fasting is often kept alive by tiny morsels of which only served to strength and laake the pangs of hunger the more acute COLD it was in october 1877 that tho government of india began to real ize that famine with all its terrible consequences was in their midst the government was financially not in a nourishing condition and so is at first resolved not to mccog nize the distress it was thought that if the government offered to assist the people that professional would bo alie rage and that the entire population of india from the desert banks of the indus to the umbrageous glades velly would cast themselves upon th reground eg round and demand the author 28 it was ill ready whispered th at was sharp in cashmere the smiling vaults of that lovely land were described by returning holiday makers who had there goue to avoid the sultry heats places of desolation as fearfully unpleasant as the valley of dead mens bu t with trouble the english in their awu territory alie official breast was not to bo filled with anny erratic feelings of sympathy and the government contented itself with addressing a note to the maharajah Mah arajah to save his people from death from hunger after this philanthropic duty had been performed lord lytton calmly folded his fiands and prepared himself for the worst by yielding up himself to the pleasures ofa profligate court A in no better season can upper india be seen than in the months of october november december and january tho rains have passed away as a summer shower the late barren earth has brought forth an abundant luxuriant vegetation alie heavy umbrage of ahe trees which for these many months past have worn as livery of the count rys wretched climate a dull brown color laden with accumulated dust have now burst with a gorgeous green tho older leaves have dropped and the young ones are budding forth with life and freshness hill and plain eeck to have long been cultivated with tender care each dry river bed is alive with clear pushing water each river is a mighty sea each well an unmeasured depth from which alie surrounding country is to be fed during when not a drop of water dainia the soil and now creeping animal life which came so soon into ugly prominence after the first rainfall has disappeared with the first touch of frost and man can go forth to his tasks in liar yest field and orchard with more assurance the broad country round wears a mask of smiling joy the high crop shave already been garnered and the assiduous bayat patiently potters over his acreage tending zealously the outward welfare of the hidden vegetables A OUTLOOK but iu the autumn of the year 1877 the aspect was far different anstead of crops covering the not even a blade of grain re deved monotony of bare brown earth in all the dullness of barren ugliness file country proclaimed its distress the walls were dry the persian wheels and hung list leee by the eloping mound stood the cattle expectant to be joked yoked to the clumsy harnesk and draw the water both to quench their chirat and the great thirst around them the river beds which first sent a stream of trickling water grew less and less in quantity and finally cease d then came alio cry of de pair from that timid patient people then at each hindmo temple and shrine were invoked by half naked prietta with ashes on their haade gravers for the fall of water in mohammedan mosques preach on every side was palpable proof of famine in city well ns country people perished by hundreds daily in the great city of agra a city of fabulous wealth th emporium of tra doof all upper india the death rate was appalling corpses of hunger victims polluted every highway the road to tho hinda burning chats was dotted with the dead and dying in order to save the city from being poisoned the government had to undertake the responsibility of burying and burning and yet with this fact before them the government go said that there was some slight distress in upper india 1 INTO ACTIVITY suddenly the government awoke from its lethargy with that haste chich beto kena insanity pre para lions were commenced upon the most extravagant scale to combat tho famine to each district were sent ordera to to organize systems of relief and to make that system as paying as possible or in other words to provide alie people with labor upon public works and to pay for that labor in the shape offord the district officials were to closely and make fair decision as to those who we not incapacity inca pacita bcd from work and choso choso whoso condition was so feeble that to save them from death they should be received into famine camps no sooner was the decision made than prompt action followed young men from various brauchi w of the service were drafted into this new department called the famine relief tho famine then raged with the direst violence throughout the presidencies cies of bombay and madras in budh and in the northwest the of gaunt was not uncommon but the government thought it best not to commence work all over india at once EXTENT OF FAMINE FIELD india is a huger country than most people imagine and travel is perhaps not as expeditious as it might be the writer had to atrayel through its entire length before he reached his destination in the extreme of india and in those long days nd nights was not a mite of land passed which had enough of vegetation upon it even to yield a breakfast for a half satis fied locust animals had fled to parts unknown even the timorous cowardly jackal whose food is the half burned corpse and whose in india is cyca offensively known could not be seen never was such a desolation even the most ancient of the mohammedan chroniclers had not in their faithful histories ever reported the fact of so grave so general so common a distress As the trains drew into stations and exposed to the view of some few stragglers the bags of grain tho wretches regardless of the danger they ran would board the vans and attempt to filch somo handfuls of the gram and what spectacles of misery they presented what gaunt frames mere spectres spec tres of the former man dis ease in its most horrid form had attacked several the disease gotten from the continual pinch of hunger FORMATION OF FAMINE 8 the formation of one famine camp was much like that of any other A huge high benco bounds ed a row of buildings and an open space tho building were divided into hospitals sleeping sheds and cooking sheds food was dispensed twice a day consisting solely of rice and chile water the recipients of charity were remorselessly set to labor upon the government works the idea of providing food and employment to starving multi bidia deserves the but tho fact to be deplored and condemned is that no action was taken until the people were actually beyond tho power of relief the mere starting of a camp brough no aid to many starving thousands but when the glad news was bruised bruited abroad that in tho chief village of the district was a free mart where who went would receive his dole then commenced the most heartrending pilgrimage that the world ever saw for miles and roiley the roads were thronged thron ged with a great crowd of people bound for the place where their hunger was to bo satisfied A OP those choso whoso strength was past the effort of the walk were left be hind to die in tho abandoned homes of that slow certain painful death of hunger the old and the young the married and tho unmarried left their parents wives and children behind them villages stood like great charpel faults houses were locked up and left and when after beveral months elapsed british officers visited theeo cities of tho dead what sights met their affrighted emesi here in several houses were the indications of an aripio wealth instead of brass drinking vessels there lay scattered about the rooms vessels of the purest gold and the ins mate who can speak of them some stretched out on the cold pitiless mud floor with their faces close pressed to the earth had there died if to abut out from that sight which would soon bo dead the spectacle of any other misery than what they themselves felt others again in cramped positions with fucca a hant between their knees and their arms locked across their jops had thus in death everywhere was death in horrid form expectaci OP on the roadside road side on the rooftop roof top by the dry well lay many a corpse aud by their eide lay those of their household animals thus of pilgrimage who had started from their homes to the great trysting place some could barely stagger from out the confines of their village home when faint and weary mothers would cast to the ground the babe which beat the withered breast man snatched from woman tho berry her eye had seen upon the ground mother and eon quarrelled quarrel led like wild and feeble hyenas over some putrid garbage thousands died by the way the air for miles was poisonous men of ruddy health fresh from the vigorous climes of the were frightful caius and if instantaneous relief waa not administered died for six long months continued this plague the land was devastated hardly were there men enough left to yoke the osen when like a curtain of godlike hope there appeared in the azure of the pitiless pit ilesa heaven a dark cloud blacker and blacker it grew the priests renewed their lamentations and in answer to their prayers there came the lon rain which told that for the next season at least was famine to be averted |