Subscriptions for the Indian Famine are pouring in to the
Man- sion House, but the aid required is a grant from the National Treasury. There is no time to wait when a letter like this can be written, by Mr. W. E. James, of the Mysore Revenue Survey Service, to a friend in England :—" Bangalore, July 22. There is nothing to write about save the famine, which is staring every one in the face ; the country is like a vast desert. My compound, where even last year I was able to keep two cows, will not now grazes goat. The railway is taxed to its utmost limit, and is bringing 4,000 tons of grain a week into the province, but as this will only feed a million and a half of people, the other three million and a half in Mysore must starve, as all the stores of grain in the country are exhausted. Already the sufferings of the people are awful ; there is a regular service organised, in addition to the police, to keep the streets of Bangalore clear of the dead and dying, but outside the municipal limits dead bodies are lying in all directions ; the lower castes are cooking and eating the bodies, two men were caught doing so, and have been brought before the Magistrate this week. Two days ago, when riding past the Hussar stables, I saw a crowd of wretched women and children routing in the dung-heap, and picking out the un- digested grains of corn to eat." Mysore is still under British Administration, and half its population will perish.
