The news of the week from India is chequered. Abundant
rains have improved the autumn crops in Bombay, Madras, and Mysore, and prices show a downward tendency ; but in the Punjaub, Rajpootana, Central India, and the North-West Provinces the monsoon has failed, and the gloomiest anticipations everywhere prevail. Thus the need for help continues as urgent as ever. The subscriptions to the Lord Mayor's Fund are munificent,—they now considerably exceed a quarter of a million,—yet the striking dis- proportion between the sum and the demands upon it is inducing many public meetings to pronounce in favour of a grant from the Imperial Exchequer. A Penzance meeting having done so, Lord Beaconsfield, in acknowledging through his private secretary the receipt of the resolutions passed, states that the subject is re- ceiving the anxious consideration of the Government. Apparently, then, Ministers are still apprehensive that a grant may become indispensable. Should it be deemed so, care must be taken to mark its exceptional character. We suggested last week that the several Colonial Legislatures should contribute a quota, and that we still think the best plan. But if from want of time or any other cause, it should be impracticable, some other means should be taken of preventing the vote from being regarded as a precedent. Indian administrators must not be allowed to think that in the future they can shift the cost of famine on to the British taxpayer.
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