INDIAN FAMINES - Institute for Social and Economic Change

IIISTORIOAL FAMINES. 8
to bear in mind the leading features of each.
The result we must look for in a famine is the
mortality statement. No record of mortality is
absolutely accurate; but we may fairly assume
that the inaccuracy is not such as to interfere
materially with its value for purposes of comparison.
This principle of pinning our faith
to a mortality statement h8.''1, however, been
questioned by one of the daily papers, in
which the writer says that a nation cannot be
roused to the proper pitch of sympathy and
energy by the mere operation of statistics. This
assertion, however, we may in our turn also
question. A practical result establishes a
standard that can be appreciated by every one,
which no amount of distress-painting can do, as
the writ.er referred to would wish to infer.
I need hardly preface my remarks by saying
that a country without an indigenous history is
not one to look to for a satisfactory account of
any event whatever. In India there are masses
of written material, but scattered, desultory, and
unconnected. The best portions of these have
been utilised, and are now appearing in detail
under the title of the 'History of India as told