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    No. 436, JVAY 31, 1858,] THE LEADEB, _^ ...

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    COTTON CULTIVATION AND THE ASSOCIATION. ...

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    INDIAK RAILWArS. The admitted importance...

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    Railways A3std The Guarantee System. Whi...

    Australia is a new example , but a successful one . Although the revenues of the provinces a few years ago -were so scanty that a guarantee was to be contemplated with } fear , the railway system was begun , and Victoria , finding herself in possession of more abundant resources , has made provision for railway accommodation on a large scale . Spain , Portugal , Brazil , Chili , Russia , Naples , Turkey , and other countries , have successfully applied the guarantee system , and the results are so satisfactory that preparations ar « everywhere made for extended operations .

    The Indian Government , like the Governments of manv European countries , -whose names will readily suggest themselves , is a paternal Government , and the consequence is , instead of letting enterprise take its course , it is very careful to put it in leading-strings . The Government assumes tliat if it gives guarantees freely the capitalists will eat each other up , or India will be covered with too many railways , and that the price of rails will rise , or the rate of freights be enhanced , and has many excellent reasons for imposing restrictions . A very strong argument for the Government against granting more guarantees is , that the

    market is at this moment in such a state that the new railway stocks , now before the public , cannot be placed , and are at a discount . This is a state of affairs which must always take place from time to time , and must , therefore , always be anticipated ; but a time of sluggish enterprise , and of marked dulness of speculation , instead of affording the full measure of the extent of operations , only shows the minimum , and the further confirms the uecessity of a liberal policy . If the Indian Government were sincerely desirous at this time of issuing railway stock largely , it would find great difficulty in doing so , because it is not the Government which is the master of

    the market , but the market of the Government . There are fluctuations and vicissitudes in the money-market , as in all other institutions , and a prudent system of finance would so direct its operations as to take advantage of the market when it was free , and there was a full tide of prosperity , so as to place its securities at such a time as was most convenient to capitalists , or most agreeable to their caprices , if caprice influenced the market . ' " . ¦; . . . ' ' ¦ ¦¦ ' i ¦ '¦ . - . ¦ ¦ ¦ ¦ . ¦ ¦ ¦ . ' ' \ Instead of a liberal grant of guaranteed stocks diminishing the market , or throwing it down , it strengthens and extends the market , and this is very fullv shown

    by a comparison of the market in this period of discount , with many millions of Indian railway stock afloat , and in the former period of discount , when the whole amount of effective" stock was little over a million . Railway directors will not press stocks on the market when they are at a . discount , but their exertions will be stimulated to find means for placing their securities and carrying out their operations , while a regular body of capitalists has been constituted , whose chief investments are in Indian railway stock , Indian railway stock now constituting one of the sub-divisions of the railway market on the Stock Exchange with its own set of dealers .

    As railway enterprise extends , so will the body of capitalists be increased , and there will be a greater power of placing stock . They become canvassers , inducing friends and acquaintances by their example to engage in the like operations , and although the rate of interest is small , Indian railway securities will in time be largely held in India itself , as other Government securities . It is a fallacy to suppose , because local rates of interest are high , Government securities with moderate rates of interest cannot bo placed , for the experience of moat countries is otherwise on this head , and we have special experience with regard to India . In Indin , as in Prance , with the opening of railways , the local population will become more alh'e to their advantages , and accept them as an eligible investment , and then the pressure on the home market will cease to be a matter for cnnsiflorntirm .

    With regard to the supposition that the guarantees may press on the Indian Treasury , Mr . Charles Freshfield has effectually shown that under any reasonable system of administration they must confer great benefits on the Treasury , instead of imposing a burden upon it . The development of the traffic of the railways is , however , tho chief source to which the Government lias to look for relief , not by interference with the details of traffic , as on the East Indian , the Great Indian Peninsular , and the Madras Railways , but by leaving the railway managers to conduct the traffic in the best way they can- How they impede it is , however , well enough shown in a recent parliamentary paper , which records that tho ^ Madras Government has refused to allow tho railway company to run Sunday excursion trains , as they proposed , or to run extra trains on the occasion of Hindoo and Mahomodan holidays and fairs .

    The sooner Indian rail-way enterprise is allowed free course , the better will it be for the railways and the Government 5 but the interference of tho Indian Government in tho construction of railways has been such an impediment as to meet with tho censure of the Institution of Civil Engineers , and its interference ) with tho conduct of the traffic luia brought down tho remonstrances of railway directors and shareholders .

    No. 436, Jvay 31, 1858,] The Leadeb, _^ ...

    No . 436 , JVAY 31 , 1858 , ] THE LEADEB , _^ . 753

    Cotton Cultivation And The Association. ...

    COTTON CULTIVATION AND THE ASSOCIATION . The Indian Administration and the Manchester Association are now face to face on the cotton question . The Indian Government party assert that no legislative or political obstacles any longer exist which can impede the increase of Indian cotton ; and they assume that the Manchester men are committing a misdemeanour in demanding ; the care of the Government for the cotton cultivation .

    There is more of obstinacy than of skill in the attitude assumed by the governing party on this subject , as , indeed , is too often the case on Indian subjects . Instead « f boldly relying on the favourable results of their efforts for improving this branch of industry , by which they ha-ve greatly increased the export of cotton within the last few years , they appeal with more complacency to those points on which they have failed , with the confidence that they have done everything which can be done , aid that nothing more can be done , and yet the railways , which they have authorised expressly for the purpose of stimulating the cotton traffic , are not yet in effective operation . Thus they spoil their own case sooner tlian allow that any one can suggest to Ihem the possibility of improvement .

    With equal complacency they appeal to the zemindaree system and the perpetual settlement in Bengal , and to the ryotwaree system and new settlement in Madras , as equally the consummation of perfection , and as affording all the facilities that are required for the acquisition of land and the cultivation of cotton . It is a great argument , too , that the cultivation is now made so free that if the ryot does not grow it with the same readiness as any other crop , it is because , for economical reasons , he finds the growth of other crops more remunerative . Such was the assertion with which Colonel Sykes twitted his brother member , Mr . B . Smith , when , in the progress of his zealous labours , and as the representative of the Manchester Association , be brought before the Society of Arts tbe present undeveloped state of the Indian cotton market . . ¦ . - . - ¦ ¦ ¦ ¦ ' : - ¦ . ' ,. ¦ ¦ ¦ ; ¦ . '; * ' ¦ - ' ' ¦ ' ¦ ¦

    mules are employed , the means of transit mustbe imperfect , as they were in the last century in manv parts of the south and north . of England , where such beasts of burden were employed , long since superseded by effective wheel conveyances , by tramways or by railways . Pack beasts are onl y used because no better conveyance can be iised , not because they are efficient or economical . Wherever a cart can be brought , it beats a horse in England , or a mule in Spain or South America . In India the misfortune is that the transport is confined to bullocks or bullock carts in many of the cotton-growing districts , and in many other districts too ; and as nature does not provide bridges for India , as she is said to do roads , the transit is impeded whenever a drv nullah !«

    come to or a watercourse . Delay is the least that can be expected . Sometimes a hackery breaks down sometimes the cotton gets wetted and rotted in the stream ; sometimes a flood , comes on , and neither bullocks nor hackeries can get across to the ao-called road or road ground on the other side . Besides the assumed plains , which are always available for traffic in the season , but which , in . truth , present many natural obstacles , the route to Bombay , for instance , with a cargo of cotton , in many cas « s leads across large rivers , and across high mountain chains .

    Cotton is , therefore , an article which is peculiarly dependent on cheap and efficient transport , and until that is provided India canxot grow cotton as it ought , bat can only produce it as a precariou s cultivation , and the supply for export must be chiefly obtained , when a demand arises , from the small portions of unconsumed stock , or from some excess which has remained on hand after a former demand had suddenly ceased . Improved transport is one great essential for the promotion of the cotton cultivation , as a boon to the Indian ryot and the English manufacturer , so that English agency may penetrate the country to supervise the purchase , the packing , and . the transport of the article , and see that the transport is effectually conducted . This the Manchester Association will persist in demanding , as well as an improvement in the land tenures , an extension of irrigation , and the protection of English settlers by English law .

    Putting aside the land question for the present , it may be worth while to consider the fallacy of Colonel Sykes ' s report , that the cotton crop is only restricted at this time by the fair and natural operations of the market , and the economic laws governing prices . This would be so if the conditions of the cotton and other crops were the same , bat they are not . Take a rice , grain , or pulse Prop , for instance ; that is a matter of primary necessity for the consumption of the grower , and is further an article of large local consumption . So , too , oil-producing plants , and sugar to a great extent ; for though sugar may be exported , it enters largely into local consumption . Cotton , like jute , is an article , to a limited

    degree , of local consumption , but is a commodity of export , dependent for its consumption on its transmission to some Indian seat of manufacture , to China , or to a European market . The ryot will and must grow grain , pulse , fodder , oleaginous products , and sugar . This is scarcely a matter of choice , but it is a matter of choice , and a question dependent on market considerations of price , whether he shall grow cotton , indigo , or opium . Grain he can sell at his own door , if he has more tlian ia required for his household consumption ; but the purchasers of cotton are few , and those purchasers collect for the European agent , who transmits it to the merchant at the port of transit , and he ships it to Europe ,

    The price of grain in the nearest market may be influenced by the export of rice to a neighbouring collectorate suffering from famine , to China , or to Europe , but what the man himself and his household eat is not measured by price . Out of a cotton crop , however , it is very little the ryot , in most parts of India , wants or gets for his own vestment . The crop must be sold ; it is a question of price ; , and that prico , as matters no w stand , is dependent on tho vicissitudes of the Liverpool market . We have here assumed that there is an English agent in the district , who has organised a trade in cotton , and that there are means for its conveyance to market ; but if there be no European market , and if

    there bo no roads , or no good nver conveyance , tho ryot who grows cotton may leave it to rot on the field , whatever may be the intrinsic value of the cotton he can grow , and the labour he can bestow upon it . There is not , therefore , under such circumstances , a free competition between cotton and other crops , but no competition at all , and no vend for the cotton , and , therefore , the ryot does not grow it . This is the extreme case , but tho case which is to bo found over a great part of India ; but even in the beat cotton districts of India there ore such unfavourable conditions of market , chiefly dependent on inadequate means of transport , that the cultivator of cotton ia greatly discouraged .

    It is a favourite assumption of many authorities that roads are not wanted in India , because the country is a plain open to travel for many months of tho year . The test of thia is a very simple one , for the goodness of the road will bo shown by the weight of the load that can bo carried , apart from the consideration what animal power is set to convoy tho load . If pack horses or pack

    Indiak Railwars. The Admitted Importance...

    INDIAK RAILWArS . The admitted importance of our subject will command our earnest and stated advocacy , not merely of the introduction and extension of the railway ' system * : in India , trot of the prudent and safe administration of Indian "Railway Companies in England . ¦* . ' . - •¦ - ¦ ; . ¦¦ * " / - . ¦ . :. The value of railroads to British India can scarcely be over-estimated ; and the permanent success of undertakings , having for their object the opening up that vast and populous , but long neglected country , , to social and commercial intercommunication , must depend , in a great degree , upon the integrity and wisdom with which their ati ' airs are conducted in this country .

    Unfortunately , we have in the present disjointed aspect of the " Bombay , Baroda , and Central India Railway Company , " an apt illustration of the lamentable condition , to which mismanagement and discord may reduce the most promising undertaking , and we propose to lay before our readers a brief summary of its position . In the original constitution of the Directory there was an entire absence of commercial experience—a circumstance whicli may account for much of the subsequent complexity into which the affairs of the Company have lapsed , until at length we find it in a state of very undesirable confusion . And although , recently , the commercial quality of the governing body had been somewhat improved by the accession of two mercantile directors , this very

    circum stance would appear to have indirectly conduced to the present crisis . For , in the natural course of things , the details of the administration being more narrowly investigated than , they had previously been , it was found that the affairs of the company , instead of being conducted upon sound mercantile principles , were almost wholly in the hands of irresponsible subordinates , whilst the authority of the board was merely nominal . An attempt to correct the manifold evils which had supervened upon this incongruous condition of affairs , gave offence to the parties into whose hands the conduct of the company had fallen , and the late effort of the directors to assert their independence of their officers was met by a combination which , for the moment , seems to fee triumphant .

    It would appear that one of tho original promoters of the company , Colonel Kennedy , was appointed , by tho deed of settlement , managing director and chief engineer at a salary of 2500 / ., with a bonus of 50 OO & , and expenses for a voyage to India . It further appears tliat this managing director ap pointed , or , as ho Bays , " recommended" his brother secretary to the company , and his nephew agent and chief engineer in India . In tho train of these family arrangements there followed the nomination or " recommendation" and appointment of solicitor stockbroker , and a w ^ olo staff of clerks and agents

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), July 31, 1858, page 25, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_31071858/page/25/