APPENDIX E 
251 
As to distortion, mal is easily misread as sal if the loop of the 
mim is left open, as sometimes happens; and, given sal, to turn 
iz into har would be easy and natural. Har hdl, tar mal, and 
partal would be “shots,” made by puzzled copyists; har sal 
bar mal, the work of a man with conflicting MSS. before him. 
At any rate, the authority for mal is much better than that for 
sal. 
As to meaning, mal-s jins-¢ kamil denotes Demand-on-high- 
grade-crops. Now, from the 14th to the 17th century, 
we find the development of high-grade crops forming 
one of the two main lines of the policy of the Revenue Ministry, 
the other being extension of cultivation: it is, at the least, 
probable that the Ministry tabulated figures year by year to 
show the progress made in this direction; and I read the text 
as saying that, having struck an average of the Demand, the 
officials also took into account these figures for the Demand 
on high-grade crops, and, for them, took the maximum instead 
of the average. 
Now the averaging of the Demand, as to which the text is 
clear, would not be the way to obtain the new Demand-rates, 
which we know were introduced at this time, but would be an 
obviously proper basis for a useful Valuation. This consideration 
proves, to my mind, that paragraph E tells of the preparation 
of a new Valuation, not new Demand-rates. It is clear that 
an average Demand for the past ten years was struck: would 
this average be a good Valuation by itself? or would it require 
adjustment? We must remember that the work was in charge 
of Shih Mansiir, whose reputation as a meticulous accountant 
is notorious. One can almost hear him insisting that such 
an average would be unfair to the State, because it would under 
value villages where high-grade crops were extending. “We 
must accept the average,” he would argue, “for crops dependent 
on the rains; but in a case where the State has sunk wells, or 
made advances, and thereby fostered a large extension of 
sugarcane or poppy, why should we surrender any part of the 
benefit to the assignee? Suppose sugarcane has risen steadily 
from 2 to 10 in the course of the decade, why value the village 
as if the figure were only 6? The wells are there, the assignee 
can maintain the area at 10 by proper management, and, if he 
fails to do so, he deserves to lose. To make the Valuation fair 
to the State. we must raise the calculated average-Demand by 
substituting the maximum for the average on these high-grade