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the cultivator, to make up for bad seasons or family
troubles; and should encourage him to improve
instead of impoverishing the land by giving him some
fixity of tenure, or fair compensation for improve.
ments if the land is taken away from him.

It is on this principle that the British government
 acts-in its revenue administration ; and it attempts
 to induce the landowners under it to follow
the same rule with regard to their tenants, who
form the bulk of the cultivating classes,

Incidence of Taxation.

Of the total revenue proper as above shewn,
only 36} millions are really paid by the people of
British India ; of the remainder, 61 millions are paid
by the Chinese, and £ million by the native states,
The sum of 36} millions distributed over the 190
millions in British India, would give an average of 3s,
od. per head per annum, which will doubtless appear
very small. But this is by no means the real incidence,
*The landowner pays for land revenue, an amount
ranging from Rs. 3 to Rs. 7 per cent. on the gross
produce of his lands, and a further fraction by
way of provincial rates, If he goes to law he may
contribute something to stamps; if he drinks, to
excise; and if he prefers English to native cloth,
to customs; but when he has paid his land revenue

* India in 1880, p. 2435, extract from remarks by Mr. IH. S. Cunningham.