marked one of the Hovas to a recent correspondent of The Times (London) in Madagascar, and the same statement might be made by a man of almost any Asiatic or African nationality. The social effect of these brooding misgivings is to make mutual intercourse reserved, constrained, and wary, while, on the other hand, frank and open confidence gives assurance, courage, and cheerfulness to men, and adds to the happiness and prosperity of society, for survival. 9. POVERTY.-The problem of poverty is an old one in the economic life of man. The struggle to live has been ceaseless. Slowly and surely man has added other resources to the ordinary products which nature supplies for his sup- The ceaseless struggle port, and has utilized her forces and cultivated her fructifying powers for his maintenance and comfort. The great difference between the abundant economic harvests of modern material civilization, so fruitful in provisions for human needs, and the pinched and meagre resources of early civilization, is due in large part to man's power over nature and his ability to subsidize her capabilities and extract her hidden wealth. The belated civilization of the non-Christian world is still in various stages of ignorance and incompetence as regards the mastery over nature and the intelligent use of her productive capacities. This is especially true so far as the modern industrial plant is concerned, and all those processes of developing and utilizing nature's generous resources which have been brought about by the inventive genius and the economic enterprise of modern times. The genesis of poverty. This backward status is due not only to ignorance and the disabilities of primitive environment, but to the working of oppression and injustice, on the one hand, and, on the other, to the influence of prejudice, obstinacy, inertia, pride, incapacity, shiftlessness, the power of custom, and general heedlessness as to better modes of living. The result is that an awful status of poverty has weighted a large section of heathen society, and holds it prostrate in helpless and hopeless indigence. Dependence upon agricultural and pastoral resources, even if man escapes the ravages of war and pillage, is destined as population increases either to become a scant reliance or to fail altogether, so that the history of uncivilized man, and even of races with tolerably advanced methods, has been, and is still, often marked by a long and desperate struggle for livelihood or in many instances even for a meagre subsistence. Christianity as an agency for the teaching of saving moral principles, the production of a higher order and system in life, the cultivation of broader intelligence, the humanizing of law, the protection of property rights, the introduction of science, the establishment of philanthropy, the awakening of aspiration, the kindling of hope, and the heralding of a new and progressive era among uncivilized man, has a truly helpful mission in the material betterment of society. In cooperation with commerce, economic science, and modern industrial facilities, it will do much to mitigate the sorrows of poverty, and provide a remedy for the suffering and despair which penury produces among races where there is little or no relief from its grinding miseries. The social import of poverty. Where the struggle for the support of life is intense and prolonged, yielding at best only a sustenance, and often only the daily bread necessary to sustain life, with now and then a temporary failure which threatens starvation, as is the case in China, and would be still in India were it not for governmental assistance, poverty becomes a social evil of portentous and gloomy import. It puts society into a state of distress and helplessness, in which life becomes a desperate and exhausting slavery to daily need. This struggle for existence may contain in an important sense the potency of evolutionary progress, but after it has gone on for centuries with little revelation of its power to alleviate and benefit, one longs for some outside help from a source which will give a new impetus to life, bring more hope and security, provide more sane and effective remedies, and lift the shadows of despair. This is one of the many reasons why the introduction of Christianity and modern civilization into China, and in fact throughout the non-Christian world, is a noble and beneficent undertaking. Once introduced there, it will become a saving power, as it has been in Christendom; not that it will at once banish poverty, but that it will provide many remedial forces and introduce many alleviating instrumentalities. It will at least give a helping hand to many who in their extremity are now without aid. It will tend also to break up that colossal system of pauperism which is incidental, more or less, to all false religious systems, and is so burdensome to the people, under the guise and sanction of priestly requirement, ceremonial obligation, or ascetic practice. Half the pauperism of the non-Christian world is religious, and a large section besides makes its plea in the name of religion, and so plays upon superstitious fears as to gain a ready hearing and impose large exactions. In this connection, however, we are not concerned so much with the explanation of this state of poverty as with the reality and extent of its existence and its social results. India is perhaps, more than other non-Christian lands, the home of poverty. This is due to the immense population, which has increased for centuries within the fixed geographical limits India's recurring misery. of the peninsula, taxing its agricultural resources to the utmost. At the same time a burden of social and religious customs, far more expensive than the people can support, has rested upon them.1 The result of this twofold impoverishment has been the most grinding poverty among almost the entire rural population of India. If, as sometimes happens, the rains fail, and with them the harvests, the people are plunged into the extremities of famine. No more pathetic and dreadful scenes of starvation have been witnessed than those which characterized some of the great famines of Indian history. Even as late as the famine of 1868-70 in Rajputana 1,250,000 people perished. A century or so ago there were famines which destroyed millions of the people. Mr. John Eliot, 1 "The Rev. C. B. Ward, of the American Methodist Episcopal Mission, has prepared a table of statistics showing some of the details and causes of the poverty prevailing among the working classes within the dominions of H. H. the Nizam of Hyderabad. These figures are the result of thirteen years of careful observation and diligent study of the subject in close contact with the people. These statistics show, concerning the direct cost of heathenism per annum, that, out of every Rs 100 earned, Rs 36 go for heathen rites and bad or useless habits. If any one questions this, the figures can be produced. Is it a wonder that such a people is called poor?" -The Baptist Missionary Review (Madras), January, 1896, p. 38. 2 "There cannot be the slightest doubt that famines and epidemics were far more frequent and destructive in former centuries than at present. Allusions to terrible famines occur in ancient Hindu writings. The Ramayana mentions a severe and prolonged drought which occurred in Northern India. According to the Orissa legends, severe famines occurred between the years 1107 and 1143 A.D. The memory of a terrible twelve years' famine, ' Dvadasavarsha Panjam,' lives in tradition in Southern India. Duff, in his history of the Mahrattas, states that 'in 1396 the dreadful famine, distinguished from all others by the name Durga Devee," commenced in Maharashtra. It lasted, according to Hindu legends, for twelve years. At the end of that time the periodical rains returned; but whole districts were entirely depopulated, and a very scanty revenue was obtained from the territory between the Godavari and the Kistna for upwards of thirty years afterwards.'”—Raghavaiyangar, "The Progress of the Madras Presidency During the Last Forty Years," P. 4. For account of other famines, consult ibid., pp. 6, 27, 31, 36, 42. 3 Robson, The Story of the Rajputana Mission," p. 40. 4 "The following is an account of the famine in Bengal last century: "All through the hot season the people went on dying. The husbandmen sold their cattle; they sold their implements of agriculture; they devoured their seedgrain; they sold their sons and daughters, till at length no buyer of children could be found; they ate the leaves of the trees and the grass of the field, and in June it in a recently published volume on Indian Famines, states that there have been seventeen within one hundred and twenty-two years. The total mortality of these calamities, extending over centuries, is something appalling. In 1832-33, Madras, one of the districts affected, lost from 150,000 to 200,000 inhabitants out of a total population of 500,000. In 1837, in Upper India there were at least 800,000 victims. In 1860-61, in the Northwest Provinces and the Punjab, 500,000 human beings perished. In 1865-66, in Orissa alone 1,000,000 people died out of a total population of 3,000,000.1 These awful visitations have greatly increased the prevalence of leprosy throughout India. The Leprosy Commission in 1890-91 expressed the conviction that "the greater the poverty of a district, the more prone the latter is toward leprosy."2 It is also one of the causes of child labor, so detrimental at the tender age at which it is exacted by so many of the poor in India.3 The beneficent efforts of the British Government. The British Government has now established a system of famine relief, or rather prevention, which makes past scenes of suffering no longer possible; but it cannot, of course, do more than save the people from extremities. As regards their condition of poverty, it is still distressing. The rule among the vast agricultural population of the Indian villages is that they live upon what is sufficient for sustenance, or little more. A careful estimate based upon the census shows that there are multitudes who have not more than from six to twelve rupees a year for support. The mean annual income of the people of India is from twenty to twenty-seven rupees, equivalent at the present rates of silver in India to about six to eight dollars. Among the resolutions offered and passed at the Indian National Congress of Madras, 1894, was one bearing upon the problem of poverty, introduced by Mr. Seymour Keay, M.P., in which it was urged that "this Congress, concurring in the views set forth in previous Congresses, affirms that fully 50,000,000 of the population, a number yearly increasing, are dragging out a miserable existence on the verge of starvation, and that was reported that the living were feeding on the dead. Two years after the dearth Warren Hastings made a progress through Bengal, and he states the loss to have been at least one third of the inhabitants, or probably about 10,000,000 of people. Nineteen years later, Lord Cornwallis reported that one third of Bengal was a jungle inhabited only by wild beasts.'"-" Pictorial Tour round India," pp. 33, 34. 1 See The Literary Digest, December 7, 1895, "Famines in India." Report of the Leprosy Commission in India, 1890–91," p. 98. 2 3 Satthianadhan, "The History of Education in the Madras Presidency," p. 7. 'Report of the Tenth Indian National Congress, Held at Madras, 1894,” p. 20. ་ ་་ |