without exaggeration, not have been raised if the canals had not existed," the wealth of the Northern Provinces was during the year increased by almost the total cost of the group.

Passing South it may be noticed concerning Behar, that since the opening of the Sone canals, the sugar trade in parts of Shahabad has already increased ten-fold. And the irrigation that in 1873-74 saved crops valued at over half a million, could now, if necessary, be quadrupled. Even in lower Bengal the people are beginning to recognize the superior value of canal irrigated crops. The certainty given to all agricultural operations and the increased yield obtained even in years of average rainfall, have been alluded to in a previous article; the fertilizing matter carried down from the hills in suspension contributing in no small degree to enrich lands that as a rule are cropped year after year with no rest and no manure. It has been often stated by Bengal officers, and probably as often disputed, that the comparative outturn of irrigated against unirrigated crops, was under many circumstances as 2 to I, and in support of this, it may be interesting to notice that seven hundred distinct measurements in the Mahánadi district in 1877-78 gave results follows:

as

Balance in favour of irrigation

which, at the rates then prevailing, equalled Rs. 17 per acre against a water rate of Re. 1. The total irrigated area of Bengal that year was 400,000 acres, and the value of the crops estimated at

800,000, so that in a season not specially abnormal, in a province least favourable to irrigation, the canals may be credited with £400,000 of indirect returns.

Irrigation in Sind is not so much a protection against faminefor having no rainfall. no risks can be run-but without it neither agriculture nor population could exist, and the ten million acres under the inundation canals is so much land producing food that would otherwise relapse into barren waste.

The three great deltaic systems of Madras from which such splendid direct returns are realized are even more striking instances of immensely increased wealth to the people. The condition of the Godavery and Kistna deltas prior to the construction of the canals was miserable in the extreme. They had been in great part depopulated by the famine of 1833, a large extent of country was subsequently submerged by a cyclonic wave. The difficulties of communication rendered it unprofitable to raise grain for export. There was little or no trade. The ryots frequently could not meet the Government demand, and remissions

had constantly to be made. The district now contributes a revenue second only to that of Tanjore. The returns show for an average year as carried by the canals 22 million of ton miles for goods, carried at about one-sixth of the land rate, and 31 million of passenger miles. They may be said to have created over two million acres of annual food crops and to have transformed a mere hamlet into the thriving port of Coconada, and developed almost all the export trade of the two deltas. The entire export trade from the united Godavery ports in ports in 1845 amounted to £90,777; the imports to £38,848. In 1871-72, or twenty years after the opening of the main canals, the exports had risen to £866,633, the imports to £186,239. While during the recent famine in Madras, the quantity of rice exported by sea in 1876-77 from the one port of Coconada alone, was valued at £870,000, and a still larger quantity is said to have been exported by land. The total value of this crop raised on the Godavery and Kistna deltas, says Mr. Cunningham in a recent pamphlet on finance," where, but for the canals, not a blade would have been seen, has been officially computed at five millions sterling, or about four times the entire capital spent up to the end of that year on both." The value of such an oasis as this, while over the most part of Southern India every district was importing food for the 36 millions more or less in want, can hardly be exaggerated.

All this increased production must represent vastly increased wealth to the people, and to take the meanest view of it, must also represent a much greater tax paying capability, Irrigation might not only be credited with additional land revenue, but possibly with additional income tax. But it is not merely as a means of adding to the exchequer, which would be only another form of direct returns, that the financial value can be measured. The Government of India is in the position of a great landlord, and as such, is financially deeply interested in the prosperity of its tenantry. This increased prosperity in some of the older canal districts is most marked. The staple food of the people over considerable areas has changed from the coarser to the finer grains, wheat has now largely supplied the place of barley, millet, or gram; and if not much of light,' surely something of sweetness,' in the form of sugar must have con tributed to the luxury of the cultivator. In many cases brick houses have taken the places of mud huts. If the agriculturalist has not acquired wealth, his banker most certainly has. The greatly increased sums spent by the canal villager on his weddings and feasts is proverbial. The increased value of irrigated land is presumably only proportionate to the increased value of land generally; both are of course equally indebted to the advantage of settled Government and the enormous benefits

of British rule generally, but land that will grow valuable crops, independent of the rains, is equally of course worth more than land that is at the mercy of the season, and brings a correspondingly higher price. The ordinary rental of irrigated land in Northern India is doubled; in some districts of Madras it is four fold; in Tanjore it is said to be ten-fold. The selling price in Northern India is certainly 2 to 3 times, in parts of Mysore is quoted as high as 14 times, that of the unirrigated.

One of the natural resources of wealth, in great part lost to India by former unfortunate denundations, was undoubtedly its forests, and as an assistance to restoring these, canals are invaluable. In a few years long lines of trees follow the banks, or can easily be made to follow each channel as opened, These lines of trees assist the retention and absorption of the rainfall, if indeed they do not increase it, and so by keeping the soil naturally moist, economise the necessity for artificial watering, and supply, in some measure, fuel to take the place of the manure of which the cultivator almost entirely robs the soil. They provide moreover great stores of artificial power available for the development of other forms of industry, and to assist in providing the diversity of occupations and the fostering of new trades, which is admittedly another of the wants of the country. And if cotton and sugar and corn mills have not extended as they might, it is possible that the attention of canal officers has not been sufficiently turned in that direction, or that Government has not seen its way to initiating what private enterprise in this country is especially long in undertaking.

And finally the expenditure on the construction of these works in itself adds to the capital of the cultivating classes. There are no public works of which so large a proportion of the outlay finds its way back so quickly to the pockets of the people. The principal items of expenditure are for land, earth-work, and bricks; the bulk of the payments for all of which go back, almost at once, to the people most immediately concerned.

Viewed as commercial undertakings, it has been shown that the returns are not merely satisfactory, but handsome. Viewed as works of public utility, their importance can hardly be over-estimated; but while both may be fully accepted, the desirability of their extension must inevitably be first measured by the resources avaibable.

How far such extensions may be desirable or even possible must be reserved for consideration hereafter.

E, E, OLIVER.

THE

ART. IX.-INDIAN FOLKTALES.

WHAT SHOULD BE AND WHAT CAN BE DONE.

HE growing interest in Indian Folklore, now that the Folklore Society proposes to actively extend its work to India induces us to make some remarks on the subject. Fairy Tales form naturally the most widely interesting section of the folklore collectors' work, and that which is most likely to be mainly studied, at any rate at first. We shall therefore confine our remarks to them.

The sciences connected with the study of nature are the result of the study of observations-they are the result, that is, firstly of the labors of the collector, secondly of the collator. The collector gathers the information which the collator compares and examines, and from which he draws his conclusions and eventually forms the science. These divisions of labor though perfectly distinct are interdependent, are of equal importance and demand the exercise of intelligence and discernment in an equal degree. Inexact observations beget false inferences, careless examination leads to false theories and both to false conclusions. The collector cannot be too cautious in recording his facts, or too careful that they are presented in their proper light. In the case of such a science as that now known as Folklore, the importance of these considerations cannot be exaggerated, dealing as it does with the languages, creeds, ideas and habits of thought, of many widely differing nations. It is absolutely necessary for the purposes of collation, since men cannot know every language or think with every people, that the legends, beliefs, superstitions, customs, proverbs of the world should be translated and presented in a dress intelligible to the examiners-reduced as it were to certain denominators. Stories, then, inexactly translated, customs recorded in misleading terms, beliefs presented in a wrong light, legends containing references unexplained or incorrectly explained, are useless for the purposes of collection and therefore useless altogether; since a fact of Folklore unfitted for comparison is merely an idle tale. The Folklore collector should therefore first make himself as sure as he can, that he quite understands what he is recording; secondly, that he translates his record correctly, having especial regard to the idea which the terms he employs will give rise to in the minds of his readers; thirdly, that all doubtful terms used, if some be unavoidable, and all references, are carefully explained; and lastly, with a view to avoiding misconceptions as

far as possible, he should always, when practicable, give the original in full. The origiuals of tales have also this advantage.they are in the language of the vulgar, and frequently contain forms and words not found in the tongue of the educated, and therefore not in books. These forms are not only quaint but frequently antique, and give those clues to the philologist by which only a modern tongue can be satisfactorily traced to its origin. How deficient we are in such data in India, only the philologist and worker in languages can fully appreciate. Such seem to us to be the principles upon which all books of Folktales should proceed.

The above reflections rise prominently in the mind on perusing little Miss Stokes's book of Indian Fairy Tales-a book that can never fail to be interesting, but has missed being valuable, despite the elaborate notes, and the able introduction, because its method is not sound; the fault of so many books of a similar nature. The proximate sources of the stories are native bodyservants-a circumstance which should at once put the Folklore collector on his guard. We all know how susceptible are servants to the influences around them, and that the narrators of Miss Stokes's tales have felt the influence, unconsciously it is true, of the Christians whom they served, is apparent from their tales. The stories were evidently very carefully collected from them; so it must be presumed that the aberrations observable in them. from the purely native cast of sentiment which they should possess, are due to the narrator, not to the collector. The lesson taught is that the future collector is to avoid native servants' tales, or to accept them with great caution, and only after close investigation as to origin and the bearings of the details on the religion of the narrator. Miss Frere's Old Deccan Days has just the same fault; her tales came from an ayah, who, if we recollect rightly, was a Christian. Again the notes to Miss Stokes's books, valuable, complete and searching as they are in some respects, are incomplete in that very respect in which all notes to books of original research should be most complete, viz., the explanation of local coloring, of religious references and expressions; a point in which it must be observed, most folktale collections fail. Collectors are in too great a hurry they keep on adding to their list without sufficiently investigating the value of each item of the total; without stopping to render what they collect valuable by leaving nothing unexplained which is likely to mislead.

We shall perhaps best illustrate our meaning and the principles on which we think all collections of folktales should be compiled by dissecting "Loving Laili," one of Miss Stokes's stories. Loving Laili purports to be told by the Hindu ayah Dûuknî, who says she