1849, and was then found to contain canals of two kinds -inundation canals and permanent canals.

The inundation canals are cuts from the rivers, which are empty during the winter, because the water is then not high enough to enter them; but as the water rises in the spring, from the melting of the snows, these channels fill, and remain full till late in autumn. The fertility of the South-Western Punjab mainly depends on these canals; and in a former age they appear to have been conducted from all the rivers; their course being traceable by the ruins, not only of villages, but of cities and public buildings, which depended for existence on their fertilising influence. Such of these canals as were found in working order at the annexation have been maintained, improved, and enlarged; and plans and estimates have been formed for the restoration of others. As yet, however, a greater part of the funds which could be spared for the purpose have been devoted to the construction and improvement of permanent canals.” 1

The only important permanent canal which the East India Company undertook in the Punjab was the Baree Doab Canal, about 450 miles in length. To John Lawrence and to Lord Dalhousie, India is indebted for this magnificent work. John Lawrence continuously pressed on the Indian Government the expediency of constructing roads and canals, promising that such expenditure would soon return itself tenfold in increased revenue. "If we wish to feed the thousands of human beings," wrote the Lahore Board, "whom the change of rule must necessarily throw out of employment, we cannot more readily do so than by cutting new canals, and improving the beds of the old ones.' "Everywhere," responded Lord Dalhousie, "I found lands of vast extent, fertile properties now lying comparatively waste, but wanting only water to convert them into plains of the richest 1 Memorandum of the Improvements, &c., 1858.

2 Lahore Board to the Supreme Government. Letter dated November 29, 1850.

cultivation." And the Court of Directors gave them "cordial assent to the undertaking "-the Baree Doab Canal-but with a caution that the work should be carried out with "due regard to economy."

Baird Smith had become the most distinguished authority on irrigation in Northern India, and he took advantage of a furlough to Europe to visit Italy, and examine the great canal works of Lombardy and Piedmont. And the East India Company paid his expenses for a similar scientific visit to the United States of America. It is needless to add that the Baree Doab Canal was pushed on vigorously. By May 1856, more than 325 miles had been excavated; and the work was expected to be completed in 1859. The total cost was estimated at a million sterling, and the expected return at £120,000, or 12 per cent. on the outlay per annum.3

The province of Bombay does not boast of large rivers, except the Narbada and the Tapti, which water a few districts only; and there is little scope for irrigation by canals in the uplands of the Deccan. And sufficient attention was not paid by the Company's servants to irrigation by means of wells and reservoir tanks. Sindh, cultivation was dependent on the rise of the Indus, whose waters were distributed by a network of old canals; and the Company spent £25,000 annually in keeping these canals in working order.

In

Madras was rich in the remains of reservoir tanks, built by old Rajas and Polygars; and Dr. Francis Buchanan had observed and described them in course of his journey from Madras to the West Coast as early as 1800. A

1 Minute dated December 6, 1850

2 Court of Directors to the Governor-General. Letter dated April 25, 1851.

Memorandum of the Improvements, &c., 1858.

4 Every province in India has its distinct irrigation requirements. In the alluvial basins of the Ganges and the Indus the most suitable irrigation works are canals from these rivers; while away from the rivers, wells are the most suitable. In Bengal with its copious rainfall, shallow ponds are the most suitable works, and these were numerous in the olden times, sometimes of very large dimensions. In Madras and Southern India, where

systematic restoration and preservation of these ancient works, and the excavation of new works of the same kind where most needed, would have changed the face of the country within fifty or sixty years, and the Company might have handed over the Southern Province to the Crown with its agriculture safeguarded, and its population protected from famines. But irrigation was sadly neglected; and when, sometimes, a Collector undertook the restoration of an old reservoir, it was mainly with the purpose of adding to the heavy assessment of his district.

There are, however, a few tracts in the Province of Madras where irrigation by means of canals on a large scale is possible, and these tracts are the deltas of the great rivers the Godavari, the Krishna, and the Kaveri. Thoughtful men perceived, early in the nineteenth century, the possibility of utilising these great rivers, and irrigating their deltas; and the name of Sir Arthur Cotton is imperishably connected with the first great canal works in the South, as those of Baird Smith and his colleagues are in the North.

Coleroon is one of the branches of the Kaveri; and the old Coleroon Works, constructed by the ancient Hindus, can be traced from the second century of the Christian Era. When the country came under British administration in 1801, the old works were found to be very defective; the bed of the river was rising by the deposit of silt; and the extent of irrigated land was diminishing. The success of the Jumna Canals in Northern India at last suggested the improvement of the Coleroon Works in the South; and from 1836 the work was regularly and vigorously prosecuted. The total expenditure on the Upper and Lower Coleroon anicuts

the soil is undulating, and the underlying rock retains the water, the most suitable irrigation works are reservoirs made by putting up large embankments, and thus impounding the water descending from the hill slopes. Such were most of the old reservoirs of Madras. See Voelcker's Improvement of Indian Agriculture, 1893.

came to upwards of £80,000; and a further sum of £100,000 was spent on subsidiary works for conveying irrigation over the district of Tanjore, and portions of Trichinopoly and South Arcot. The lands irrigated from the Coleroon and Kaveri increased from 630,000 acres to 716,000 acres; and the land revenue was increased by £44,000 per annum, giving a return of over 24 per cent. on the outlay.1

The East India Company took credit to themselves for the successful and profitable results of this great work, but the real credit is due to Sir Arthur Cotton, who first conceived the idea, and commenced the construction, of the Upper Coleroon Dam against much opposition. Born in 1803, he had come out to Madras in 1821; and before his final retirement from India in 1860, he had won for himself a reputation higher than that of any other engineer who has ever worked in India. "The permanent prosperity of Tanjore," wrote Baird Smith, the great irrigation man of Northern India, "is without doubt to be attributed in large measure to that first bold step taken by Colonel Cotton in the construction of the Upper Coleroon Dam, under circumstances of great difficulty, with restricted means, against much opposition, and with heavy personal responsibilities." 2

The great reputation won by Arthur Cotton by the Coleroon Works marked him out as the fittest man to undertake the task on which his fame mainly rests, the Godavari Works. He selected a place a few miles below the ancient Hindu capital of Rajamundri, and he constructed his magnificent anicut in four sections, taking advantage of two islands in the river. The total estimated expenditure was £264,000; but the East India Company looked at it as a profitable spéculation, and ex

1 Memorandum on the Improvements, &c., 1858.

2 General Sir Arthur Cotton, his Life and Work, by his daughter, Lady Hope (London, 1900), p. 52.

pected an increase of land revenue by £300,000, or over 100 per cent. per annum.1

There remained, then, the Krishna River; and the anicut across that river was commenced in 1853. The cost was originally estimated at £155,000; and an increase of £60,000 in the land revenue, or 39 per cent. on the outlay, was expected per annum.2

These were the principal irrigation works undertaken by the East India Company before 1858, when they ceased to exist. The works were constructed at a great expense; and the Company could fairly claim an adequate return on their outlay by a moderate rate on the water they supplied. It will be noticed, however, from the figures given above, that the Company went further, especially in the benighted Province of Madras; they raised the land revenue as much as it was possible to raise it, leaving the unfortunate cultivators as permanently poor as they were before. This policy would scarcely be considered wise or generous in a landlord dealing with his tenants; it was distinctly ungenerous and unwise in the Government of a great country dealing with a vast agricultural population. The growth of wealth and the accumulation of capital among a people should ever be the foremost aim of an enlightened Government.

The history of railways in India is different in its character from the history of irrigation works. Irrigation works paid, and more than paid, from the very commencement; railways did not give an adequate return on the

1 Memorandum on the Improvements, &c., 1858.

The work with its extensions cost much more in the end, and neither the East India Company, nor the Crown Administration which succeeded, was willing to find money for this beneficial and profitable irrigation work, while they squandered money over railway works. Sir Arthur Cotton spoke of it before the Select Committee of 1878 when he was examined as a witness. "It has taken thirty-two years to obtain £700,000 for them-£20,000 a year for works which from the very first had been a most prodigious The only dispute is whether they yield 27, 28, or 40 per cent.; and now after thirty-two years only 700,000 acres out of one million are irrigated. . . . During this time there was not the least question about £500,000 for sixty miles of railway to Nagpur, which it was acknowledged would not pay 4 per cent."-General Sir Arthur Cotton, his Life and Work, by Lady Hope, p. 276.

success..

2 Memorandum on the Improvements, &c., 1858.