MR. J. B. SMITH* rose to call the attention of the House to the importance to the commerce and manufactures of this country of opening up the navigation of the river Godavery, and to ask the Secretary of State for India what were the intentions of the Government in respect thereof. The hon. Member said the Godavery valley is one of the richest portions of Central India, and has an area about four times that of Ireland. It abounds in iron and timber. It produces corn, rice, oil seeds, and sugar; but what he particularly wished to call attention to was, that it also produced flax, hemp, and cotton. The manufactures of this country were increasing so rapidly that the consumption of raw materials was overtaking their production. It was, therefore, natural that our manufacturers should look to those places which could supply them with the raw materials, especially if they happened to be, as in this case, under the dominion of the British Crown. Hon. Gentlemen connected with the linen trade of Ireland and Scotland would inform the House that the progress of that important 527 manufacture was absolutely stopped for want of an adequate supply of flax and hemp, and as regarded cotton, who could look with unconcern at what was now passing in the Southern States of America, especially when he reflected that eight-tenths of the cotton consumed by our manufacturers last year came from those States? Some Gentlemen perhaps might say, that this was a Manchester question, and no doubt it was. But he asked the House whether a manufacture, which amounted to upwards of £60,000,000 per annum in value, was not also a question of great national interest and importance; and was it not the duty of Parliament to secure, as far as possible, this vast manufacture from accidents in the supply of the raw material? There was abundant evidence that India could furnish all the cotton we require. Dr. Forbes Watson, the botanist of the India Department, estimates that India already grows nearly double the quantity of cotton grown in America. India, however, had to clothe 200,000,000 of her own population, and she had only a small quantity left for exportation. The principal discouragement to growing cotton for exportation was the enormous expense of conveying it to market; to obviate this, good roads and cheap water-carriage were wanted. As an illustration of the state of the roads he would read a short extract from a letter from Line and Co., of Madras, dated in October last. They said:—
If Government will only give us roads in the Tinnivelly district, our exports would increase rapidly. It is a melancholy sight to see heavy cartloads of cotton dragged across country; the produce is so bulky that in swaying from side to side it strains carts to pieces, and the bullocks drag it over mounds of earth, and through ditches and ruts, in a way which is painful to witness. AH this loss of carts and cattle, and the delays of such a mode of carriage, must of course be borne by the cotton. It is difficult to estimate the annual loss both to the district and the trade.The roads all over India were in a similar condition, and we were entirely shut out from the finest cotton district of India by the bad state of the roads and the cost of carnage. The American planters had great advantages in this respect over those in India. Cotton was brought 1,000 miles down the Mississippi to a port of shipment for one-eighth of a penny per pound, or about 5 per cent on its value. From Berar the carriage by bad roads costs 100 per cent, on its value. The river Godavery leads to Berar, where the largest quantity and the finest quality of cotton is grown. 528 Captain Haigh, a gentleman of great ability, who was examined before the India Colonization Committee, and who had surveyed the Godavery, stated it could be made navigable for a distance of 500 miles for about £300,000, and that cotton could then be brought from Berar to a port of shipment for one-eighth of a penny per pound, thus placing the American and Indian planter on the same footing in respect of the carriage of cotton. Since Captain Haigh had given his evidence he had visited the navigable rivers of Europe, having previously visited all the river and water communications of America, and he returned with the conviction that there were fewer obstacles to be overcome in the Godavery than had been overcome in European rivers, and before his return to India he felt it his duty to address a letter to the Secretary of State for India, to endeavour to impress upon him the importance of opening up the Godavery to the commerce of this country. In this letter he pointed out, in addition to the commercial, the advantages of this great work in a military point of view. Besides the saving in time in the conveyance of troops and stores by the river, the saving in expense would pay the interest on the outlay of making it navigable. He further stated that the Government would be large gainers by the increased sale of salt. Salt was a Government monopoly in India. It was to be regretted that the necessities of the Government had compelled them to place an additional tax upon this indispensable of life; but the greatest tax which the people of India had to pay on salt was the cost of conveyance. Captain Haigh stated that salt sold at Nangpore at 90 rupees per ton, and sometimes as high as 160 rupees in that district. The Government price for salt was 25 rupees, and if the Godavery were navigable it could be carried at 5 rupees a ton. The opening up of this river, therefore, would enable the people to pay the increased tax on salt, and still to obtain it at less than half the price they paid for it at present. The increase in the consumption would be enormous, and of course the gain of the Government would be in proportion. The increase in the revenue on salt is estimated at £64,000 a year, an amount that would pay the interest on the outlay on the river more than three times over. He (Mr. Smith) ought to state that there had been much controversy on the part of the civilians in India as to the practicability of opening up the Godavery, 529 and as to the profits on the works of irrigation. His hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen (Colonel Sykes) late chairman of the East India Company, was of opinion that it was impracticable to make the Godavery navigable. The hon. Member for Dumbartonshire (Mr. Smollet) says "that such projects as the opening up the navigation of the river Godavery in order to reach the cotton fields of Berar seems to be an undertaking of the most impolitic character, inexpedient in the present financial condition of India, and of very doubtful utility when completed." But Sir Charles Trevelyan, the Governor of Madras, in order to test these various opinions had visited these districts, taking with him engineers and scientific men, and on his return he stated in a minute that he considered the works of such great public importance that he should feel it his duty to visit them every year whilst he remained Governor of the Province. He said the Godavery ran through the most fertile region of Central India. That the opening of this river would be equivalent to the opening of a new trade to the extension of which no limits could be assigned. He (Mr. Smith) thought he had proved the practicability and importance of opening up the Godavery. This great work would enable us to obtain ample supplies of cotton conveyed at a cheap rate from the finest district in India, and would do much to preserve us from those accidents which may arise to the supply of this important raw material. For these reasons he wished to ask the Secretary of State for India what were the intentions of the Government in this matter, and if he answered that it was their intention to open the navigation of the Godavery, he would further ask when? It was necessary to make this inquiry as to the time when the work was to be commenced, because Sir Charles Trevelyan, while he strongly recommended it, added that he hoped the state of the revenue would soon enable the Government to proceed with the work. Now, were they to wait until there was a surplus revenue for the commencement of this work? It had been the policy of the East India Company to make their public works out of the revenue, but he (Mr. J. B. Smith) hoped that would not be the policy of the Queen's Government in India. He could give many instances of the injurious effects of this policy, but he would only mention one as a sample of scores of a similar kind. Tankaria Bunder, in Western India, was a 530 place where there were considerable shipments of cotton. For twenty years there had been complaints, that for want of a wharf there, cotton had to be rolled through the mud to the boats, the consequence was, that the cotton was more or less damaged by the wet. It was estimated that the loss sustained in this way amounted in twenty years to £10,000. Now, the cost of making a wharf was only £2,000, and the Government bad at length consented to execute this small work, but if they had to wait until there was a surplus revenue, they might continue to roll cotton in the mud at Tankaria for twenty years longer. It was a false policy to make reproductive public works out of revenue, since it was always impossible to calculate when a work was commenced how long it would be before it was finished. It was notorious that public works in India cost in many cases double the amount they would have cost if the means of completing them had been uninterruptedly provided. The only legitimate fund for reproductive public works was loans, and he had no hope of seeing any great improvement in India, until that course was adopted. The finances of India were at present in a very embarrassed condition, but he (Mr. J. B. Smith) was not one of those who had any fears that India was unable to discharge all her obligations great as they were. When he saw the vast undeveloped resources of India, and the poverty of the people, it appeared to him that the only way to extricate the country from its difficulties was to increase the tax paying power of the people by means of increased and cheap facilities of conveyance, and by great public works, which could not be executed except by public loans for the special purpose.
§ MR. SIDNEY HERBERTsaid, he was anxious to say a few words in reply to the Questions which had been put to him in the course of that discussion. With regard to the disembodiment of the militia regiment, which the hon. and gallant Member (Colonel Dickson) so worthily and successfully commanded, he could only say it was always very painful for the Government to come to a decision that would be distasteful or operate to the prejudice of individuals; but the interests of the public service necessarily overrode all considerations of that kind, and he had taken the earliest opportunity of communicating to the gallant Officer the conclusion at which they had arrived. He had stated last year, in moving the Army Estimates, that in his 531 opinion a large and continuous embodiment of the militia, in time of peace, was radically wrong in principle. It was unwise to anticipate the resources which ought to be kept in reserve for periods of emergency, and the militia was a force only required when the regular army was abroad. Holding that opinion, he followed the course that he had announced—namely, that of gradually disembodying the militia regiments in proportion as the regular troops were available for taking their place. This operation was necessarily very uncertain, and was retarded in the present instance by the requirements of India, and to the demand upon our regular force caused by the recent unfortunate calamity in China. With regard to the claims of officers of the Land Transport Corps, a Committee of that House had sat, before which was brought the case of certain officers who had entered that corps under very peculiar circumstances, and who at the conclusion of the Crimean War were dismissed from that service. The Committee went carefully through the matter, and divided the cases into certain classes, making recommendations as to the manner in which those different classes should be treated by the Government. The War Office, then presided over by his predecessor, applied to the Treasury for the funds requisite for carrying out those recommendations; and after a good deal of correspondence all the claims were satisfied which were recommended by that Committee. That corps was raised on the distinct understanding that it was only to be continued during the Russian War, and engagements for two years, with very high pay, were given in certain instances. On the return of peace it became necessary to dissolve the corps; but the case of those officers to whom a Committee of that House recommended that compensation should be paid differed from that of those officers of whom the Committee took no notice, and with respect to whom it made no recommendation. Among others there was the case of men who had given up situations in the Civil Service which carried the right to a pension, and who, when they lost their position in the Land Transport Corps, were left without the expectation either of the pension which their civil situation would have given them, or of the half-pay which military employment conferred. There were other cases to which he need not particularly refer, but the position of those gentlemen was this, that they were merely 532 appointed "until further orders." The hon. Member had quoted a letter from Colonel Wetherall to show that these gentlemen were to be treated in the same manner as the others. But in this impression Colonel Wetherall was entirely wrong, for the arrangement was only a provisional one, and the gallant Officer could have no means of knowing what course the Government intended ultimately to take. To illustrate how little claim existed on the part of the officers in whose favour the Committee did not report, he would mention a single instance. Lieutenant Delamere, a very respectable person, was an ensign in the 21st Regiment of Foot, when he joined the Land Transport Corps, of which he was made a captain till further orders. He, however, still remained on the strength of his regiment, so much so that he actually received promotion in it during the time he was acting as captain in the Land Transport Corps. He became a lieutenant, and was sent back to his regiment. He stands in no worse position than anybody else; he gained his promotion. But to make him a captain over the heads of all the other officers, who were constantly under fire and in the trenches, while he was not, would surely be very un-just. The House of Commons, therefore, having given this subject its best consideration, and the recommendations of the Select Committee having been adopted—in carrying out which, indeed, the Government had gone even further than its own sense of justice might, perhaps, have induced it to go—he thought they could not now reopen the question of the claims of these officers.
§ COLONEL SYKESobserved that after what had fallen from the hon. Member for Stockport (Mr. J. B. Smith), he wished to say that his hon. Friend had evidently mistaken his opinions as he was a strenuous advocate for the opening of all communication in India, by land or by water, though he thought that ought to be done with the means of the country. His opinion had always been that the opening out of the Godavery was quite practicable, because nothing was impracticable to engineering science, but that the cost of its execution would exceed reasonable bounds. But recurring to the questions he had to put; the recent mutiny had deranged Indian finance. The interest on the Government loans was in 1856 and 1857, 4 per cent, but the Government had immediately to open a 5 per cent loan. Finding 533 that even that increase would not take, they were obliged to offer 5½ per cent., with an undertaking not to pay off for 26 years. They consented also to accept the new loan half in paper and half in money, thereby raising the previous loans to 5½ per cent. Still, these terms were found insufficient, and the Government in India were obliged to write to the home authorities for assistance. Very luckily, there was a better appreciation of the real capabilities of India in the money-market of this country than in that of Calcutta; and the result was that the 5½ per cent, loan while at a discount of 4 per cent in India, was a few days ago at a premium of 5¼ per cent. in England. The finances of India were now paying 5½ per cent. for a loan that could be obtained here at 4 per cent. The five per cent loan open in Calcutta now stood at 103. All contributions to it were to the damage of the finances of India, and he therefore desired to know whether it was the intention of the Secretary of State to direct that it should be immediately closed. He also wished to be informed by the right hon. Gentleman whether the unanimous recommendation of the Governor-General and his Council that batta should be granted to the troops of the Persian expedition, as had been done in the case of the first Burmah expedition, of the China expedition, and of the capture of Delhi and Lucknow, would receive his sanction; and whether the three officers of the 3rd Bombay Native Light Cavalry, who so greatly distinguished themselves in the charge upon a regiment of Persian Infantry formed in square at the battle of Kooshab, near Bushire, would receive the Victoria Cross?