was, from a railway point of view, completely imprisoned, and there seemed to be no prospect of anything being done to connect the Province with the western seaboard for many years to come.  However, a Mysore planter last year sought a personal interview with Viscount Cross, the Secretary of State for India, who has always taken a great interest in railway extensions, and the result of this was that Lord Cross initiated action which resulted in prompt steps being taken.  Early this year a preliminary survey of the route from a point on the line in the interior of Mysore, via the Manjarabad Ghaut, to Mangalore was made, and I am in a position to state that the completion of this much and long-wanted line may be regarded as a thing of the near future.  After this line has been made a line will be constructed from Hassan to Mysore, via Holi Nursipur, and Yedatora, and from Mysore a line will be run, via Nunjengode[2] to Erode, the junction of the Madras and South Indian Railways.  I may mention here that Sir Andrew Clarke, in his able Minute of 1879 on Indian Harbours, says that “Mangalore undoubtedly admits of being converted into a useful harbour,” though he adds that “the project may lie over until the prospects of a railway connecting it with the interior are better than at present.”  As the immediate prospects of a line being made are quite secure, it is of great importance to call attention to this matter now, as it is to the manifest interest of both Governments that the harbour of Mangalore should be improved as soon as possible.

After having done so much to contend against famine-producing causes, it may seem that the Dewan might rest and be thankful; but it must be considered that, though railways will undoubtedly enable the State to save life, it will have to pay a ruinously heavy charge whenever a widespread and serious drought occurs, and, sooner or later, it seems inevitable that such a drought must occur.  And it is therefore perfectly evident, that without the extension of deep wells the province cannot be placed in a thoroughly sound financial position.  It is, then, of obvious importance to remove at once the great obstacle that stands in the way of the rapid addition to the number of deep wells.  That obstacle, and a most formidable obstacle it is, as I shall fully show, lies in the fact that the present form of land tenure in Mysore (under which also about four-fifths of the land of British India are held) does not provide a sufficient security for investors in landed improvements.  By the existing tenure the land is held by the occupier from the State at a rental which is fixed for thirty years, and after that it is liable to augmentation.  The Government, it is true, has declared that it will not tax improvements, and that, for instance, if a man digs a well no augmentation of rent will be demanded for the productive power thus added to the land, but it has reserved to itself wide powers of enhancing the rent on general grounds,