Its total imports into the United Kingdom in the years 1867 to 1881 ranged between 58,283 and 106,307 cwt., varying greatly from year to year ; the values, £1.712,995 and £2,937,224.
Since the year 1833, in Bengal, the cultivation of the indigo plant and manufacture of indigo have greatly fallen off. In the troubles which followed the famine of 1769, the cultivation had declined. During the years which followed 1786, Lord Cornwallis, and with him Sir John Shore, re-established it under extraordinary privileges. Minute accounts of how the plant should be grown and the drug beaten out, written by high officials, appeared in the public prints. The Company's servants were permitted, nay, encouraged, to remit their savings in indigo investments, in spite of the croakings of an alarmist, who foretold the failure of such efforts by reason of the manu facture having been successfully introduced into the Brazils, which were nearer the European market. For a dine, indeed, the Government was shy of actually engaging in the cultivation, and contented itself with winking hard at its officers, who were willing to venture on their own account. But the revival of the indigo planting, which took place in the ten years subsequent to 1786, was conducted under the auspices of Government, though at the risk of its commercial residents. For long it continued to be the most profitable part of these officers' private trade, and more than one great Calcutta house owed its origin to their operations. The valleys of the Dainuda and of the Adjie, and indeed all 13ardwan, were dotted with factories.
The Indigo of Bengalis divided into two classes, called in commercial language, Bengal and Oudh ; the first being the produce of the southern pro vinces of Bengal and Behar, and the last that of the northern provinces, and of Benares. The first class is in point of quality much superior to the other. The inferiority of the Oudh indigo is thought to be more the result of soil and climate than of any difference in the skill with which the manufacture is conducted. The indigo of Madras, which is superior to that of Manila, is about equal to ordinary Bengal indigo. The produce of Java is superior to these. Large quantities of indigo, of a very fine quality, are grown in Sind. Mr. Wood, deputy collector of Sukkur, was of opinion that Sind is much better suited than Bengal for the production of this dyestuff; the alluvial soil on the banks of the Indus is equal in richness to that on those of the Ganges, and the climate seems equally well suited for the growth of the plant. But in two years out of three, the crops
of the Bengal plants are injured by excessive inundations, while the work of gathering and manipulation is necessarily performed during the rainy season under the greatest imaginable dis advantages. In Sind, on the other hand, the inundation of the river is produced almost solely from the melting of the snows in the Himalayas, and it is not liable to those excessive fluctuations in amount, or that suddenness in appearance, peculiar to inundations chiefly arising from falls of rain. The Ganges sometimes rises ten feet in 24 hours, and at some parts of its course its depth is at times forty feet greater during a flood than in fair weather ; while the Indus rarely rises above a foot a day, its extreme flood never exceeding fifteen feet, the limits and amount of the inunda tion being singularly uniform over a succession of years. Moreover, as rain hardly ever falls in Sind, and when it does so, only continues over a few days, and extends to the amount of three or four inches, no danger or inconvenience from this can be apprehended. The districts of Kishnagar, Jessore, and Murshidabad, in Bengal, ranging from 88° to 90° E. longitude, and 22r to 24° of N. latitude, produce the finest indigo. That from the districts about Bardwan and Benares is of a coarser or harsher grain. Tirhut, in lat. 2G° N., yields a tolerably good article. The portion of Bengal most propitious to the cultivation of indigo, lies between the river Hoogly and the main stream of the Ganges.
The culture of indigo is a very precarious trade, not only in so far as respects the growth of the plant from year to year, but also ns regards the quantity and quality of the drug which the same amount of plant will afford in the same season. Tho fixed capital required in the manufacture consists simply of a few vats of common masonry for steeping the plant and precipitating the colouring matter, a boiling and drying-house, and a dwelling for the planter. Thus a factory of ten pairs of vats, capable of producing, at an average, 12,500 lbs. of indigo, worth on the spot £2500, will not cost above £1500 sterling. The buildings and machinery necessary to produce an equal value in sugar and rum, would probably cost about £4000.