Among the Mahrattas, when a Ryot once rents a piece of land, he can never leave it, nor even relinquish a part of it. If he were to be deprived of the assistance of his children, or such relations as cultivated it with him, he must still continue to hold it, and pay his rent as usual. Even the widows are obliged, after the death of their hus bands, to engage for the usual quantity of ground.
The Brahmins have been already noticed as the pro prietors of villages in the south of India. In the Carnatic they also rent a considerable quantity of land ; but they will not hold the plough, nor perform any other part of the labour necessary for its cultivation. The inferior castes, particularly the Sudras, are obliged to cultivate them, and are in fact their slaves. There are, however, some Sudras who rent farms on their own account, which they cultivate, either by their own labour, or by slaves. The Mahomedan farmers in this part of Ilindostan are not nu merous: their agricultural labour, in general, is performed by slaves. The Haiga Brahmins, who live in the province of North Canara, above the Ghauts, differ from the Brahmins in most other parts of India ; for they are very industrious, and perform all agricultural operations with their own hands.
The agricultural labourers in Hindostan are either such as work for hire, or slaves. The condition of the former, as has been already remarked, is by no means unfavourable. His money wages, indeed, are low. In Bengal, where a ploughman is hired by the month, he one rupee, in some parts only half a rupee for that period but, in addition to this, he has an allowance of grain, and at his leisure hours cultivates some land, which he rents front his master at a payment in kind. A herdsman receives, in food, money arid clothing, about one rupee znd a half per month. The wages of the other labourers are chiefly in kind. In the neighbourhood of Seringapatam, the hire of farm labourers is six rupees per month ; but in the country, at a distance from any large town, it is much less. On the Malabar coast, agricultural labour varies from two rupees to six rupees a month. Such a com paratively high rate, however, it should be observed, in cludes the value of all that the labourer receives in kind.
The average price of agricultural labour in the ceded dis tricts is about two rupees a month ; and this, indeed, seems to be about the average of Hindustan, independent of al lowances in kind. If, therefore, the very low price of all commodities in Hindostan be considered, and it be further taken into account, that the agricultural labour requires very few of them, we shall be disposed to regard their situ ation as by no means uncomfortable.
The slaves who labour the farms in the south of India are the absolute property of their lords ; but they are not like the slaves in Russia, Sze. attached to the soil : they may be sold or transferred to any person their master may think fit. Children may be separated frtnn their parents, but a husband and wife cannot be sold separately. In the district of Palighaut, in the province of Malabar, where the greater part of the labour of the field is performed by slaves of different castes, a young man and his wife will sell from 61. 48. to 71. 88. ; if there be children, the value will be increased according to their number and ages. They live in temporary huts, formed of the bamboo and other wood, something like large baskets, which they erect for themselves. The personal labour of the wife is always at the disposal of the master of the husband ; the master of the girl having no authority over her, so long as she lives with the slave of another man.
The women and children of the free labourers, as well as of the slaves engaged in agriculture, are principally em plo)ed in protecting the seed and crop from the birds, in those districts where this is not performed by men.
OF all the various manufactures carried on in India, that of cotton claims our first and most extended notice, on ac count of its antiquity, of its being the staple and most com mon manufacture of the country, and of the variety of the fabrics which it prcduccs. The perfection to which the natives are known, from the most remote times, to have carried the cotton manufacture, must be mainly attributed to the circumstance, that every distinct kind of cloth is the produce of a particular district, in which the mode of manufacturing it has been transmitted for centuries from father to son.