Page:Aurangzíb and the Decay of the Mughal Empire.djvu/133

Rh richesses qui l'Empereur perçoit des seuls fonds de terre de son Domaine .' This 'casuel' consisted of the jizya, or poll-tax on Hindús, the transport customs and port dues, the tax on the 'blanchissage de cette multitude infinie de toiles qu'on travaille aux Indes,' the royalty on diamond mines, the royal right of inheritance of all official estates, and the tribute of various Rájas. Catrou is not able to give details of these receipts, save in one instance. He mentions that the port dues of Súrat amounted to thirty lacs, and the tax on the mint-profits of the same city to eleven lacs of rupees. In other words Súrat contributed something like half-a-million sterling in addition to the land tax. At this rate it is not difficult to believe that the 'casuel' revenue amounted to as large an income as that derived from the land. The third statement is that of Dr. Gemelli Careri, who visited Aurangzíb in the Deccan in 1695, and 'was told' that the Emperor's revenue 'from only his hereditary countries' was eighty crores of rupees (or ninety millions of pounds). Now we have already seen that in 1697 the land revenue amounted to 43½ millions. Careri's estimate of the gross revenue is therefore equivalent to rather more than double the land tax, which accords very accurately with Catrou's statement that the 'casuel' was as much as, or more than, the land revenue, and with Hawkins' rough record of Jahángír's income of fifty crores or more than double the land tax of his