Page:English Historical Review Volume 35.djvu/464

 456 REVIEWS OF BOOKS July critic might complain that the results arrived at hardly compensate for the sedulous care lavished on the inquiry. But in the first place we do not complain of his non-committal verdicts, for the evidence in regard to population, wealth, and industrial conditions in India in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries must be so exceedingly conjectural as to render dogmatism dangerous and unwise, and, in the second place, though the comparison with to-day is obviously always before the author's eyes, his chief aim, as stated by himself, is ' a presentation of the economic life of India at the. . . period immediately antecedent to the first appearance of those new forces which were destined to exercise an increasing and even- tually predominant influence on the development of the country '. That aim has been admirably realized. Certainly we know of no other account so elaborate, so vivid, and so comprehensive, of the agricultural, industrial, and commercial life of India under the Moguls, the methods of trade, the habits of different classes and their standards of life. There are many shrewd reflexions on matters political and financial, the outcome of inde- pendent study and an original survey. It is true, though the fact is not always recognized, that even at the end of Akbar's reign the empire was still a novelty, that, under the Moguls, * administration meant primarily the collection of the land revenue ', and that in regard to financial organization, especially in Southern India, ' we may regard the empire as having been superimposed on the system previously existing'. In the sixteenth century industrial expansion in the modern sense had not appeared, ' for the day of capitalist enterprise had not yet dawned '. unfashionable — ' may render substantial economic services if they use their wealth wisely, and direct a steady flow of savings into productive channels.' The whole position at the end of Akbar's reign is excellently summed up in the statement, ' The economic life of India at the end of the sixteenth century was characterized essentially by inadequate production and faulty distribution '. When we come to the comparison between the present and the past some of Mr. Moreland's conclusions — though drawn with every caution — seem from lack of trustworthy data to be so extremely empirical as to be of doubtful value for purposes of argument. It appears likely that he has underrated the growth of Indian wealth in modern times. It is true, no doubt, that he generally considers the question in relation to the amount of real wealth and comfort per head of the population. That being so, he is probably right in holding that the Indian ryot cannot be said economi- cally to have made much progress since Akbar's day. * His equipment ', says Mr. Moreland, is even now * so nearly the bare minimum required for his work that it is impossible to believe he was ever much worse off than he is at present '. Such sentences — usually divorced from their context — are often seized upon with avidity by those who wish to deny the beneficial results of British rule in India. It need hardly be said that Mr. Moreland means us to draw no such inference. Under the Mohammedan regime the lot of the ryot economically, in the rare periods of peace, may not have been appreciably worse than his condition to-day, but terrible cataclysms of nature and maleficent outbursts of human energy, famines, floods, Maratha
 * A wealthy upper class ', says Mr. Moreland sturdily — for the doctrine is