Page:How People May Live and not Die in India.pdf/8

 are spread on a nice clean table. This the men like very much. And decrease in drink may be very much attributed to increase of useful work and of play, as the Commander-in-Chief in India himself says.

The practical result of these reforms is, then, that the soldier's time is more profitably occupied than formerly—and that intemperance and crime have visibly diminished.

So far for the soldier's habits.

But the main causes of disease in India, want of drainage, want of water-supply, for stations and towns, want of proper barracks and hospitals, remain as before in all their primitive perfection. Of this there is no doubt.

The above-mentioned improvements have removed several of the causes of disease enumerated in the Report of the Royal Commission. And they have also, happily, taken away some of the point in this paper.

Nevertheless it has been thought best to reprint it as read, because there are stations where little or nothing has been done in improving the soldier's habits, and because the great work of civilization in India has yet to be begun. It is moreover to be feared that little amendment has taken place in the self-indulgent eating and drinking habits of the European population generally.

While thankfully acknowledging the excellent beginning made, since the advent to power of the present noble Governor-General of India, enough remains to justify this reprint.

F. N.

August, 1864.