Page:Life or Death in India.djvu/11

 round 69 per 1,000. In 1871 the Death-rate, including deaths among invalids after their arrival in England, was 18&middot;69 per 1000. [The strength was 56,806 non-commissioned officers and men]; that is, 18 men died where 69 died before. Of the invalids sent home to England, 16&middot;02 per 1,000 on a similar strength were discharged the service.

From these facts we arrive at this result: namely, leaving out the loss from invaliding in the old Indian Army altogether, the total loss to the present Indian Army in 1871 by deaths and discharges was 34&middot;7 per 1,000, or just one-half of the loss occasioned by the old death-rate alone. In other words, we lost, in 1871, 18 men only by death—in India and England both—out of every 1,000 of the British Indian army; and 16 more were discharged as unfit for further service; that is, there was a saving of 51 men in every 1,000 in 1871 (a healthy year), or 2,858 men in an army of 56,806 were the savings of that year: one year's results: as compared with the average losses of old.

Let us remember, with the mercantile Briton's spirit, that every man costs with his arms 100l. set down in India: hence £285,800 was the money saving on recruits in that year.

But what is the value of a man otherwise?

To us these are not figures, but men.

Returning to the Bengal Presidency, we find in 1871 the deaths 17&middot;83 per 1,000, where formerly the Bengal death-rate lay between 70 and 80 per 1,000, and annual losses from other casualties actually rose