392 NORTH-WESTERN PROVINCES AND OUDH. distress sensibly abated. Relief works and poorhouses were provided; but the mortality from famine and its attendant diseases reached an enormous figure. The Rohilkhand Districts suffered most, particularly Bijnaur; then the Oudh Districts of Lucknow, Rái Bareli, and Bara Banki, followed by Basti, Gorakhpur, Azamgarh, Agra, and Muttra; but no District of the Lieutenant-Governorship escaped altogether. The Government expenditure on relief operations for the North-Western Provinces and Oudh is officially returned at £185,696, besides a State outlay on charitable relief amounting to £37,315. At the present time, the system of irrigation canals, the network of railway communications, and the cross-country roads, probably suffice to protect the Doab, the trans-Tumna Districts, Rohilkhand, and the Benares Division from the extremity of famine. But the country beyond the Gogra is not yet well provided with means of communication; and the almost isolated position of the Jhansi Division, combined with the poverty of its soil and the absence of irrigation, render the recurrence of drought in that tract especially dangerous. Of recent years, however, the Betwa Canal and railway lines that will traverse the Division north and south and east and west are being rapidly pushed on. The Sárda Canal project, when carried out, will do much to protect the Oudh Districts, and the eastern Districts of the NorthWestern Provinces through which it will pass, from future visitations of famine. The new Agra Canal has already proved a great success in this respect. Commerce and Trade, etc.—The export trade of the North-Western Provinces is chiefly confined to the raw produce of its agriculture. It may be divided into two parts, the trade with Tibet and Nepál, and the trade with other Provinces of British India, including the ports of Calcutta and Bombay. The export staples include wheat, oil-secds, raw cotton, indigo, sugar, molasses, timber, and forest produce, dyestuffs, ghí, opium, and tobacco. The imports consist mainly of English piece - goods, metal - work, manufactured wares, salt, and European goods. In 1880-81, the value of the trans-frontier export trade, as represented by the commodities exported to Tibet from the North-Western Provinces and Oudh, was £16,882, and £23,648 in 1883-84 ; of commodities exported to Nepál, £322,262 in 1881-82, and £291,124 in 1883–84. The imports from Tibet and Nepál are as follow :-Values in 1881-82, £43,242 from Tibet and £ 572,264 from Nepál ; in 1883-84, $60,845 from Tibet and £735,788 from Nepál. The chief exports to Tibet are grain, sugar, cotton goods, and pedlars' wares. The Tibetan lakes supply the people with salt and borax, and the pastures of Tibet rear goats of the finest fleece. These products are bartered for goods from India. Chief imports from Tibet (1883-84)—borax, £33793 ;
