proprietors, though apparently intricate and laborious, had been familiar to native Governments; that individuals called Patels, or head-men, were perfectly capable of aiding in the Settlement of their respective villages; that a complete establishment of hereditary revenue servants was already in existence; that Ryots were in the habit of meeting and holding discussions about agricultural stock, cultivation, and payment of rent; and that an active Collector making the circuit of his district, and beginning when the early crop was reaped and the late crop sown, was quite capable of conducting these multifarious operations to an issue financially profitable to Government, and socially advantageous to the Ryot. There was more correspondence of the usual kind; statistics, reports, Minutes, and Resolutions. In the end, the Permanent Assessment was staid. In only a single portion of the Madras Territory had the Bengal system been introduced. Malabar, Kánara, Coimbatore, the Ceded Districts, Nellore and Arcot, and those magnificent tracts of country comprised in Tanjore, Trichinopoli, and Tinnevelli had nearly all escaped.
This is not the place to discuss minutely the merits and demerits of the various revenue systems prevailing in different provinces of India. Variety in the mode of collecting the dues of the State, and in the persons or communities responsible for the revenue, is an essential part of our administration, and contributes to the accumulation of a large stock of
