The third is a tax in money, according to admeasurement of the field, assessed previously to cultivation. The fourth is a mixed tax, of both money and produce. None of these modes is free from objection. That of _kut_, or conjectural estimate of the standing crop, is, however, liable to much greater abuse than _lattha_, or measurement of the grain. In the first case, it is well known that by a bribe to the officer, he will _kut_ a field at ten maunds, which may realize twice the quantity; for the chief guarantees to honesty are fear of detection, and instinctive morality; feeble safeguards, even in more civilized States than Rajwara. If he be so closely watched that he must make a fair _kut_, or estimate, he will still find means to extort money from the ryot, one of which is, by procrastinating the estimate when the ear is ripe, and when every day’s delay is a certain loss. In short, a celebrated superintendent of a district, of great credit both for zeal and honesty [538], confessed, “We are like tailors; we can cheat you to your face, and you cannot perceive it.” The ryot prefers the _kut_; the process is soon over, and he has done with the government; but in _lattha_, the means are varied to perplex and cheat it; beginning with the reaping, when, with a liberal hand, they leave something for the gleaner; then, a “tithe for the _khurpi_, or 'sickle'”; then, the thrashing; and though they muzzle the ox who treads out the corn, they do not their own mouths, or those of their family. Again, if not convertible into coin, they are debited and allowed to store it up, and “the rats are sure to get into the pits.” In both cases the _shahnahs_, or field-watchmen, are appointed to watch the crops, as soon as the ear begins to fill; yet all is insufficient to check the system of pillage; for the ryot and his family begin to feed upon the heads of Indian corn and millet the moment they afford the least nourishment. The _shahnah_, receiving his emoluments from the husbandman as well as from the crown, inclines more to his fellow-citizen; and it is asserted that one-fourth of the crop, and even a third, is frequently made away with before the share of the government can be fixed. Yet the system of _lattha_ was pursued by the regent before he commenced that of pateli, which has no slight analogy to the permanent system of Bengal,[10.7.12] and was attended with similar results,—distress, confiscation, and sale, to the utter exclusion of the hereditary principle, the very corner-stone of Hindu society. ----- Footnote 10.7.1: [See Vol. I. p. 535.] Footnote 10.7.2: [_Lattha_, literally a ‘measuring pole’; _batāi_, division of crop between landlord and tenant.] Footnote 10.7.3: [In the United Provinces the _jarīb_ is 55 yards, and one square _jarīb_ = 1 _bīgha_. The standard _bīgha_ is five-eighths of an acre (Wilson, _Glossary of Indian Terms_, _s.v._).] Footnote 10.7.4: