There can be no doubt in the mind of anyone who studies the figures, that India is a chronically, seriously over-populated country, despite the oft-quoted dictum of Sir William Hunter. That India might produce food enough to feed her present population need not be contested. But that any action on the part of the authorities will succeed in providing for an increase of ten millions annually is inconceivable. The whole Empire owes a tribute of gratitude and admiration to Sir A. Cotton whose magnificent irrigation schemes have so greatly increased the possibilities of agriculture. They have no doubt been the real cause of the 7 per cent. increase of population in the last decade. This, however, only means providing for two out of the seven millions to be saved; and irrigation like everything else has its limits.[9] Nothing will remove starvation, pestilence, misery and unrest from India, except the adoption by her people of the parental prudence of western nations. Footnote 9: In the article on India in the “Encyclopaedia Britannica” it is stated that the Irrigation Commission of 1901–03 emphatically asserted that irrigation alone could not cure famine. The idea has been constantly put forward that the religious prejudices of the Indian population make such a contingency impossible. Is it certain, however, that this is so? The Census Report of 1901 suggested that in Assam some restraints upon births had been in vogue. In 1911, again, the Vice-President of the Calcutta Municipality, Babu Nilambara Mukerji, M.A., called attention to the extreme poverty caused by over-population, and strongly advocated such restraints. His address seems to have been received with considerable favor, and I have been asked to write articles for prominent native papers on the subject. The project of encouraging emigration from India has, of course, been put forward. But the recent experiences in South Africa and elsewhere hardly favor this proposition, and Mr. Archer in an interesting article on “India and Emigration,” in the _Daily News_ of December 26, pointed out that the real difficulty of over-population could not be appreciably lessened in this way. _Ceylon._—In view of the foregoing, reference may be made to Ceylon which has published its birth and death rates continuously since 1881, though I do not know what reliance can be placed on them. Fig. 8 shows that the birth-rate has rapidly risen from 27 to 41 per thousand, but that the death-rate and infantile mortality have also greatly increased. _The Empire._—The top line in Fig. 1 shows the increase of the population of the whole of our Empire according to the Statistical Abstract just issued. The figures are as follows:— Census 1891 1901 1911 Population 345,356,000 385,572,000 417,268,000 Per cent. increase in decade 11.6 8.3