In the Presidency of Madras there are upwards of 53,000 tanks, or reservoirs for irrigation purposes alone, exclusive of small tanks near villages, all executed by the natives prior to the occupancy of the Deccan by the British. The aggregate length of the embankment of these reservoirs is fully 30,000 miles; bridges, culverts, sluices, &c., are more than 300,000 in number. The stored-up waters, sent forth at the proper season, still brings to the exchequer of the Madras Presidency a yearly income of a million and a half sterling (one-sixth of the whole revenue), although many of the finest of these reservoirs are in ruins, or useless from want of being properly kept up. One of them, the Ponairy Reservoir, in the district of Trichinopoly, has a superficial area of about 80 square miles, or say 50,000 acres; the banks are 30 miles in extent. Another, the Veranum Reservoir, has nearly 35 square miles of area, or upwards of 20,000 acres, and 10 miles of banks. An expenditure of a considerable amount has been incurred for nearly half a century by the Government of the Madras Presidency in keeping open the existing narrow waterway through the rocky reef which connects the island of Ramisseram with the mainland of India. Even so, however, the navigation has been extremely unsatisfactory. The tide, when making southwards, heaps up the water at the northern entrance to the channel to such an extent that even full-powered steamers require to employ kedges and warps to surmount and pass it. The Madras Government, therefore, are favourable to a proposed new channel, which will at once relieve them of a serious outlay, provide greater security to navigation, and materially reduce the time now occupied in steaming between Ceylon and their own seaboard. It has been proposed to increase the maritime facilities of India and Ceylon by cutting a canal through the island of Ramisseram, which at the present time excludes the possibility of ships drawing more than 12 feet of water from passing northward to the Bay of Bengal. For this reason ships proceeding to Madras or Calcutta have to steer to the east of Ceylon, which entails a voyage of 300 or 400 miles longer than would be required if the route by the Gulf of Manaar and the Palk Straits were open to them. For some years previous to 1887 negotiations had been carried on between the parties promoting this canal and the Government of India, with a view of obtaining such concessions as were deemed necessary to the realisation of the scheme. Authority has been given to obtain land and cut the canal, and the aid of the Government has been promised towards obtaining from the railway companies in the south of India an extension of their system to the new port which it is proposed to establish at the Indian end of the canal.