only commend this sapient contention to our self-governing Colonies, who have all had recourse in turn to British capital for the development of their resources, and paid interest on their loans to British bondholders without being apparently conscious of any “soaking drain.”  The supposed “drain” is estimated in various ways, but a common method adopted is to lay stress upon the excess of exports over imports[22].  Lord Curzon has rightly pointed out that economically this test is quite fallacious; and that in the richest country in the world, America, the value of the exports exceeds the imports by over L100,000,000 per annum.  Home charges represent three-fourths of the “drain,” and these may be calculated at about L18,000,000 annually.  Of this sum, L6,750,000 is paid in interest on railway capital; but the railways are a source of profit, and the payment comes from the railway passenger.  Moreover, in course of time, the Indian railways will become, and are becoming, a property of enormous value to the State.  The interest on India’s public debt is L3,000,000, but it has to be remembered how much India has benefited by expenditure which has proved reproductive.  Sir Bampfylde Fuller has stated that the lowest estimate of the increase in produce obtained through irrigation works alone is estimated at L30,000,000 annually.  In the last 50 years the total volume of Indian trade, imports and exports, has increased from L40,000,000 to L200,000,000.  The remaining items are roughly, home military charges, L2,000,000; India Office, &c., L250,000; leave allowances, L750,000; pensions, L4,000,000.  A considerable part of these pensions represent merely deferred pay.  Moreover, unlike some other countries, e.g., the United States, where L32,000,000 are spent on pensions, mostly unearned, India has had good value, brimming over, for her pensions.  The private remittances to England, which must be added to these sums, are not treated in any other country as an economic loss.  No American economist would so regard the enormous annual sums remitted by immigrants to Ireland, Italy, and other European countries, or the vast annual expenditure of American tourists in Europe.  Indian immigrants remit L400,000 annually to India from the Straits Settlements and Malay States alone, and considerable sums must be sent from East and South Africa and Ceylon, as well as smaller sums from Mauritius and the West Indies.  Yet these colonies do not apparently complain about a “drain” to India.

What India is entitled to ask is whether Indian loans have been expended for the benefit of the Indian people, and the answer is conclusive.  India possesses to-day assets in the shape of railways, irrigation canals, and other public works which, as marketable properties, represent more than her total indebtedness, without even taking into account the enormous value of the “unearned increment” they have produced for the benefit of the people of India.  If, therefore, we look at the Government of India