THE HISTORY OF KATHIAWAD fresh rules for the protection of Imperial interests were drawn up. This measure led to a claim by the States to be allowed to cultivate and manufacture opium for consumption, and a controversy arose upon the point. Two years later the Government of India ruled that the British Government had always exercised the right of levying opium duty, and that the prohibition as regards its cultivation was also of long standing, and the rules promulgated in A.D. 1881 finally settled the question. In this year also the Rajasthanik Court was abolished, as it was considered that all cases which were brought before it for decision could be equally well disposed of in the Courts of the States concerned. Appeals against the decisions of these Courts were to be made to the Agency, and parties still dissatisfied were to have the right of appeal to the Government of Bombay. The abolition of the Rajasthanik Court was indicative of the improved relations existing between chiefs and their subject land- holders, and of the progress in efficiency of the State Courts. The most disastrous famine of modern times was brought about in AJD. 1899 by the failure of the rains. It soon became evident that distress was imminent, and as only six inches of rain fell, wells quickly began to dry up, and the cattle suffered severely through failure of the grass crop. Every attempt was made by irrigation to make the cold-weather crops of some use, but the yield, even after the most strenuous exertions, fell far short of the average, and death from starvation stared nearly the whole of the cultivating classes in the face. Before the middle of January A.D. 1900 less than half the cattle in the province remained alive, A regular system of relief works was opened everywhere, and wells were dug as rapidly as possible in the hopes of finding sufficient water even for drinking purposes. In Dhrangadhra over fifteen hundred 254