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CHAPTER II.

PROVINCES OF INDIA.

HAVING now given a comprehensive description of the general aspect of Hindoostan, its rivers, mountains, plants, and animals, we shall next proceed to enumerate and describe separately the several provinces which compose the empire. The first of these, both in extent and importance, is Bengal'. This province, which has frequently formed a separate kingdom, is strongly protected by nature on all sides from foreign invasion; on the north, by a belt of impenetrable thickets 2 and a chain of low mountains; by vast rivers and another mountainous ridge on the east; on the south, by an inaccessible shore and impenetrable woods; and on the west, by a sterile and almost desert frontier. Bengal is divided by the Ganges into two nearly equal parts, of which that on the eastern side of the river is least accessible to an enemy. With the exception of a few gentle hills on the north, the whole province may be termed one vast plain, like the country between the Tigris and the Euphrates, or the level tract of land which separates the Volga from the Jaik. In all the level ground of the southern districts, which is overflowed in the

1 The ancient name of this province was Banga.

2 Along the whole northern frontier, from Assam, westward, there runs a belt of low land, from ten to twenty miles in breadth, covered with the most exuberant vegetation, particularly a rank weed, named in Bengal the augeah-grass, which sometimes grows to the height of thirty feet, and thick as a man's wrist, and mixed with these are tall forest trees." Hamilton, vol. i. p. 2. 3 Hamilton's Description, vol. i. p. 2.

rainy season, rice is cultivated, and thrives luxuriantly, but as we ascend the Ganges it gradually gives place to wheat and barley. Besides these kinds of grain the province produces cotton, indigo, tobacco, opium, and the mulberry tree. Its forests abound with wild boars, elephants, buffaloes, antelopes *, and deer, and its rivers, but more especially the Ganges, with fish; of which the principal are the delicious mango, already alluded to in our general description, and the mullet, which, as it swims against the stream with its head above water, is shot like a bird".

The most remarkable portion of Bengal is the dismal region of the Sunderbunds, or that thicklywooded swampy belt which forms the southern border of the delta of the Ganges, and is itself bounded by the ocean. This whole region is a mere labyrinth of creeks and rivers, and appears in the course of ages to have been traversed in every direction by the principal branches of the Ganges, which seem, in fact, to have formed this delta by their deposits, there being no appearance of virgin earth from the Tipperah hills on the east, to the district of Burdwan on the west. Forests of vast extent here cover the whole soil, and encroach upon the rivers; the masts of vessels sailing up or down the streams being frequently entangled in the branches of the trees. These wide extended woods are inhabited only by a few fanatical fakeers.

* In the Institutes of Menu, the country in which it is lawful for a follower of the Brahminical religion to live is determined by certain natural boundaries: the legislator then proceeds, "that land on which the black antelope (antilope cervicapra) naturally grazes is held fit for the performance of sacrifices." Menu, ii. 23. Parallel passages occur in several other ancient Hindoo law-codes.

5 Hamilton's Description, vol. i. p. 28.

• This word is derived from sundari-vana, "a forest of sundari trees." Hamilton, vol. i. p. 123. The sundarî is a small timber tree (herritiera minor).

7 Hamilton, vol. i. p. 123.

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On all sides a gloomy silence prevails, occasionally broken by the cooing of the dove, the bray of the deer, the crowing of the cock, the screaming of the parroquets, and the leaping and springing of monkeys from tree to tree. Alligators of enormous size may almost every where be seen basking on the sunny banks of the rivers, or plunging into the streams; while huge tigers prowl about the margin of the water, and spring suddenly upon the miserable woodcutter or salt-maker, or swim out into the rivers to attack the boats' crews lying at anchor. The fakeers themselves, who pretend to possess charms sufficiently powerful to repel these indiscriminating persecutors, and live in miserable huts by the river-side, where they receive the prayers and the charity of the passersby, become the prey of the tigers, and disappear one after the other. The cultivation of these salt marshy lands is supposed to be impracticable; and, even were it otherwise, it might not perhaps be judicious to clear away the forests, which, besides furnishing the capital with an inexhaustible supply of wood for fuel, boatbuilding, and other purposes, present a strong natural barrier against maritime invasion along the whole southern frontier of the province.

The most fertile and best cultivated portion of Bengal is the district of Burdwan, which, environed by the jungles of Midnapoor, Pacheta, and Birbhoom, appears like a garden in the midst of a wilderness.

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Many of the wood-cutters are Hindoos, who have assigned to various gods and goddesses particular portions of the Sunderbunds. These Hindoo labourers raise elevations of earth, three or four inches high and about three feet square, upon which they place balls of earth, and having painted them red, perform worship before them, offering rice, flowers, fruit, and the waters of the Ganges. The head boatman then fasts and goes to sleep; during which last operation a god or goddess informs him in a dream where wood may be cut without dread of tigers." Hamilton's Description of Hindostan, vol. i. p. 125.

It was ceded, with other districts, to the British government in 1760, and has gone on from that period improving in cultivation and riches. It produces sugar, cotton, indigo, pawn, tobacco, and mulberry trees; and three great roads convey its productions to Hooghly, Culna, and Cutwa, the district not having the advantage of internal navigation".

The seasons of Bengal are the cold, the hot, and the rainy. In the month of April, or earlier in some parts, storms, accompanied by thunder, lightning, and rain, are frequent, and generally, towards the close of the day, set in from the north-west. These continue to mitigate the heat, until the commencement of the rains in June. When the monsoon breaks up early in September the weather grows intolerably hot, and the inhabitants, especially the Europeans, become very sickly. In the eastern and middle districts thunder-storms and sometimes milder showers refresh the atmosphere and mitigate the heat. Fogs are frequent in winter, and there falls an abundant penetrating dew. Frost and extreme cold are experienced in the mountainous parts, and even in the plain ice is obtained simply by assisting evaporation in porous vessels 10.

On the south of Bengal, proceeding along the seacoast, lies the province of Orissa; bounded on the east by the sea, and on the west by the province of Gundwana; whilst on the south, an imaginary line, drawn due west from the northern point of the Chilka lake, divides it from the northern Circars11: this pro9 Hamilton's Description, vol. i. p. 153.

10 Ibid. p. 16, 18.

11 Malte-Brun, vol. iii. p. 147. Formerly, however, Orissa extended much farther to the south, and comprehended the greater part of the northern Circars. In his map, drawn and coloured by Arrowsmith, Hamilton agrees with the French geographer in making Orissa extend only as far as the Chilka lake; but he asserts in the text that the river Godavery is the real southern boundary of Orissa, vol. ii. p. 31.

bably was the country of the ancient Gangarida (see Pliny, N. H. vi. 20). The interior of the province, consisting of rugged hills, pathless deserts and jungles, deep water-courses, and impenetrable forests, pervaded by a pestilential atmosphere, remains in a very savage state, and forms a strong natural barrier to the maritime districts. Even the plain country, though by nature exceedingly fertile, is neither well cultivated nor thickly peopled. Rice and salt are the principal articles of produce; the former is sufficiently abundant to allow of exportation. The sea-coast is frequently visited by tremendous hurricanes, and the low lands are liable to sudden and destructive inundations. Wild beasts multiply with such astonishing rapidity in the jungles and upland forests of this province, that they are daily gaining ground upon the inhabitants, and extending their empire; even the low lands are occasionally infested by jackalls, tigers, and other noxious and rapacious animals.

In the district of Cuttac in this province stands the celebrated temple of Jagannât'h1. It is situated on a low sandy plain, about one mile and a half from the sea-shore, and is chiefly remarkable for the superstitious rites of which it is the scene, being in itself a mere mass of shapeless and decayed granite, now much damaged by a late earthquake. It is said, however, to contain images of Krishna and of his brother and sister, which the Hindoos believe to be four thousand years old 13. The precincts of this temple for ten miles round are accounted so holy,

12 Properly Jagannât'ha, i. e. "The Lord of the Universe," which is in Sanscrit one of the names of Vishnu or Krishna. The temple is called by the title of the deity to which it is sacred. The name is sometimes corruptedly written Juggernauth.

13 Ayeen Akbery, vol. ii. p. 16, 18; Bernier's Travels, Osborn's Collection, folio, p. 198; Travels of W. Bruton, Osborn's Collection, vol. ii. p. 277; Anquetil Duperron, Zendavesta, Disc. Prélim. tom. i. p. 81; Sonnerat, Voy. aux Indes Orien

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