Page:Adam's reports on vernacular education in Bengal and Behar, submitted to Government in 1835, 1836 and 1838.djvu/99

Rh and religious tracts that have been translated into Ooria. The Missionaries have begun to employ masters capable of understanding the English alphabet, but still retaining the Native method of teaching by writing upon the floor when learning the letters, and thus preparing the scholars for reading books and for writing on paper or the palm-leaf. These schools are scattered over the town of Cuttack and neighborhood; and there is also another school at Bhyreepore near Cuttack, which is attended by most of the children in the village, but the number of scholars attending this school is not stated by my informant, who is himself the superintendent of the schools.

Population.—This district is comparatively of recent creation, being composed of sections from Burdwan, Midnapore, and other adjacent districts. A large proportion of the surface of this district is still in a state of nature. Gang-robbery and river-piracy were at a comparatively recent period prevalent in it, and the number of widows who sacrificed themselves on the funeral piles of their husbands was here always remarkably great. The inhabitants have the repute of being better acquainted with the existing laws of the country than those of most other districts. In 1801, the total number of inhabitants was estimated at 1,000,000, in the proportion of three Hindoos to one Mahomedan.

Indigenous Elementary Schools.—On the state of Native education in this district I derive many details from the records of the General Committee of Public Instruction, in some respects confirming and in others modifying the general view already given of the system of indigenous schools, both elementary and learned.

The indigenous elementary schools amongst Hindoos in this district are numerous, and they are divisible into two classes; first those which derive their principal support from the patronage of a single wealthy family; and secondly, those which are destitute of such special patronage, and are dependent upon the general support of the Native community in the town or village in which they are established. The former are the most numerous, there being scarcely a village without one or more of them. The primary object is the education of the children of the opulent Hindoos by whom they are chiefly supported; but as the teacher seldom receives more than three rupees a month from that source, he is allowed to collect from the neighborhood as many additional pupils as he can obtain or conveniently manage. These pay him at the rate of two to eight annas per month, in addition to which each pupil gives him such a quantity of rice, pulse, oil, salt, and vegetables at the end of each month as will suffice for one day’s