Page:Calcutta Review Vol. II (Oct. - Dec. 1844).pdf/367

362 the whole people of any nation, may be reckoned as under fourteen years of age, and that of this entire population of children, three-sevenths are of an age to go to school, even when the school-commencing age is fixed at seven years complete. In India, however, the school-commencing age is, in point of fact, not seven but five years; and at this lower rate it has been reckoned all along. This would render the proportion of the juvenile population of the school-going age not three-sevenths, but about three-sixths, or one-half. Let us now, then, actually apply these proportions to the case before us. In Bengal and Behar, there is a population of about 36,000,000,—thirty-six millions. Eleven-thirtieths of this aggregate will give us a juvenile population amounting to 13,200,000, or upwards of thirteen millions. The half of this gives us 6,600,000, or upwards of six and a half millions, as the number of children of the school-going age. But we have already ascertained that of children of the school-going age, only 7 in 100 receive instruction of any kind. Consequently, of the 6,600,000, or upwards of six and a half millions, of the school-going age, only 511,500 or about half a million, receive any kind of instruction, —leaving 6,088,500, or about six millions of children, capable of receiving school instruction, wholly uneducated!—that is, a number of school-going children in the provinces of Bengal and Behar alone, wholly uneducated, greatly more than double the aggregate of the entire population of Scotland, including men, women, and children! Then, again, as to the adults:—deducting the juvenile population of 13,200,000, or upwards of thirteen millions, from the sum-total of 36,000,000, or thirty-six millions, it will leave 22,800,000, or nearly three millions, as the aggregate of the adult population. But we have already found that, of the adult population, only an average of 5 in 100 receive instruction of any kind. It will hence appear, that of the entire adult population of about twenty-three millions, only 1,254,000, or about a million and a fourth, receive instruction of any kind;—leaving 21,546,000, or upwards of twenty-one and a half millions of adults wholly uneducated!—that is a number of adults, in the provinces of Bengal and Behar alone, wholly uneducated, considerably exceeding in amount the entire aggregate of the population of England and Scotland united, including men, women, and children! What a tremendous conclusion, to have been arrived at, is this! Upwards of six millions of children, of the school-going age, and upwards of twenty-one and a half millions of adults, in the provinces of Bengal and Behar alone, without one shred or tittle of school or domestic instruction of any kind or degree, however humble, meagre, or inadequate! And yet,