Page:Reports on the State of Education in Bengal (1835 & 1838).djvu/196

126 well as to the West Indies, that the first step towards a national system is to ascertain what has been or can be done for the promotion of education by private means. In undertaking and prosecuting, therefore, the investigation of which I now present the first-fruits, we are encouraged by the example and stimulated by the declared opinions of His Majesty’s Government, the gratifying spectacle being thus presented of similar and simultaneous efforts in England, in the West Indies, and in British India, to promote the great cause of general education.