Page:The Imperial Gazetteer of India - Volume 2 (2nd edition).pdf/331

 BENGAL. The

them.

of

schools

secondary

321 instruction

were

1894

in

At the head of these stand the zild or District schools, established by Government at the head-quarters of each District. In them candidates are prepared for the matricunumber, with i4t,o 95

lation examination

scholars.

of the University of Calcutta.

The

University

speaking, an imperial rather than a provincial institution, as

is,

strictly

it

exercises functions over the whole of the Bengal Presidency



but

and the majority of its students belong to the Dower Provinces. Its function is to examine and confer degrees. The students for degrees must study at certain affiliated colleges, of which its

seat

in Calcutta,

is

Bengal— at

there are six in the interior of

Hugh’, Rajshahi, and Krishnagarh.

Patna,

Dacca, Cuttack,

In Calcutta, two Government and

four private colleges receive grants-in-aid from the State.

Newspapers.

— In

1881-82,

there

were

13

principal

newspapers

published in the vernacular, and about 38 of less importance, some of them merely broadsheets, or 5 1 in all ; but the number is constantly

The

changing. believed

to

circulation of the 13 principal vernacular papers is aggregate 7900 copies, that of the lesser papers about

Apart from advertising sheets, there were 16 11,700 copies. newspapers published in English within the Lieutenant-Governorship of

an aggregate circulation of 15,000 copies. Of this about two-thirds are assigned to the Calcutta daily papers. The Englishman, The Indian Daily Netvs, The Statesman, and The

Bengal

in 1881, with

circulation,

A

Indian Mirror.

weekly paper. The Hindu Patriot, conducted by

native gentlemen, but printed in English, also deserves special mention.

The

Calcutta Review

is

a high-class quarterly, to which

many

of the

leading Indian administrators, soldiers, and statesmen have contributed

during the past half-century. Climate.

—Although Bengal

tropical zone, cally tropical.

its

is,

for the

most

part, situated outside the

climate to the south of the Himalayas

The mean temperature

is

characteristi-

of the whole year varies between

80° F. in Orissa and 74° in parts of xssam



that of Calcutta being

an elevation of 6685 feet above sea level, the mean temperature is about 54°, and occasionally In the annual range of their falls as low as 24° in the winter. temperature, as well as in point of humidity and rainfall, the eastern and western portions of the Province are strongly contrasted. In Cachar, nearly 200 miles from the sea, the mean temperature of June 64'5° ; and the highest and lowest temis 82°, that of January peratures recorded in a period of 5 years, namely 99° and 43°, show a range of 56°. At Chittagong, on the sea-coast, the range does not exceed 49°. On the other hand, Patna, with a mean temperature of 87 '2° in June, and 6o'7° in January, registered in 1869 a maximum temperature of ii 6‘3 in May, and a minimum of 36 '9 in January, giving an absolute 79°.

VOL.

In the

II.

hill

station of Darjiling, with

X