Page:The Imperial Gazetteer of India - Volume 2 (2nd edition).pdf/332

 BENGAL.

322 range of 7 9 '4°. the lowest 52-8

The highest recorded temperature in Calcutta is

giving an extreme range of 53°.

106°,

and

During the rains the

temperature of the Hazaribagh plateau, to the west of the Delta, falls more rapidly than that of any other part of Bengal. Between May and October, the

fall at

Hazaribagh

in about the

same

latitude,

more than

The

3°.

it

rather over 11°, while at Berhampur,

is

is

only about 4^°, and at Calcutta

little

excessive humidity of the atmosphere in Bengal,

become proverbial. It is greatest on the coast of Orissa and the Sundarbans, and diminishes inland as

especially in the eastern Districts, has

the distance from the sea increases.

The

Districts of Eastern Bengal,

including Cachar and Sylhet, and the Himalayan the heaviest

amounts

The

rainfall.

average annual

to over 100 inches,

amount

fall

iardi.,

are those of

throughout those Districts

and on the exposed

hill

flanks

and

at

Thus, Sylhet has an annual average of 141 inches; Darjiling, 126 inches; Baxa, 280 inches; and Chara Piinji, 527 inches, the highest average rainfall hitherto their foot, this

is

greatly exceeded.

recorded in the world.

The

rainfall

is

also higher along the coast

Thus, Sagar island, at the mouth of False the Hugh', has an average of 80 inches, and Calcutta only 66 Point 74 inches, and Cuttack only 52^ inches. The lowest rainfall is than on the

inland

plains.



where the annual fall does not much exceed 40 inches. North of the Ganges, it increases gradually up to the Himalayas and from the southern bank, the rainfall rises by degrees, up to the high ridge of forest-clad country drained by the Son, the Damodar, and their tributaries. In Calcutta, the highest rainfall recorded is that of 1871, when it amounted to 93'3i inches; in 1837, the registered fall was as low as 43 ’61 inches. By far the greater part of Showers fall also in the the rainfall occurs between June and October. hot weather months, and hailstorms are not infrequent in February and March. In the Eastern Districts rain occurs occasionally in the

in the south of Behar,



cold weather, but

is

less

common

western Bengal.

Medical Aspects



Vital Statistics

.

in the

Delta and the Districts of

—Apart from the

large hospitals in

the city of Calcutta, charitable medical relief was afforded in 1881 by

231 hospitals or dispensaries; the total number of persons treated during the year being 970,978, of whom 23,444 were in-door and Six lunatic asylums contained a daily 937,534 out-door patients. The registered death-rate for the Province average of 893 inmates. 1881 was 20^96 per thousand, or a total of 1,243,257 out of a population of 65 millions where the registration system is This average is almost certainly below the truth, owing compulsory. in

total

to imperfections in the returns.

The

death-rate

among

the prison

population was as high as 66 per thousand.

Conclusion.

—The cheapness of labour,

as

compared with European