Freda Bedi, by Wikipedia

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Re: Freda Bedi, by Wikipedia

Postby admin » Sat Dec 14, 2019 5:56 am

Mountstuart Elphinstone
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 12/13/19

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The manuscript of the Divine Comedy, a poem composed by Dante Alighieri in the 14th century, was written in the second half of the 15th century. It is a beautiful codex on parchment and richly illustrated. It was given to the Society by Mountstuart Elphinstone, governor of Bombay and President of the Society from 1819–1827 and bears his signature.[3] In 1930, the Italian government under Benito Mussolini offered the society one million pounds, calling the book a national treasure.[3] Mussolini believed that the offer could not be refused, but to his shock, the Society turned down his request stating that it was donated by an ex-member of the Society and hence it was their property.

-- The Asiatic Society of Mumbai, by Wikipedia


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Mountstuart Elphinstone
Governor of Bombay
In office: 1 November 1819 – 1 November 1827
Governor-General: The Marquess of Hastings
The Earl Amhurst
Preceded by: Sir Evan Nepean, Bt
Succeeded by: Sir John Malcolm
Personal details
Born: 6 October 1779, Dumbarton, Dumbartonshire, Scotland
Died: 20 November 1859 (aged 80), Hookwood, Surrey, England
Nationality: British
Alma mater: Royal High School
Occupation: Statesman, historian

Image
Mountstuart Elphinstone's memorial in St Paul's Cathedral

The Hon Mountstuart Elphinstone FRSE (6 October 1779 – 20 November 1859) was a Scottish statesman and historian, associated with the government of British India. He later became the Governor of Bombay (now Mumbai) where he is credited with the opening of several educational institutions accessible to the Indian population. Besides being a noted administrator, he wrote books on India and Afghanistan.

Early life

Born in Dumbarton, Dumbartonshire (now Dunbartonshire) in 1779, and educated at the Royal High School, Edinburgh, he was the fourth son of the 11th Baron Elphinstone in the peerage of Scotland. Having been appointed to the civil service of the British East India Company, of which one of his uncles was a director, he arrived at Calcutta (now Kolkata) early in 1796 where he filled several subordinate posts. In 1799, he escaped massacre in Benares (now Varanasi) by the followers of the deposed Nawab of Awadh Wazir Ali Khan. In 1801 he was transferred to the Diplomatic Service where he was posted as the assistant to the British resident at the court of the Peshwa ruler Baji Rao II.

Envoy

In the Peshwa court he obtained his first opportunity of distinction, being attached in the capacity of diplomatist to the mission of Sir Arthur Wellesley to the Marathas. When, on the failure of negotiations, war broke out, Elphinstone, though a civilian, acted as virtual aide-de-camp to Wellesley. At the Battle of Assaye, and throughout the campaign, he displayed rare courage and knowledge of tactics such that Wellesley told him he ought to have been a soldier. In 1804, when the war ended, Elphinstone was appointed British resident at Nagpur.[1] This gave him plenty of leisure time, which he spent in reading and study. Later, in 1807, he completed a short stint at Gwalior.

In 1808 he was appointed the first British envoy to the court of Kabul, Afghanistan, with the object of securing a friendly alliance with the Afghans against Napoleon's planned advance on India. However this proved of little value, because Shah Shuja was driven from the throne by his brother before it could be ratified. The most valuable permanent result of the embassy was in Elphinstone's work titled Account of the Kingdom of Cabul and its Dependencies in Persia and India (1815).[1]

After spending about a year in Calcutta arranging the report of his mission, Elphinstone was appointed in 1811 to the important and difficult post of resident at Pune (formerly known as Poona). The difficulty arose from the general complication of Maratha politics, and especially from the weakness of the Peshwas, which Elphinstone rightly read from the first. The tenuous peace between the Peshwas was broken in 1817 with the Marathas declaring war on the British. Elphinstone assumed command of the military during an important crisis during the Battle of Khadki and managed to secure a victory[1] despite his non-military background. As reparations, Peshwa territories were annexed by the British. Elphinstone became the Commissioner of the Deccan in 1818.

Governor

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Elphinstone College, Mumbai, established in 1856

In 1819, Elphinstone was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of Bombay, a post he held until 1827. During his tenure, he greatly promoted education in India, at a time when opinion in Britain was against educating the "natives". He may fairly be regarded as the founder of the system of state education in India. One of his principal achievements was the compilation of the "Elphinstone code."[1] He also returned many lands that had appropriated by the British to the Raja of Satara.

He built the first bungalow in Malabar Hill during this time, and following his example, many prominent people took up residence here. It soon became a fashionable locality, and remains so to the present.[2]

His connection with the Bombay Presidency is commemorated in the endowment of Elphinstone College by local communities, and in the erection of a marble statue by the European inhabitants.[1] However, the Elphinstone Road railway station and the Elphinstone Circle, both in Mumbai city, are not named after him but in honour of his nephew, John, 13th Lord Elphinstone, who later also became Governor of Bombay in the 1850s.

The township of Elphinstone, Victoria, Australia, was named after him. The suburb of Mount Stuart, Tasmania, Australia, and its main road, Elphinstone Road, were also named after him.[3]

There is a statue of him in the crypt of St Paul's Cathedral in London.[4]

Return to Great Britain

Returning to Britain in 1829, after an interval of two years' travel, Elphinstone continued to influence public affairs,[1] but based in England rather than Scotland. Nevertheless, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1830 with his proposer being Sir John Robison.[5]

Sir John Robison KH FRSE FRSSA (11 June 1778 – 7 March 1843) was a Scottish inventor and writer on scientific subjects. He was the son of the physicist and mathematician, Professor John Robison.

-- John Robison (inventor), by Wikipedia


He twice refused appointment as Governor-General of India, preferring to finish his two-volume work, History of India (1841). He died in Hookwood, Surrey, England, on 20 November 1859. He is buried in Limpsfield churchyard.[6]

James Sutherland Cotton later wrote his biography as part of the Rulers of India series in 1892.[7]

The historian James Grant Duff named his son after Elphinstone.

Works

• Elphinstone, Mountstuart. The History of India. Full text online at ibiblio.org (Both volumes in HTML form, complete, chapter-by-chapter, with all footnotes)
• Elphinstone, Mountstuart (1843) [1841]. The History of India (Vol. 1). London : J. Murray.
• Elphinstone, Mountstuart (1841). The History of India (Vol. 2). London : J. Murray.
• Elphinstone, Mountstuart (1905). History of India (9th ed.). London: J. Murray. (Index)
• The Rise of British Power in the East (1887)

See also

• Asiatic Society of Bombay
• Horniman Circle Gardens

References

1. One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Elphinstone, Mountstuart". Encyclopædia Britannica. 9 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 298–299.
2. "Malabar Hill: How a jungle turned into a posh address". DNA India. Retrieved 20 February 2019.
3. http://www.mountstuarttas.org.au/?q=con ... rt-history
4. St Paul's – The New Church
5. Biographical Index of Former Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 1783–2002 (PDF). The Royal Society of Edinburgh. July 2006. ISBN 0 902 198 84 X.
6. Biographical Index of Former Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 1783–2002 (PDF). The Royal Society of Edinburgh. July 2006. ISBN 0 902 198 84 X.
7. "Rulers of India: Mountstuart Elphinstone by J. S. Cotton". The English Historical Review. 7 (28): 813. October 1892. JSTOR 547455.

Further reading

• "Elphinstone, Mountstuart". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/8752.(Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
• J. S. Cotton, Mountstuart Elphinstone (Rulers of India series), (1892)
• T. E. Colebrooke, Life of Mountstuart Elphinstone (1884)
• G. W. Forrest, Official Writings of Mountstuart Elphinstone (1884)
• Harrington, Jack (2010), Sir John Malcolm and the Creation of British India, Ch. 5, New York: Palgrave Macmillan., ISBN 978-0-230-10885-1
• Montstuart Elphinstone (GFDL site)
• William Dalrymple, White Mughals Oxford UP 2002.
• Gautam Chandra, Veerendra Kumar Mishra & Pranjali. (2018) From inactivity to encouragement: the contribution of Lord Elphinstone to the educational development of the Madras Presidency (1837–1842), History of Education, 47:6, 763-778, DOI: 10.1080/0046760X.2018.1484181

External links

• The harsh lesson of Afghanistan: little has changed in 200 years, Ben Macintyre, November 13, 2008, The Times of London, Times Online, timesonline.co.uk
• "Archival material relating to Mountstuart Elphinstone". UK National Archives.
• Mountstuart Elphinstone, and the making of southwestern India by J S Cotton (1911)
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Re: Freda Bedi, by Wikipedia

Postby admin » Sat Dec 14, 2019 6:28 am

The Asiatic Society of Mumbai
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 12/13/19

NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT

YOU ARE REQUIRED TO READ THE COPYRIGHT NOTICE AT THIS LINK BEFORE YOU READ THE FOLLOWING WORK, THAT IS AVAILABLE SOLELY FOR PRIVATE STUDY, SCHOLARSHIP OR RESEARCH PURSUANT TO 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107 AND 108. IN THE EVENT THAT THE LIBRARY DETERMINES THAT UNLAWFUL COPYING OF THIS WORK HAS OCCURRED, THE LIBRARY HAS THE RIGHT TO BLOCK THE I.P. ADDRESS AT WHICH THE UNLAWFUL COPYING APPEARED TO HAVE OCCURRED. THANK YOU FOR RESPECTING THE RIGHTS OF COPYRIGHT OWNERS.


Image

The Asiatic Society of Mumbai
Predecessor •Literary Society of Bombay
•Asiatic Society of Bombay
Formation 1804
Founder Sir James Mackintosh
Founded at Mumbai
Type Learned Society
Literary Society
Location
Town Hall, Shahid Bhagat Singh Marg, Fort, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
Coordinates 18.931589°N 72.836131°E
Membership
2649
President
Prof. Vispi Balaporia
Website http://www.asiaticsociety.org.in

The Asiatic Society of Mumbai (formerly Asiatic Society of Bombay) is a learned society in the field of Asian studies based in Mumbai, India. It can trace its origin to the Literary Society of Bombay which first met in Mumbai on 26 November 1804, and was founded by Sir James Mackintosh. It was formed with the intention of "promoting useful knowledge, particularly such as is now immediately connected with India". After the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland was established in London in 1823, the Literary Society of Bombay became affiliated with it and was known as the Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (BBRAS) since 1830. The Bombay Geographical Society merged with it in 1873, followed by the Anthropological Society of Bombay in 1896. In 1954, it was separated from the Royal Asiatic Society and renamed the Asiatic Society of Bombay.[1] In 2002,[2] it acquired its present name.[1] It is funded by an annual grant from the Central Government of India.

Aims and Objectives

The aims and objectives of the Society when it was formed in the year 1804 were "to promote useful knowledge particularly such as is now immediately connected with India". Thereafter, on several occasions, some more aims and objectives were added such as encouraging the research studies in the language, philosophy, arts and natural and social sciences in relation to India and Asia, publishing journals, maintaining a library and museum, establishing institutes and centres which fulfill aims and objects of the Society.

Holdings

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'The Society in its early days'

The library of the Society has over a hundred thousand books out of which 15,000 are classified as rare and valuable. It also has priceless artifacts and over 3,000 ancient manuscripts in Persian, Sanskrit and Prakrit, mostly on paper but some on palm leaf. The numismatic collection of 11,829 coins includes a gold coin of Kumaragupta I, a rare gold mohur of Akbar and coins issued by Shivaji. Its map collection comprises 1300 maps.[1] The collection of the Society include:

1. One of only two known original copies of Dante's Divine Comedy.[1]
2. The manuscript of Vasupujyacharita (1242), a Sanskrit text on the life of the Jain Tirthankara Vasupujya.
3. The manuscript of Shahnama of Firdausi (1853), written in Persian.
4. The Aranyakaparvan (16th century) manuscript contains illustrated text from the Mahabharat and is written in Sanskrit.
5. Five Buddhist caskets excavated in the ancient port town of Sopara near the suburb of Nala Sopara.

The Divine Comedy

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'Asiatic Library, Fort, Mumbai'

The manuscript of the Divine Comedy, a poem composed by Dante Alighieri in the 14th century, was written in the second half of the 15th century. It is a beautiful codex on parchment and richly illustrated. It was given to the Society by Mountstuart Elphinstone, governor of Bombay and President of the Society from 1819–1827 and bears his signature.[3] In 1930, the Italian government under Benito Mussolini offered the society one million pounds, calling the book a national treasure.[3] Mussolini believed that the offer could not be refused, but to his shock, the Society turned down his request stating that it was donated by an ex-member of the Society and hence it was their property.

Functions of the society

Image
'Close-up picture of the building'

• Holding: Preserving, conserving, cataloguing and documenting holdings.
• Research: Generating supporting and disseminating research in its chosen fields.
• Public interface: Providing a forum for debate and discussions on topics of public interest.

The adopt-a-book scheme was recently introduced by the Society which allows patrons to fund the upkeep of rare books. The Society is financially in the red with a loss of Rs 1 crore (10 million). Due to the availability of information from the internet, membership has dropped significantly in recent years.

Journal

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Located at Fort, Mumbai

Initially, the Literary Society of Bombay published its transactions under the title, Transactions of the Literary Society of Bombay. In 1841, the Asiatic Society of Bombay commenced publishing its journal titled, Journal of the Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society. From 1955 to 2002, it published its journal under the name, Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bombay and from 2002, its journal has been published under the name, Journal of the Asiatic Society of Mumbai.

Digitization of Collection

The Society has undertaken digitization of all its collection including books, newspapers, manuscripts, government publications, journals and maps and has made them available on the Society's digital platform ‘Granth Sanjeevani'.[4][5]

Awards[6]

Campbell Memorial Gold Medal


The Campbell Memorial Gold Medal was established in 1907 and is awarded to recognize distinguished services on the subject of Oriental History, Folklore or Ethnology which further the investigation and encouragement of Oriental Arts, Sciences and Literature.

The first winner was archaeologist Aurel Stein in 1908.

MM.Dr. P.V.Kane Gold Medal

Established in 1946, the medal is awarded for valuable research work in Vedic Studies or in Classical Sanskrit with special reference to Dharma Shastra and Poetics.

Silver Medal

The Silver Medal is awarded to a member of the Society who has written a book adjudged as the best in the given 3-year period.

Town Hall

Main article: [[:Town Hall Mumbai]]

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Town Hall Mumbai Building

The Asiatic Society of Mumbai Town Hall or just Town Hall (colloquially Called "Tondal" in the 19th century) that houses the Asiatic Society of Mumbai was not built in 1804, the year in which the Literary Society of Bombay was formed. Though Sir James Mackintosh mooted the proposal for a grand edifice, it was not completed until the year 1833 after many fits and starts, when the Government of Bombay agreed to make up for the shortfall in funds in return for office-space.

Apart from the Asiatic Society of Mumbai, the building also houses State Central Library and a museum, Maharashtra Women's Association, and the Additional Stamp Controller Office.

The edifice is in the prime Fort area of South Mumbai overlooking the Horniman Circle Gardens and the Reserve Bank of India.

Administration

The Managing Committee looks after the administration of the Society. The Managing Committee consists of a President, Four Vice Presidents, an Hon. Secretary, who is also the Chief Executive Officer of the Society, and Fifteen members who are elected from among the Resident members. In addition to the elected members, the Central Government and State Government have one representative each.

In September 2019, Vispi Balaporia became the first woman president of The Asiatic Society of Mumbai in its 215-year-old history.[7]

Early Presidents

Literary Society of Bombay (1804)


• 1804 Hon. Sir James Mackintosh
• 1811 Dr R. Stewart
• 1815 William Taylor Money
• 1818 Olyett Woodhouse
1819 Hon. Mountstuart Elphinstone (Governor of Bombay)
• 1827 Sir John Malcolm (Governor of Bombay)

Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (1829)

• 1830 John Romer (Acting Governor of Bombay)
• 1831 Lt-Col Vans Kennedy
• 1835 Rev. John Wilson, FRS
• 1843 Hon. George William Anderson (Acting Governor of Bombay)
• 1846 Hon. Lestock Robert Reid (Acting Governor of Bombay)
• 1849 Hon. John Pollard Willoughby
• 1853 Rev. John Stevenson
• 1855 Hon. William Edward Frere
• 1864 Hon. Justice Henry Newton
• 1869 Hon. Henry Pendock St George Tucker
• 1875 Hon. James J. Gibbs
• 1881 Hon. Sir Raymond West
1893 Hon. Justice Kashinath Trimbak Telang
• 1894 Hon. Herbert Mills Birdwood (Acting Governor of Bombay)
• 1895 Hon. Justice Sir John Jardine
• 1897 Dr. Peter Peterson
• 1900 Hon. Justice Edward Townshend Candy
• 1903 Hon. E.M.H. Fulton

See also

• The Asiatic Society

Notes and References[edit]

1. Bavadam, Lyla (8–21 May 2010). "Treasure house". Frontline. 27 (10). Retrieved 21 May 2010.
2. According to its official website, it was renamed in 2005
3. Tharoor, Ishaan (2 January 2009). "The Divine Comedy of Mumbai" TIME. Retrieved on 14 February 2011
4. "Granth Sanjeevani". granthsanjeevani.com. Retrieved 15 October 2019.
5. "Granth Sanjeevani". granthsanjeevani.com. Retrieved 15 October 2019.
6. "Honorary Fellowships and Medals". The Asiatic Society of Mumbai. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
7. "Asiatic Society of Mumbai gets first woman president". The Indian Express. 2 September 2019. Retrieved 15 October 2019.

External links

• official website
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Re: Freda Bedi, by Wikipedia

Postby admin » Sat Dec 14, 2019 6:50 am

James Mackintosh
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 12/13/19

NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT

YOU ARE REQUIRED TO READ THE COPYRIGHT NOTICE AT THIS LINK BEFORE YOU READ THE FOLLOWING WORK, THAT IS AVAILABLE SOLELY FOR PRIVATE STUDY, SCHOLARSHIP OR RESEARCH PURSUANT TO 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107 AND 108. IN THE EVENT THAT THE LIBRARY DETERMINES THAT UNLAWFUL COPYING OF THIS WORK HAS OCCURRED, THE LIBRARY HAS THE RIGHT TO BLOCK THE I.P. ADDRESS AT WHICH THE UNLAWFUL COPYING APPEARED TO HAVE OCCURRED. THANK YOU FOR RESPECTING THE RIGHTS OF COPYRIGHT OWNERS.


Image
Sir James Mackintosh
—by Sir Thomas Lawrence.
Born 24 October 1765
Aldourie, Inverness-shire
Died 30 May 1832 (aged 66)
Citizenship United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
Education University of Aberdeen
Occupation Political philosopher and politician
Political party:
Whig

Sir James Mackintosh FRS FRSE (24 October 1765 – 30 May 1832) was a Scottish jurist, Whig politician and historian. His studies and sympathies embraced many interests. He was trained as a doctor and barrister, and worked also as a journalist, judge, administrator, professor, philosopher and politician.

Early life

Mackintosh was born at Aldourie, 7 miles from Inverness, the son of Captain John Mackintosh of Kellachie.[1] Both his parents were from old Highland families. His mother died while he was a child, and his father was frequently abroad, so he was brought up by his grandmother, and then schooled at Fortrose Seminary academy. At age thirteen he proclaimed himself a Whig, and during playtime he persuaded his friends to join him in debates modelled on those of the House of Commons.[2]

He went in 1780 to King's College, University of Aberdeen, where he made a lifelong friend of Robert Hall, later a famous preacher. In 1784 he began to study medicine at Edinburgh University. He participated to the full in the intellectual ferment, became friendly with Benjamin Constant, but did not quite neglect his medical studies, and took his degree in 1787.

In 1788 Mackintosh moved to London, then agitated by the trial of Warren Hastings and the first lapse into insanity of George III. He was much more interested in these and other political events than in his professional prospects. He was also a founder member of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (later the RSPCA).[3]

Marriages and children

In 1789 he married Catherine Stuart, whose brother Daniel later edited the Morning Post. His wife's prudence counteracted Mackintosh's own unpractical temperament, and his efforts in journalism became fairly profitable. They had a son, who died in infancy, and three daughters:

• Mary Mackintosh (1789–1876) married Claudius James Rich
• Maitland Mackintosh (1792–1861), married William Erskine
• Catherine Mackintosh (1795-18??) married Sir William Wiseman, 7th Baronet (1794–1845), was the mother of Sir William Wiseman, 8th Baronet.

In 1797 his wife died, and next year he married Catherine Allen (died 6 May 1830), sister-in-law of Josiah II and John Wedgwood, through whom he introduced Coleridge to the Morning Post. They had two sons, one of whom died in infancy, and two daughters:

• Frances Emma Elizabeth Mackintosh (Fanny) (1800–1889), married Hensleigh Wedgwood.
• Robert Mackintosh (1803), died in infancy.
• Bessy Mackintosh (1804–1823)
• Robert James Mackintosh (1806–1864), colonial governor.

French Revolution

Mackintosh was soon absorbed in the question of the time, the French Revolution. In April 1791, after long meditation, he published his Vindiciae Gallicae: A Defence of the French Revolution and its English Admirers, a reply to Edmund Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France. It placed the author in the front rank of European publicists, and won him the friendship of some of the most distinguished men of the time. The success of the Vindiciae finally decided him to give up the medical for the legal profession. He was called to the bar in 1795 and gained a considerable reputation there as well as a tolerable practice.

Vindiciae Gallicae was the verdict of a philosophic liberal on the development of the French Revolution up to the spring of 1791. The excesses of the revolutionaries compelled him a few years later to oppose them and agree with Burke, but his earlier defence of the rights of man is a valuable statement of the cultured Whig's point of view at the time. Mackintosh was the first to see Burke's Reflections as "the manifesto of a counter revolution".[4]

Of the Origin of the Present Old Governments

It is impossible that such governments as have hitherto existed in the world, could have commenced by any other means than a total violation of every principle sacred and moral. The obscurity in which the origin of all the present old governments is buried, implies the iniquity and disgrace with which they began. The origin of the present government of America and France will ever be remembered, because it is honourable to record it; but with respect to the rest, even Flattery has consigned them to the tomb of time, without an inscription.

It could have been no difficult thing in the early and solitary ages of the world, while the chief employment of men was that of attending flocks and herds, for a banditti of ruffians to overrun a country, and lay it under contributions. Their power being thus established, the chief of the band contrived to lose the name of Robber in that of Monarch; and hence the origin of Monarchy and Kings.

The origin of the Government of England, so far as relates to what is called its line of monarchy, being one of the latest, is perhaps the best recorded. The hatred which the Norman invasion and tyranny begat, must have been deeply rooted in the nation, to have outlived the contrivance to obliterate it. Though not a courtier will talk of the curfew-bell, not a village in England has forgotten it.

Those bands of robbers having parcelled out the world, and divided it into dominions, began, as is naturally the case, to quarrel with each other. What at first was obtained by violence was considered by others as lawful to be taken, and a second plunderer succeeded the first. They alternately invaded the dominions which each had assigned to himself, and the brutality with which they treated each other explains the original character of monarchy. It was ruffian torturing ruffian. The conqueror considered the conquered, not as his prisoner, but his property. He led him in triumph rattling in chains, and doomed him, at pleasure, to slavery or death. As time obliterated the history of their beginning, their successors assumed new appearances, to cut off the entail of their disgrace, but their principles and objects remained the same. What at first was plunder, assumed the softer name of revenue; and the power originally usurped, they affected to inherit.

From such beginning of governments, what could be expected but a continued system of war and extortion? It has established itself into a trade. The vice is not peculiar to one more than to another, but is the common principle of all.
There does not exist within such governments sufficient stamina whereon to engraft reformation; and the shortest and most effectual remedy is to begin anew on the ground of the nation.

What scenes of horror, what perfection of iniquity, present themselves in contemplating the character and reviewing the history of such governments! If we would delineate human nature with a baseness of heart and hypocrisy of countenance that reflection would shudder at and humanity disown, it is kings, courts and cabinets that must sit for the portrait. Man, naturally as he is, with all his faults about him, is not up to the character.

Can we possibly suppose that if governments had originated in a right principle, and had not an interest in pursuing a wrong one, the world could have been in the wretched and quarrelsome condition we have seen it? What inducement has the farmer, while following the plough, to lay aside his peaceful pursuit, and go to war with the farmer of another country? or what inducement has the manufacturer? What is dominion to them, or to any class of men in a nation? Does it add an acre to any man's estate, or raise its value? Are not conquest and defeat each of the same price, and taxes the never-failing consequence?- Though this reasoning may be good to a nation, it is not so to a government. War is the Pharo-table of governments, and nations the dupes of the game.

If there is anything to wonder at in this miserable scene of governments more than might be expected, it is the progress which the peaceful arts of agriculture, manufacture and commerce have made beneath such a long accumulating load of discouragement and oppression. It serves to show that instinct in animals does not act with stronger impulse than the principles of society and civilisation operate in man. Under all discouragements, he pursues his object, and yields to nothing but impossibilities.


-- Rights of Man, by Thomas Paine


Charles James Fox singled out Mackintosh's book as that which did most justice to the French Revolution, and he preferred it over Burke and Thomas Paine.[5] After Paine's Rights of Man, Mackintosh's book was the most successful reply to Burke and Burke's biographer F. P. Lock considers it "one of the best of the replies to Burke, in some respects superior to Rights of Man".[6]

The poet Thomas Campbell claimed that had it not been for Mackintosh's book, Burke's anti-revolutionary opinions would have become universal amongst the educated classes and that he ensured that he became "the apostle of liberalism".[7]

Mackintosh wrote to Burke on 22 December 1796, saying that "From the earliest moments of reflexion your writings were my chief study and delight...The enthusiasm with which I then embraced them is now ripened into solid Conviction by the experience and meditation of more mature age. For a time indeed seduced by the love of what I thought liberty I ventured to oppose your Opinions without ever ceasing to venerate your character...I cannot say...that I can even now assent to all your opinions on the present politics of Europe. But I can with truth affirm that I subscribe to your general Principles; that I consider them as the only solid foundation both of political Science and of political prudence".[8] Burke replied that "As it is on all hands allowed that you were the most able advocate for the cause which you supported, your sacrifice to truth and mature reflexion, adds much to your glory".[9] However, in private Burke was sceptical of what he considered Mackintosh's "supposed conversion".[10] Burke invited Mackintosh to spend Christmas with him at his home in Beaconsfield, where he was struck by Burke's "astonishing effusions of his mind in conversation. Perfectly free from all taint of affectation...Minutely and accurately informed, to a wonderful exactness, with respect to every fact relative to the French Revolution".[11]

When Mackintosh visited Paris in 1802 during the Peace of Amiens, he responded to compliments from French admirers of his defence of their revolution by saying: “Messieurs, vous m’avez si bien refuté” [Gentlemen, you refuted me so well ].[12]

Lawyer

As a lawyer his greatest public efforts were his lectures (1799) at Lincoln's Inn on the law of nature and nations, of which the introductory discourse was published and ran to several editions; the resulting fame helped open doors for him later in life. Mackintosh was also famed for his speech in 1803 defending Jean Gabriel Peltier, a French refugee, against a libel suit instigated by Napoleon – then First Consul (military dictator) of France. Peltier had argued that Napoleon should be killed at a time when Britain and France were at peace. In front of an audience of ambassadors, it took only one minute for the jury to convict Jean-Gabriel, but the sentence was never applied, it was decidedly a political trial. J-G Peltier was no more satisfied with the judgment than Napoleon. The newspapers of France received the defense of praising the pleading under pain of suppression ! The speech was widely published in English and also across Europe in a French translation by Madame de Staël, who became a friend of Mackintosh's.

[A]ll the weapons directed against the humanist conception of man can be summed up under one modern concept: the "Conservative Revolution."...

Romanticism was consciously promoted by the European oligarchy as a movement which advocated the total rejection of reason and humanism, upon which Weimar classicism was based. One of the oligarchy's most influential agents, who supported the young Romantics with body and soul, was Madame de Stael, daughter of the Swiss banker Jacques Necker, who as French finance minister had ruined France for the sake of the Swiss banks. Heinrich Heine has pointedly described how Madame de Stael and her circles were angered that the "republican" culture found in the Weimar classics, in musical soirees at home, or in the great theater houses had begun to spread through large portions of the population. In a blue rage, she attempted to regain her own control of culture by luring young artists into her own salon. These recruits threw themselves into action with the same abandon as today's "beautiful people" or the nobility's "Jet set." Not only did this romantic movement produce the organized terrorism of Giuseppe Mazzini's "Young Europe," but it also spawned the tendency stretching from the turn-of-the-century youth movement to today's counterculture "alternative" movement, along with its ideologues Friedrich Nietzsche, Paul de Lagarde, Julius Langbehn, Alfred Rosenberg, and so forth. The Nazis too drank out of this "alternative" trough.


-- The Hitler Book, edited by Helga Zepp-LaRouche


In 1803 he was knighted.

Judge of Bombay

He was appointed Recorder (chief judge) of Bombay, taking up the post in 1804. Within a few months he had established the Bombay Literary Society at his home, where a circle of intellectuals and friends would meet to discuss the history, geography, zoology and botany of the sub-continent as well as its peoples and languages, customs and religions.

The first meeting of the Society was held on the 26th November 1804, at Parell-house, where Sir James Mackintosh then resided; -- the Discourse which he read on that occasion is prefixed to the present volume. At this meeting the following persons were present:

The Honourable Jonathan Duncan, governor of Bombay.
The Honourable Sir James Mackintosh, knight, recorder of Bombay.
The Right Honourable Viscount Valentia.
General Oliver Nicolls, commander-in-chief at Bombay.
Stuart Moncrieff Threiplond, esq. advocate-general.
Helenus Scott, M.D. first member of the medical board.
William Dowdeswell. esq. barrister-at-law.
Henry Salt, esq. (now consul-general in Egypt).
Lieutenant-colonel Brooks (now military accountant-general at Bombay).
Lieutenant-colonel Joseph Boden, quarter-master-general at Bombay.
Lieutenant-colonel Thomas Charlton Harris, deputy quarter-master general at Bombay.
Charles Forbes, esq.
Robert Drummond, M.D.
Colonel Jasper Nicolls (now quarter-master-general in Bengal).
Major Edward Moor.
George Keir, M.D.
William Erskine, esq.

***

List of the Members of the Bombay Literary Society.

The Hon. Jonathan Duncan.
The Rt. Hon. Lord Viscount Valentia.
The Hon. Sir James Mackintosh.
General O. Nicolls.
Helenus Scott, Esq.
George Keir, Esq.
Robert Drummond, M.D.
S.M. Treipland, Esq.
William Dowdeswell, Esq.
Henry Salt, Esq.
Lieut.-colonel William Brookes.
Lieut.-colonel Joseph Boden.
Lieut.-colonel T.C. Harris.
Colonel Jasper Nicolls.
Major Edward Moor.
Charles Forbes, Esq.
William Erskine, Esq.
Robert Steuart, Esq.
Francis Wrede, Esq.
Robert Henshaw, Esq.
Major D. Price.
William Boag, Esq.
Lieut.-colonel A. Hay.
Colonel Alexander Walker.
Lieut.-colonel C.B. Burr.
Lieut. E.S. Fressell.
John Pringle, Esq.
Alexander Mackonochie.
Dom Pedro de Alcantara, bishop of Antiphile, and apostolical vicar in the dominions of the Great Mogul.
Lewis Corkran, Esq.
Thomas Lechmere, Esq.
Benjamin Heyne, M.D.
Captain Thomas Arthur.
James Milne, M.D.
Hugh Bell, Esq.
Edward Nash, Esq.
James Hallett, Esq.
James Morley, Esq.
Joseph Cumberlege, Esq.
T.M. Keate, Esq.
Major-general Charles Reynolds.
Reverend Arnold Burrows.
William Sandwith, Esq.
Captain David Seton.
Reverend N. Wade
William Taylor Money, Esq.
P.C. Baird, Esq.
Dr. James Skene.
Charles C. Mackintosh, Esq.
Samuel Manesty, Esq.
Ollyett Woodhouse, Esq.
Luke Ashburner, Esq.
Sir George Staunton, Bart.
Gideon Colquhoun, Esq.
J.G. Ravenshaw, Esq.
Edward Hawke Locker, Esq.
Jonathan Thorpe, Esq.
David White, M.D.
John Leyden, M.D.
Claudius James Rich, Esq.
John Taylor, M.D.
Captain Thomas Gordon Caulfield, R.N.
George Cumming Osborne, Esq.
William Newnham, Esq.
George Sotheby, Esq.
Hugh George Macklin, Esq.
David Deas Inglis, Esq.
Captain Francis Irvine.
Major William Hamilton.
Captain William Miles.
John Hine, Esq.
C.T. Ellis, Esq.
Captain A. Robertson.
Charles Daw, Esq.
Reverend W. Canning.
James Inverarity, Esq.
William A. Morgan, Esq.
Capital M. Williams.
Captain A. Gregory.
Stephen Babington, Esq.
John Wedderburn, Esq.
James Henderson, Esq.
Captain R.H. Hough.
James Calder, Esq.
Lieut.-general the Hon. Sir John Abercromby, K.C.B.
Dougal Christie, Esq.
Captain Edward Frederick.
Hill Morgan, M.D.
Andrew Jukes, M.D.
Brigadier-general Sir John Malcolm, K.C.B.
Lieutenant James Macmurdo.
David Craw, Esq.
William Mackie, Esq.
Captain C. Tyler, R.N.
Captain John Briggs.
Lieutenant J.W. Graham.
James Farish, Esq.
Hon. M.S. Elphinstone.
Byram Rowles, Esq.
Major Henry Rudland.
Hon. Sir John Newbolt.
Lieut.-colonel William Franklin.
John Copland, Esq.
Charles Norris, Esq.
Captain W. Bruce.
Edward William Hunt, Esq.
Captain B. Hall, R.N.
Lieutenant Samuel Hallifax.
Charles Northcote, Esq.
Captain Sir William Wiseman, Bart. R.N.
William Baillie, Esq.
Lieutenant John Jopp.
Lieutenant William Miller.
Reverend R. Jackson.
Lieut.-colonel John Griffiths.
The Hon. Sir A. Anstruther.
Colonel Urquhart.
Major John Lyall.
Mr. Benjamin Hammer.
Thomas Palmer, Esq.
Lieutenant John Wade.
Captain Heard.
Richard Jenkins, Esq.
Benjamin Noton, Esq.
Lieutenant John Hawkins.
T.G. Gardiner, Esq.
Captain L.C. Russell.
Captain Josiah Stewart.
Captain John Powell.
J.H. Pelly, Esq.
Mr. Archdeacon Barnes.
The Hon. T.S. Raffles.
J. Crawford, Esq.
Richard Woodhouse, Esq.
John Hector Cherry, Esq.
Mr. R. Hereford.
R.G. Morris, Esq.
Captain E.H. Bellassis.
David Malcolm, Esq.
Edward Charles Macnaghton, Esq.
The Lord Bishop of Calcutta.
J.S. Buckingham, Esq.
Theodore Forbes, Esq.
Mr. Asselin de Cherville.
Captain James Revitt Carnac.
James Staveley, Esq.
Sutherland Meek, M.D.

President

William Taylor Money, Esq.

Vice Presidents

Ollyett Woodhouse, Esq.
The Rev. Archdeacon George Barnes.

Secretaries

Stephen Babington, Esq.
John Wedderburn, Esq.

Treasurer.

Messrs. Forbes and Co.

-- Transactions of The Literary Society of Bombay, With Engravings


The group would later evolve into the Asiatic Society of Mumbai.

He was however not at home in India, where he became ill, was disappointed by his literary progress with the mooted History of England, and was glad to leave for England in November 1811.

Member of Parliament

Mackintosh declined the offer of Spencer Perceval to resume political life under the wing of the dominant Tory party, despite prospects of office. He entered Parliament in July 1813 as a Whig. He was the member for Nairn until 1818, and afterwards for Knaresborough, till his death. In London society, and in Paris during his occasional visits, he was a recognized favourite. On Madame de Staël's visit to London he was able to keep up in talk with her. A close friend was Richard Sharp MP, known as "Conversation Sharp".[13] and both men belonged to the Whig social group, the King of Clubs. Mackintosh's parliamentary career was marked by his liberalism: he opposed reactionary measures of the Tory government; he supported and later succeeded Samuel Romilly in his efforts to reform the criminal code; and took a leading part both in Catholic emancipation and in the Reform Bill. He was, however, too diffuse and elaborate to be a telling speaker in parliament.

Professor

From 1818 to 1824 he was professor of law and general politics in the East India Company's College at Haileybury. While there, on 12 August 1823, Mackintosh wrote a two-sheet letter from Cadogan Place, London to James Savage asking for source material for Savage's edition of The History of Taunton by Joshua Toulmin.[14]

Image
Sir James Mackintosh in later life.

In the midst of the attractions of London society and of his parliamentary avocations Mackintosh felt that the real work of his life was being neglected. His great ambition was to write a history of England; he also cherished the idea of making some worthy contribution to philosophy. It was not till 1828 that he set about the first task of his literary ambition. This was his Dissertation on the Progress of Ethical Philosophy, prefixed to the seventh edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica. The dissertation, written mostly in ill-health and in snatches of time taken from his parliamentary engagements, was published in 1831. It was severely attacked in 1835 by James Mill in his Fragment on Mackintosh. About the same time he wrote for the Cabinet Cyclopaedia a History of England from the Earliest Times to the Final Establishment of the Reformation.

A privy councillor since 1828, Mackintosh was appointed Commissioner for the affairs of India under the Whig administration of 1830.

History of the Revolution in England in 1688

His history of the Glorious Revolution, for which he had done considerable research and collected a large amount of material, was not published till after his death. Mackintosh only completed it to the time of James II's abdication. However his voluminous notes on the Glorious Revolution came into the possession of Thomas Babington Macaulay, who used them for his own History of the Revolution. Mackintosh's notes stopped in the year of 1701, where Macaulay's History also ends.[15]

Mackintosh's work was published in 1834 and in his review of it, Macaulay said that he had "no hesitation" in proclaiming the book as "decidedly the best history now extant of the reign of James the Second" but lamented that "there is perhaps too much disquisition and too little narrative". He went on to praise Mackintosh: "We find in it the diligence, the accuracy, and the judgment of Hallam, united to the vivacity and the colouring of Southey. A history of England, written throughout in this manner, would be the most fascinating book in the language. It would be more in request at the circulating libraries than the last novel".[16]

Freemasonry

He was Initiated into Scottish Freemasonry in Lodge Holyrood House (St. Luke's), No.44, (Edinburgh) on 28 November 1785.[17]

The continuing close association of Freemasonry with politics is illustrated by the fact that senior members of the St. Luke Lodge No. 44 were the leaders of the Scottish Whig party between 1807 and 1860. R.S. Lindsay, A History of the Mason Lodge of Holyrood House (St Luke's) No. 44. (Edinburgh, 1935), p. 299 quoted in M. Wallace, 'Scottish Freemasonry, 1725-1810: Progress, Power, and Politics' (PhD thesis, University of St Andrews, 1007), pp. 234-235.

-- British Freemasonry, 1717-1813, Volume 4, edited by Robert Peter


Death

The premature death of Sir James Mackintosh at the age of sixty-six was attributed to a chicken bone becoming stuck in his throat, causing a traumatic choking episode. Although the bone was eventually removed, his suffering continued until he died a month later on 30 May 1832 and he was buried in Hampstead churchyard, having lived for much of his later life at 15 Langham Place, London.

Legacy

A Life, by his son R. J. Mackintosh, was published in 1836. An edition of his works, in three volumes, (apart from the History of England) was published in 1846, containing his ethical and historical dissertations, a number of essays on political and literary topics, reviews, and other contributions to periodical publications, and speeches on a variety of subjects delivered at the bar and in parliament.

Works

• Arguments Concerning the Constitutional right of Parliament to Appoint a Regent (1788).
• Vindiciæ Gallicæ: A Defence of the French Revolution and its English admirers against the accusations of the Right Hon. Edmund Burke, including some strictures on the late production of Mons de Calonne (1791).
• A Letter to the Right Honourable William Pitt (1792).
• A Letter from Earl Moira to Colonel McMahon (1798).
• A Discourse on the Study of the Law of Nature and Nations; Introductory to a Course of Lectures on That Science Commenced in Lincoln's Inn Hall on Wednesday, February 13, 1799; In Pursuance to An Order of the Honourable Society of Lincoln's Inn (2nd ed.). London: T.Cadell, Jun. and W. Davies in the Strand... 1799. Retrieved 23 February 2019 – via HathiTrust.
• The Trial of Jean Peltier for Libel against Napoleon Buonaparte (1803).
• Proceedings at a General Meeting of the Loyal North Britons (1803).
• Plan of a Comparative Vocabulary of Indian Languages (1806).
• Dissertation on the Progress of Ethical Philosophy (1830).
• The Life of Sir Thomas More (1830).
• The History of England (1830–1832, 3 vols.).
• History of the Revolution in England in 1688, prefaced by a notice of the Life, Writings and Speeches of Sir James Mackintosh (1834).
• Memoirs (edited by Robert James Mackintosh, 1835, 2 vols.).
• Inaugural Address (edited by J. B. Hay, 1839).
• Speeches, 1787–1831 (1840).

Notes

1. Biographical Index of Former Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 1783–2002 (PDF). The Royal Society of Edinburgh. July 2006. ISBN 0 902 198 84 X.
2. Patrick O'Leary, Sir James Mackintosh: The Whig Cicero (Aberdeen: Aberdeen university Press, 1989), p. 3.
3. Edward G. Fairholme and Wellesley Pain, A Century of Work for Animals: The History of the RSPCA, 1824-1934 (London: John Murray, 1934), p 54-55. Shevawn Lynam, Humanity Dick Martin 'King of Connemara' 1754-1834 (Dublin: Lilliput Press, 1989) p 232
4. J. C. D. Clark (ed.), Reflections on the Revolution in France. A Critical Edition (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001), p. 104.
5. L. G. Mitchell, Charles James Fox (London: Penguin, 1997), p. 117, p. 184.
6. F. P. Lock, Edmund Burke. Volume II: 1784–1797 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2006), p. 292, p. 347. Cf. Clive Emsley: "Burke's diatribe also brought forth a flood of responses of which Tom Paine's The Rights of Man is unquestionably the raciest and best-known, but, in comparison with, for example, James Mackintosh's Vindiciae Gallicae, it is by no means the most intellectually coherent and cogent". ‘Revolution, war and the nation state: the British and French experiences 1789-1801’, in Mark Philp (ed.), The French Revolution and British Popular Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), p. 101.
7. O'Leary, p. 22.
8. R. B. McDowell and John A. Woods (eds.), The Correspondence of Edmund Burke. Volume IX: Part One May 1796-July 1797. Part Two: Additional and Undated Letters (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970), p. 193.
9. McDowell and Woods, p. 194.
10. Burke wrote to his friend French Laurence on 25 December: "I suspect by his Letter that it does not extend beyond the interior politicks of this Island, but that, with regard to France and many other Countries He remains as franc a Jacobin as ever. This conversion is none at all, but we must nurse up these nothings and think these negative advantages as we can have them". McDowell and Woods, pp. 204-205.
11. Lock, p. 560.
12. O'Leary, p. 23.
13. For an account of Mackintosh's correspondence and relationship with Sharp, see Knapman, D. - Conversation Sharp - The Biography of a London Gentleman, Richard Sharp (1759-1835), in Letters, Prose and Verse. [Private Publication], 2004. British Library
14. Harvard College Library (2005) Hill, George Birkbeck Norman, 1835-1903. Johnsonian Miscellanies, extra-illustrated: Guide Archived 2 September 2006 at the Wayback Machine 21 October 2006.
15. Christopher J. Finlay, ‘Mackintosh, Sir James, of Kyllachy (1765–1832)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Sept 2004; online edn, Jan 2010, accessed 16 Sept 2010.
16. Thomas Babington Macaulay, Critical and Historical Essays: Volume One (London: J. M. Dent & Sons, 1935), pp. 279-280.
17. A History of the Mason Lodge of Holyrood House (St.Luke's), No.44, holding of the Grand Lodge of Scotland with Roll of Members, 1734-1934, by Robert Strathern Lindsay, W.S., Edinburgh, 1935. Vol.II, p.702.

References

• This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Mackintosh, Sir James". Encyclopædia Britannica. 17 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 259.
• Harrington, Jack (2010), Sir John Malcolm and the Creation of British India, Chs. 1 &3, New York: Palgrave Macmillan., ISBN 978-0-230-10885-1

Further reading

• J. G. A. Pocock, ‘The Varieties of Whiggism from Exclusion to Reform: A History of Ideology and Discourse’, Virtue, Commerce and History (1985).
• R. B. Sher, Church and University in the Scottish Enlightenment: The Moderate Literati of Edinburgh (1985).
• Donald Winch, Riches and Poverty: An Intellectual History of Political Economy in Britain, 1750–1834 (1996).
• Tugdual de Langlais, L'armateur préféré de Beaumarchais Jean Peltier Dudoyer, de Nantes à l'Isle de France, Éd. Coiffard, 2015, 340 p. (ISBN 9782919339280).
• Hélène Maspéro-Clerc, Un journaliste contre-révolutionnairre Jean-Gabriel PELTIER (1760-1825), Paris, Sté des Études Robespierriestes, 1973.

External links

• Works by James Mackintosh at Project Gutenberg
• Works by or about James Mackintosh at Internet Archive
• Grand Lodge of Scotland
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Part 1 of 2

Transactions of The Literary Society of Bombay [Excerpt]
With Engravings
1819

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ADVERTISEMENT.

THE objects for which the Literary Society of Bombay was instituted, are explained in the Discourse of the President, and it is unnecessary to add any thing to what is there stated.

The first meeting of the Society was held on the 26th November 1804, at Parell-house, where Sir James Mackintosh then resided; -- the Discourse which he read on that occasion is prefixed to the present volume. At this meeting the following persons were present:

The Honourable Jonathan Duncan, governor of Bombay.

The Honourable Sir James Mackintosh, knight, recorder of Bombay.

The Right Honourable Viscount Valentia.

General Oliver Nicolls, commander-in-chief at Bombay.

Stuart Moncrieff Threiplond, esq. advocate-general.

Helenus Scott, M.D. first member of the medical board.

William Dowdeswell. esq. barrister-at-law.

Henry Salt, esq. (now consul-general in Egypt).

Lieutenant-colonel Brooks (now military accountant-general at Bombay).

Lieutenant-colonel Joseph Boden, quarter-master-general at Bombay.

Lieutenant-colonel Thomas Charlton Harris, deputy quarter-master general at Bombay.

Charles Forbes, esq.

Robert Drummond, M.D.

Colonel Jasper Nicolls (now quarter-master-general in Bengal).

Major Edward Moor.

George Keir, M.D.

William Erskine, esq.

Sir James Mackintosh was elected President; Charles Forbes, esq. Treasurer; and William Erskine, esq. Secretary of the Society.

One of the earliest objects that engaged the attention of the Society was the foundation of a public library. On the 25th February 1805, a bargain was concluded for the purchase of a pretty extensive library, which had been collected by several medical gentlemen of the Bombay establishment. This collection has since been much enlarged, and is yearly receiving very considerable additions: -- being thrown open with great readiness to all persons, whether members of the Society or not, it has already become of considerable public utility.

The idea of employing several members of the Society in collecting materials for a statistical account of Bombay having occurred to the President, he communicated to the Society a set of “Queries, the answers to which would be contributions towards a statistical account of Bombay,” and offered himself to superintend the whole of the undertaking: it is perhaps to be regretted, that various circumstances prevented the execution of this plan. As these queries may be of service in forwarding any similar projects, they are subjoined in this volume in Appendix A.

Early in the year 1806 it was resolved, on the motion of the President, “That a proposition should be made to the Asiatick Society, to undertake a subscription to create a fund for defraying the necessary expenses of publishing and translating such Sanscrit works as should most seem to deserve an English version; and for affording a reasonable recompense to the translators, where their situation might make it proper.” The letter that was in consequence addressed to the president of that Society, will be found in Appendix B. The Asiatick Society having referred the consideration of the proposed plan to a committee, came to a resolution, in consequence of their report, to publish from time to time, in volumes distinct from the Asiatick Researches, translations of short works in the Sanscrit and other Oriental languages, with extracts and descriptive accounts of books of greater length. The plan of establishing by subscription a particular fund for translation, was regarded as one that could not be successfully proposed.

In the close of the year 1811, the Society suffered a severe loss by the departure of the president, Sir James Mackintosh, for Europe. Robert Steuart, esq. was on the 25th November elected president in his place; and at the same meeting moved “That, as a mark of respect, the late president Sir James Mackintosh should be elected honorary president of the Society,” – a proposition which was unanimously agreed to.

On the 13th February 1812, Brigadier-general Sir John Malcolm was induced, by the universal feelings of regard entertained by the members of the Society towards the honorary president, to move, “That Sir James Mackintosh be requested to sit for a bust to be placed in the Library of the Literary Society of Bombay, as a token of the respect and regard in which he is held by that body.” And the motion being seconded by John Wedderburn, esq. was unanimously agreed to; general Sir John Malcolm having been requested to furnish a copy of his address, for the purpose of its being inserted in the records of the Society. – It is subjoined in Appendix C.

A communication having been made to the Society of an extract of a letter from William Bruce, esq. The East India Company’s resident at Bushire, regarding a disease known among the wandering tribes of Persia, contracted by such as milk the cattle and sheep, and said to be a preventive of the small-pox; -- in order to give as much publicity as possible to the facts which it contains, for the purpose of encouraging further and more minute inquiry by professional men on a subject of so much importance, the extract is subjoined in Appendix D.

On the 31st January 1815, it was agreed, on the motion of Captain Basil Hall of the royal navy, “That the Society should open a museum for receiving antiquities, specimens in natural history, the arts and mythology of the East.” To this museum Captain Hall made a valuable present of specimens in mineralogy from various parts of the East Indies; and reasonable hopes may be indulged that it will speedily be much enriched, and tend in some degree to remove one of the obstacles at present opposed to the study of natural history and mineralogy in this country.

The Society have also to acknowledge repeated valuable presents, chiefly of Oriental books, from the Government of Bombay.

The liberality of Mr. Money, in presenting the Society with a valuable transit instrument, affords some hopes of seeing at no very distant time the foundation of an observatory, the want of which at so considerable a naval and commercial station as Bombay, has long been regretted. The right honourable the Governor in council has shown his willingness to forward a plan, which has the improvement of scientific and nautical knowledge for its object, by recommending to the Court of Directors a communication made on the subject by the Literary Society of Bombay.

On the 27th June 1815, a translation made by Dr. John Taylor from the original Sanscrit of the Lilawati (a treatise on Hindu arithmetic and geometry) was read to the Society. The Lilawati being a work which has frequently been called for by men of science in Europe, and it being desirable, for the sake of accuracy, that it should be printed under the eye of the learned translator, it was resolved that the work should be immediately printed at the expense of the Society, under Dr. Taylor's superintendence; and it has already made considerable progress in its way through the press.

Of the different papers in the following volume it is not necessary that any thing should be said; the author of each, as is understood in such miscellaneous publications, must be answerable for his separate work.

Bombay,
23d September 1815.

Contents:

Discourse at the Opening of the Society. By Sir James Mackintosh, President
I. An account of the Festival of Mamangom, as celebrated on the Coast of Malabar. By Francis Wrede, Esq. (afterwards Baron Wrede.) Communicated by the Honourable Jonathan Duncan.
II. Remarks upon the Temperature of the Island of Bombay during the Years 1803 and 1804. By Major (now Lieutenant Colonel) Jasper Nicholls.
III. Translations from the Chinese of two Edicts: the one relating to the Condemnation of certain Persons convicted of Christianity; and the other concerning the Condemnation of certain Magistrates in the Province of Canton. By Sir George Staunton. With introductory Remarks by the President Sir James Mackintosh.
IV. Account of the Akhlauk-e-Nasiree, or Morals of Nasir, a celebrated Persian System of Ethics. By Lieutenant Edward Frissell of the Bombay Establishment.
V. Account of the Caves in Salsette, illustrated with Drawings of the principal Figures and Caves. By Henry Salt, Esq. (now Consul General in Egypt.)
VI. On the Similitude between the Gipsy and Hindostanee Languages. By Lieutenant Francis Irvine, of the Bengal Native Infantry.
VII. Translations from the Persian, illustrative of the Opinions of the Sunni and Shia Sects of Mahomedans. By Brigadier General Sir John Malcolm, K.C.B.
VIII. A Treatise on Sufism, or Mahomedan Mysticism. By Lieutenant James William Graham, Linguist to the 1st Battalion of the 6th Regiment of Bombay Native Infantry.
IX. Account of the Hill-Fort of Chapaneer in Guzerat. By Captain William Miles, of the Bombay Establishment.
XI. The fifth Sermon of Sadi, translated from the Persian. By James Ross, Esq. of the Bengal Medical Establishment.
XII. Account of the Origin, History, and Manners of the Race of Men called Bunjaras. By Captain John Briggs, Persian Interpreter to the Hyderabad Subsidiary Force.
XIII. An Account of the Parisnath-Gowricha worshipped in the Desert of Parkur; to which are added, a few Remarks upon the present Mode of Worship of that Idol. By Lieutenant James Mackmurdo.
XIV. Observations on two sepulchral Urns found at Bushire in Persia. By William Erskine, Esq.
XV. Account of the Cave-Temple of Elephanta, with a Plan and Drawings of the principal Figures. By William Erskin, Esq.
XVI. Remarks on the Substance called Gez, or Manna, found in Persia and Armenia. By Captain Edward Frederick, of the Bombay Establishment.
XVII. Remarks on the Province of Kattiwar; its Inhabitants, their Manners and Customs. By Lieutenant James Mackmurdo of the Bombay Establishment.
XVIII. Account of the Cornelian Mines in the Neighborhood of Baroach, in a Letter to the Secretary from John Copland, Esq. of the Bombay Medical Establishment.
XIX. Some Account of the Famine in Guzerat in the Years 1812 and 1813, in a Letter to William Erskine, Esq. By Captain James Rivett Carnac, Political Resident at the Court of the Guicawar.
XX. Plan of a Comparative Vocabulary of Indian Languages. By Sir James Mackintosh, President of the Society.
Appendix A. Queries; to which the Answers will be Contributions towards a statistical Account of Bombay.
Appendix B. Letter of the President of the Literary Society of Bombay to the President of the Asiatick Society.
Appendix C. General Malcolm's Speech on moving that Sir James Mackintosh be requested to sit for his Bust.
Appendix D. Extract of a Letter from William Bruce, Esq. Resident at Bushire, to William Erskine, Esq. of Bombay, communicating the Discovery of a Disease in Persia, contracted by such as milk the Cattle and Sheep, and which is a Preventive of the Small Pox.
List of the Members of the Bombay Literary Society.

A Discourse At The Opening of The Literary Society of Bombay
by Sir James Mackintosh, President of the Society.
Read at Parell, 26th November 1804.

From 1818 to 1824 [James Mackintosh] was professor of law and general politics in the East India Company's College at Haileybury.

-- James Mackintosh, by Wikipedia


Gentlemen,

The smallest society, brought together by the love of knowledge, is respectable in the eye of reason; and the feeble efforts of infant literature in barren and inhospitable regions are in some respects more interesting than the most elaborate works and the most successful exertions of the human mind. They prove the diffusion at least, if not the advancement of science; and they afford some sanction to the hope that knowledge is destined one day to visit the whole earth, and in her beneficent progress to illuminate and humanize the whole race of man.

It is therefore with singular pleasure that I see a small but respectable body of men assembled here by such a principle. I hope that we agree in considering all Europeans who visit remote countries, whatever their separate pursuits may be, as detachments from the main body of civilized men, sent out to levy contributions of knowledge as well as to gain victories over barbarism.

When a large portion of a country so interesting as India fell into the hands of one of the most intelligent and inquisitive nations of the world, it was natural to expect that its ancient and present state should at last be fully disclosed. These expectations were indeed for a time disappointed: during the tumult of revolution and war it would have been unreasonable to have entertained them; and when tranquility was established in that country which continues to be the centre of the British power in Asia, it ought not to have been forgotten that every Englishman was fully occupied by commerce, by military service, or by administration; that we had among us no idle public of readers, and consequently no separate profession of writers; and that every hour bestowed on study was to be stolen from the leisure of men often harassed by business, enervated by the climate, and more disposed to seek amusement than new occupation in the intervals of their appointed toils. It is, besides, a part of our national character, that we are seldom eager to display, and not always read to communicate, what we have acquired. In this respect we differ considerably from other lettered nations: our ingenious and polite neighbours on the continent of Europe, -- to whose enjoyment the applause of others seems more indispensable, whose faculties are more nimble and restless, if not more vigorous, than ours, -- are neither so patient of repose nor so likely to be contented with a secret hoard of knowledge. They carry even into their literature a spirit of bustle and parade, -- a bustle indeed which springs from activity, and a parade which animates enterprise, but which are incompatible with our sluggish and sullen dignity. Pride disdains ostentation, scorns false pretensions, despises even petty merit, refuses to obtain the objects of pursujit by flattery or importunity, and scarcely values any praise but that which she has the right to command. Pride, with which foreigners charge us, and which under the name of a sense of dignity we claim for ourselves, is a lazy and unsocial quality; and in these respects, as in most others, the very reverse of the sociable and good-humoured vice of vanity. It is not therefore to be wondered at, if in India our national character, cooperating with local circumstances, should have produced some real and perhaps more apparent inactivity in working the mine of knowledge of which we had become the masters. Yet some of the earliest exertions of private Englishmen are too important to be passed over in silence. The compilation of laws by Mr. Halhed, and the Ayeen Akbaree, translated by Mr. Gladwin, deserve honourable mention. Mr. Wilkins gained the memorable distinction of having opened the treasures of a new learned language to Europe.

But, notwithstanding the merit of these individual exertions, it cannot be denied that the aera of a general direction of the minds of Englishmen in this country towards learned inquiry, was the foundation of the Asiatic Society by Sir William Jones. To give such an impulse to the public understanding is one of the greatest benefits that a man can confer on his fellow men. On such an occasion as the present, it is impossible to pronounce the name of Sir William Jones without feelings of gratitude and reverence. He was among the distinguished persons who adorned one of the brightest periods of English literature. It was no mean distinction to be conspicuous in the age of Burke and Johnson, of Hume and Smith, of Gray and Goldsmith, of Gibbon and Robertson, of Reynolds and Garrick. It was the fortune of Sir William Jones to have been the friend of the greater part of these illustrious men. Without him, the age in which he lived would have been inferior to past times in one kind of literary glory. He surpassed all his contemporaries, and perhaps even the most laborious scholars of the two former centuries, in extent and variety of attainment. His facility in acquiring was almost prodigious, and he possessed that faculty of arranging and communicating his knowledge, which these laborious scholars very generally wanted. Erudition, which in them was often disorderly and rugged, and had something of an illiberal and almost barbarous air, was by him presented to the world with all the elegance and amenity of polite literature. Though he seldom directed his mind to those subjects of which the successful investigation confers the name of a philosopher, yet he possessed in a very eminent degree that habit of disposing his knowledge in regular and analytical order, which is one of the properties of a philosophical understanding. His talents as an elegant writer in verse were among his instruments for attaining knowledge, and a new example of the variety of his accomplishments. In his easy and flowing prose we justly admire that order of exposition and transparency of language which are the most indispensable qualities of style, and the chief excellencies of which it is capable when it is employed solely to instruct. His writings everywhere breathe pure taste in morals as well as in literature; and it may be said with truth, that not a single sentiment has escaped him which does not indicate the real elegance and dignity which pervaded the most secret recesses of his mind. He had lived perhaps too exclusively in the world of learning for the cultivation of his practical understanding. Other men have meditated more deeply on the constitution of society, and have taken more comprehensive views of its complicated relations and infinitely varied interests. Others have therefore often taught sounder principles of political science; but no man more warmly felt, and no author is better calculated to inspire, those generous sentiments of liberty without which the most just principles are useless and lifeless, and which will, I trust, continue to flow through the channels of eloquence and poetry into the minds of British youth.

It has indeed been sometimes lamented that Sir William Jones should have exclusively directed inquiry towards antiquities. But every man must be allowed to recommend most strongly his own favourite pursuits; and the chief difficulty as well as the chief merit is his who first raises the minds of men to the love of any part of knowledge. When mental activity is once roused its direction is easily changed, and the excesses of one writer, if they are not checked by public reason, are corrected by the opposite excesses of his successor. “Whatever withdraws us from the dominion of the senses, whatever makes the past, the distant, and the future, predominate over the present, advances us in the dignity of thinking beings.”

It is not for me to attempt an estimate of those exertions for the advancement of knowledge which have arisen from the example and exhortations of Sir William Jones. In all judgements pronounced on our contemporaries it is so certain that we shall be accused, and so probable that we may be justly accused, of either partially bestowing or invidiously withholding praise, that it is in general better to attempt no encroachment on the jurisdiction of Time, which alone impartially and justly estimates the works of men.

The Myth of Origin and Destiny

Chapter 1: Historicism and the Myth of Destiny


It is widely believed that a truly scientific or philosophical attitude towards politics, and a deeper understanding of social life in general, must be based upon a contemplation and interpretation of human history. While the ordinary man takes the setting of his life and the importance of his personal experiences and petty struggles for granted, it is said that the social scientist or philosopher has to survey things from a higher plane. He sees the individual as a pawn, as a somewhat insignificant instrument in the general development of mankind. And he finds that the really important actors on the Stage of History are either the Great Nations and their Great Leaders, or perhaps the Great Classes, or the Great Ideas. However this may be, he will try to understand the meaning of the play which is performed on the Historical Stage; he will try to understand the laws of historical development. If he succeeds in this, he will, of course, be able to predict future developments. He might then put politics upon a solid basis, and give us practical advice by telling us which political actions are likely to succeed or likely to fail.

This is a brief description of an attitude which I call historicism. It is an old idea, or rather, a loosely connected set of ideas which have become, unfortunately, so much a part of our spiritual atmosphere that they are usually taken for granted, and hardly ever questioned.

I have tried elsewhere to show that the historicist approach to the social sciences gives poor results. I have also tried to outline a method which, I believe, would yield better results.

But if historicism is a faulty method that produces worthless results, then it may be useful to see how it originated, and how it succeeded in entrenching itself so successfully. An historical sketch undertaken with this aim can, at the same time, serve to analyse the variety of ideas which have gradually accumulated around the central historicist doctrine — the doctrine that history is controlled by specific historical or evolutionary laws whose discovery would enable us to prophesy the destiny of man.

Historicism, which I have so far characterized only in a rather abstract way, can be well illustrated by one of the simplest and oldest of its forms, the doctrine of the chosen people. This doctrine is one of the attempts to make history understandable by a theistic interpretation, i.e. by recognizing God as the author of the play performed on the Historical Stage. The theory of the chosen people, more specifically, assumes that God has chosen one people to function as the selected instrument of His will, and that this people will inherit the earth.

In this doctrine, the law of historical development is laid down by the Will of God. This is the specific difference which distinguishes the theistic form from other forms of historicism. A naturalistic historicism, for instance, might treat the developmental law as a law of nature; a spiritual historicism would treat it as a law of spiritual development; an economic historicism, again, as a law of economic development. Theistic historicism shares with these other forms the doctrine that there are specific historical laws which can be discovered, and upon which predictions regarding the future of mankind can be based.

There is no doubt that the doctrine of the chosen people grew out of the tribal form of social life. Tribalism, i.e. the emphasis on the supreme importance of the tribe without which the individual is nothing at all, is an element which we shall find in many forms of historicist theories. Other forms which are no longer tribalist may still retain an element of collectivism [1]; they may still emphasize the significance of some group or collective — for example, a class — without which the individual is nothing at all. Another aspect of the doctrine of the chosen people is the remoteness of what it proffers as the end of history. For although it may describe this end with some degree of definiteness, we have to go a long way before we reach it. And the way is not only long, but winding, leading up and down, right and left. Accordingly, it will be possible to bring every conceivable historical event well within the scheme of the interpretation. No conceivable experience can refute it. [2] But to those who believe in it, it gives certainty regarding the ultimate outcome of human history.

A criticism of the theistic interpretation of history will be attempted in the last chapter of this book, where it will also be shown that some of the greatest Christian thinkers have repudiated this theory as idolatry. An attack upon this form of historicism should therefore not be interpreted as an attack upon religion. In the present chapter, the doctrine of the chosen people serves only as an illustration. Its value as such can be seen from the fact that its chief characteristics [3] are shared by the two most important modern versions of historicism, whose analysis will form the major part of this book — the historical philosophy of racialism or fascism on the one (the right) hand and the Marxian historical philosophy on the other (the left). For the chosen people racialism substitutes the chosen race (of Gobineau's choice), selected as the instrument of destiny, ultimately to inherit the earth. Marx's historical philosophy substitutes for it the chosen class, the instrument for the creation of the classless society, and at the same time, the class destined to inherit the earth. Both theories base their historical forecasts on an interpretation of history which leads to the discovery of a law of its development. In the case of racialism, this is thought of as a kind of natural law; the biological superiority of the blood of the chosen race explains the course of history, past, present, and future; it is nothing but the struggle of races for mastery. In the case of Marx's philosophy of history, the law is economic; all history has to be interpreted as a struggle of classes for economic supremacy.
The historicist character of these two movements makes our investigation topical. We shall return to them in later parts of this book. Each of them goes back directly to the philosophy of Hegel. We must, therefore, deal with that philosophy as well. And since Hegel [4] in the main follows certain ancient philosophers, it will be necessary to discuss the theories of Heraclitus, Plato and Aristotle, before returning to the more modern forms of historicism.

-- The Open Society and Its Enemies, by Karl R. Popper


But it would be unpardonable not to speak of the College at Calcutta, of which the original plan was doubtless the most magnificent attempt ever made for the promotion of learning in the East. I am not conscious that I am biased either by personal feelings or literary prejudices, when I say that I consider that original plan as a wise and noble proposition, of which the adoption in its full extent would have had the happiest tendency to secure the good government of India, as well as to promote the interest of science. Even in its present mutilated state we have seen, at the last public exhibition, Sanscrit declamations by English youth; a circumstance so extraordinary*, [*It must be remembered that this Discourse was read in 1804. In the present year, 1818, this circumstance could no longer be called extraordinary. From the learned care of Mr. Hamilton, late Professor of Indian Languages at the East India College, a proficiency in Sanscrit is become not uncommon in an European Institution.] that, if it be followed by suitable advances, it will mark an epoch in the history of learning.

Appendix II: The College of Fort William in Its Connexion with the East India College, Haileybury.

On the 18th of August, 1800, the Marquis Wellesley, Governor-General of India, wrote a minute in Council containing his reasons for establishing a College at Fort William, Calcutta.

It was a long document which, when printed, occupied nearly 43 pages 4to. I subjoin a brief summary: --

The age at which writers usually arrive in India [N.B., this was written in 1800] is from sixteen to eighteen. Some of them have been educated with a view to the Indian Civil Service, but on utterly erroneous principles; their education being confined to commercial knowledge and in no degree extended to liberal studies. On arrival in India they are either stationed in the interior, where they ought to be conversant with the languages, laws, and customs of the natives, or they are employed in Government offices where they are chiefly occupied in transcribing papers. Once landed in India their studies, morals, manners, expenses and conduct are no longer subject to any regulation, restraint, or guidance. Hence they often acquire habits destructive to their health and fortunes.

Under these circumstances the General has determined to found a College at Fort William in Bengal for the instruction of the junior Civil Servants in such branches of literature, science, and knowledge as may be deemed necessary to qualify them for the discharge of their duties; and, considering that such a College would be a becoming public monument to commemorate the Conquest of Mysore, he has dated the law for the foundation of the College on the 4th of May, 1800, the first anniversary of the reduction of Seringapatam.

A suitable building is to be erected at Garden Reach. There will be a Provost, Vice-Provost, and a complete staff of Professors both of European and Oriental subjects.1 [1. A list of these was printed. I select the following: -- Provost, Rev. David Brown; Vice-Provost, Rev. C. Buchanan (both of these were Chaplains of the H.E.I.C.S.); Sanskrit and Hindu Law, H.T. Colebrooke; British Law, Sir George Barlow, Bart.; Greek and Latin Classics, Rev. C. Buchanan; Persian, Francis Gladwin; Assistant in Persian and Arabic, Mathew Lumsden; second Assistant in Persian, Capt. Charles Stewart; Sanskrit and Bengali, Rev. William Carey; Hindustani, John Gilchrist.] Statutes are to be drawn up, and all Indian civilians on first arriving in India, even those destined for Bombay and Madras are to be educated at this College, which will be called the College of Fort William.


The statutes were promulgated by the first Provost (the Rev. David Brown), on April 10, 1801, and when printed occupied 12 pages 4to. The students were then located in provisional buildings, and the first Disputation in Oriental languages was held on the 6th of February, 1802; a speech being delivered on the occasion by Sir George Barlow, the acting Visitor. All this was done without the knowledge of the Court of Directors in London, who, when they heard of the foundation of the College, passed a resolution against it, on the ground of the enormous and indefinite expenditure which it might involve. They complimented the Marquis on his able minute, and acknowledged the necessity for obtaining a higher class of civil servants by raising the standard of their education and giving them an improved special training, but they only expressed their approbation of part of his plan. In fact a compromise was arranged (see note to line 6 of page 27 of this volume), and it was decided that although the proposed collegiate Building at Garden Reach was not to be erected, an Institution to be called “The East-India College” should be founded in Hertfordshire, which was to give a good general education, combined with instruction in the rudiments of the Oriental languages, while Lord Wellesley’s Institution was to be allowed to continue at Calcutta in a less comprehensive form under the name of Fort William College, with a local habitation in “Writers’ Buildings,” the name given to a long house with good verandahs looking south at the north end of Tank Square (now Dalhousie Square).

It was thus brought about that Fort William College became a kind of continuation of Haileybury, and that its work was restricted to the imparting of fuller instruction in Oriental subjects, the groundwork of which had been laid at Haileybury. And no doubt it was originally intended that all junior civilians who had passed through the Haileybury course should repair to the College in Calcutta for such instruction. Moreover, the process of sifting, which began at Haileybury, was continued at the Forst William Institution. At any rate, it occasionally happened that the worst of those “bad bargains,” which Haileybury, in its too great leniency, had spared, were eliminated from the service at Calcutta.

-- Memorials of Old Haileybury College, by Frederick Charles Danvers, Sir Monier Monier-Williams, Sir Steuart Colvin Bayley, Percy Wigram, Brand Sapte


Among the humblest fruits of this spirit I take the liberty to mention the project of forming this Society, which occurred to me before I left England, but which never could have advanced even to its present state without your hearty concurrence, and which must depend on your active cooperation for all hopes of future success. You will not suspect me of presuming to dictate the nature and object of our common exertions. To be valuable they must be spontaneous; and no literary society can subsist on any other principle than that of equality. In the observations which I shall make on the plan and subject of our inquiries, I shall offer myself to you only as the representative of the curiosity of Europe. I am ambitious of no higher office than that of faithfully conveying to India the desires and wants of the learned at home, and of stating the subjects on which they wish and expect satisfaction, from inquiries which can be pursued only in India. In fulfilling the duties of this mission, I shall not be expected to exhaust so vast a subject, nor is it necessary that I should attempt an exact distribution of science. A very general sketch is all that I can promise; in which I shall pass over many subjects rapidly, and dwell only on those parts on which from my own habits of study I may think myself least disqualified to offer useful suggestions.

The objects of these inquiries, as of all human knowledge, are reducible to two classes, which, for want of more significant and precise terms, we must be content to call Physical and Moral; aware of the laxity and ambiguity of these words, but not affecting a greater degree of exactness than is necessary for our immediate purpose.

The physical sciences afford so easy and pleasing an amusement; they are so directly subservient to the useful arts; and in their higher forms they so much delight our imagination and flatter our pride, by the display of the authority of man over nature, that there can be no need of arguments to prove their utility, and no want of powerful and obvious motives to dispose men to their cultivation. The whole extensive and beautiful science of natural history, which is the foundation of all physical knowledge, has many additional charms in a country where so many treasures must still be unexplored. The science of mineralogy, which has been of late years cultivated with great activity in Europe, has such a palpable connexion with the useful arts of life, that it cannot be necessary to recommend it to the attention of the intelligent and curious. India is a country which I believe no mineralogist has yet examined, and which would doubtless amply repay the labour of the first scientific adventurers who explore it. The discovery of new sources of wealth would probably be the result of such an investigation; and something might perhaps be contributed towards the accomplishment of the ambitious projects of those philosophers, who from the arrangement of earths and minerals have been bold enough to form conjectures respecting the general laws which have governed the past revolutions of our planet, and which preserve its parts in their present order.

The botany of India has been less neglected, but it cannot be exhausted. The higher parts of the science, -- the structure, the functions, the habits of vegetables, -- all subjects intimately connected with the first of physical sciences, though unfortunately the most dark and difficult, the philosophy of life, -- have in general been too much sacrificed to objects of value indeed, but of a value far inferior: and professed botanists have usually contented themselves with observing enough of plants to give them a name in their scientific language and a place in their artificial arrangement. Much information also remains to be gleaned on that part of natural history which regards animals. The manners of many tropical races must have been imperfectly observed in a few individuals separated from their fellows and imprisoned in the unfriendly climate of Europe.

The variations of temperature, the state of the atmosphere, all the appearances that are comprehended under the words weather and climate, are the conceivable subject of a science of which no rudiments yet exist. It will probably require the observations of centuries to lay the foundations of theory on this subject. There can scarce be any region of the world more favourably circumstanced for observation than India; for there is none in which the operation of these causes is more regular, more powerful, or more immediately discoverable in their effect on vegetable and animal nature. Those philosophers who have denied the influence of climate on the human character were not inhabitants of a tropical country.

To the members of the learned profession of medicine, who are necessarily spread over every part of India, all the above inquiries peculiarly though not exclusively belong. Some of them are eminent for science, many must be well informed, and their professional education must have given to all some tincture of physical knowledge. With even moderate preliminary acquirements that may be very useful, if they will but consider themselves as philosophical collectors, whose duty it is never to neglect a favourable opportunity for observations on weather and climate; to keep exact journals of whatever they observe, and to transmit through their immediate superiors to the scientific depositories of Great Britain specimens of every mineral, vegetable, or animal production which they conceive to be singular, or with respect to which they suppose themselves to have observed any new and important facts. If their previous studies have been imperfect, they will no doubt be sometimes mistaken. But these mistakes are perfectly harmless. It is better that ten useless specimens should be sent to London, than that one curious specimen should be neglected.

But it is on another and a still more important subject that we expect the most valuable assistance from our medical associates: this is the science of medicine itself. It must be allowed not to be quite so certain as it is important. But though every man ventures to scoff at its uncertainty as long as he is in vigorous health, yet the hardiest sceptic becomes credulous as soon as his head is fixed to the pillow. Those who examine the history of medicine without either skepticism or blind admiration will find that every civilized age, after all the fluctuations of systems, opinions, and modes of practice, has at length left some balance, however small, of new truth to the succeeding generation, and that the stock of human knowledge in this as well as in other departments is constantly, though it must be owned very slowly, increasing. Since my arrival here I have had sufficient reason to believe that the practitioners of medicine in India are not unworthy of their enlightened and benevolent profession. From them therefore I hope the public may derive, through the medium of this society, information of the highest value. Diseases and modes of cure unknown to European physicians may be disclosed to them; and if the causes of disease are more active in this country than in England, remedies are employed and diseases subdued, at least in some cases, with a certainty which might excite the wonder of the most successful practitioners in Europe. By full and faithful narratives of their modes of treatment they will conquer that distrust of new plans of cure, and that incredulity respecting whatever is uncommon, which sometimes prevail among our English physicians; which are the natural result of much experience and many disappointments; and which, though individuals have often just reason to complain of their indiscriminate application, are not ultimately injurious to the progress of the medical art. They never finally prevent the adoption of just theory or of useful practice. They retard it no longer than is necessary for such a severe trial as precludes all future doubt. Even in their excess they are wholesome correctives of the opposite excess of credulity and dogmatism. They are safeguards against exaggeration and quackery; they are tests of utility and truth. A philosophical physician who is a real lover of his art ought not, therefore, to desire the extinction of these dispositions, though he may suffer temporary injustice from their influence.

Those objects of our inquiries which I have called moral (employing that term in the sense in which it is contradistinguished from physical) will chiefly comprehend the past and present condition of the inhabitants of the vast country which surrounds us.

To begin with their present condition. I take the liberty of very earnestly recommend a kind of research, which has hitherto been either neglected or only carried on for the information of Government. I mean the investigation of those facts which are the subjects of political arithmetic and statistics, and which are a part of the foundation of the science of political economy. The numbers of the people; the number of births, marriages, and deaths; the proportion of children who are reared to maturity; the distribution of the people according to their occupations and casts, and especially according to the great division of agricultural and manufacturing; and the relative state of these circumstances at different periods, which can only be ascertained by permanent tables, -- are the basis of this important part of knowledge. No tables of political arithmetic have yet been made public from any tropical country. I need not expatiate on the importance of the information which such tables would be likely to afford. I shall mention only as an example of their value, that they must lead to a decisive solution of the problems with respect to the influence of polygamy on population, and the supposed origin of that practice in the disproportioned numbers of the sexes*. [See Appendix A. at the end of the Volume.] But in a country where every part of the system of manners and institutions differs from those of Europe, it is impossible to foresee the extent and variety of the new results which an accurate survey might present to us.

These inquiries are naturally followed by those which regard the subsistence of the people; the origin and distribution of public wealth: the wages of every kind of labour, from the rudest to the most refined; the price of commodities, and especially of provisions, which necessarily regulates that of all others; the modes of the tenure and occupation of land; the profits of trade; the usual and extraordinary rates of interest, which are the price paid for the hire of money; the nature and extent of domestic commerce, every where the greatest and most profitable, though the most difficult to be ascertained; those of foreign traffic, more easy to be determined by the accounts of exports and imports: the contributions by which the expenses of Government, of charitable, learned, and religious foundations are defrayed; the laws and customs which regulate all these great objects, and the fluctuation which has been observed in all or any of them at different times and under different circumstances. These are some of the points towards which I should very earnestly wish to direct the curiosity of our intelligent countrymen in India.

These inquiries have the advantage of being easy and open to all men of good sense. They do not, like antiquarian and philological researches, require great previous erudition and constant reference to extensive libraries. They require nothing but a resolution to observe facts attentively, and to relate them accurately. And whoever feels a disposition to ascend from facts to principles, will in general find sufficient aid to his understanding in the great work of Dr. Smith, the most permanent monument of philosophical genius which our nation has produced in the present age.

They have the further advantage of being closely and intimately connected with the professional pursuits and public duties of every Englishman who fills a civil office in this country – they form the very science of administration. One of the first requisites to the right administration of a district is the knowledge of its population, industry, and wealth. A magistrate ought to know the condition of the country which he superintends; a collector ought to understand its revenue; a commercial resident ought to be thoroughly acquainted with its commerce. We only desire that part of the knowledge which they ought to possess should be communicated to the world.

I will not pretend to affirm that no part of this knowledge ought to be confined to Government. I am not so intoxicated by philosophical prejudice as to maintain that the safety of a state is to be endangered for the gratification of scientific curiosity.
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Though I am far from thinking that this is the department in which secrecy is most useful, yet I do not presume to exclude it. But let it be remembered, that whatever information is thus confined to a government may for all purposes of science be supposed not to exist. As long as the secrecy is thought important, it is of course shut up from most of those who could turn it to best account; and when it ceases to be guarded with jealousy, it is as effectually secured from all useful examination by the mass of official lumber under which it is usually buried. For this reason, after a very short time it is as much lost to the Government itself as it is to the public. A transient curiosity, or the necessity of illustrating some temporary matter, may induce a public officer to dig for knowledge under the heaps of rubbish that encumber his office. But I have myself known intelligent public officers content themselves with the very inferior information contained in printed books, while their shelves groaned under the weight of MSS., which would be more instructive if they could be read. Further: it must be observed that publication is always the best security to a government that they are not deceived by the reports of their servants; and where these servants act at a distance, the importance of such a security for their veracity is very great. For the truth of a manuscript report they never can have a better warrant than the honesty of one servant who prepared it, and of another who examines it. But for the truth of all long-uncontested narratives of important facts in printed accounts, published in countries where they may be contradicted, we have the silent testimony of every man who might be prompted by interest, prejudice, or humour, to dispute them if they were not true.

I have already said that all communications merely made to Government are lost to science; while on the other hand, perhaps, the knowledge communicated to the public is that of which a Government may most easily avail itself, and on which it may most securely rely. The loss to science is very great; for the principles of political economy have been investigated in Europe, and the application of them to such a country as India must be one of the most curious tests which could be contrived of their truth and universal operation. Every thing here is new: and if they are found here also to be the true principles of natural subsistence and wealth, it will be no longer possible to dispute that they are the general laws which every where govern this important part of the movements of the social machine.

It has been lately observed, that “if the various states of Europe kept and published annually an exact account of their population, nothing carefully in a second column the exact age at which the children die; this second column would show the relative merit of the governments and the comparative happiness of their subjects. A simple arithmetical statement would then perhaps be more conclusive than all the arguments which could be produced.” I agree with the ingenious writers who have suggested this idea, and I think it must appear perfectly evident that the number of children reared to maturity must be among the tests of the happiness of a society; though the number of children born cannot be so considered, and is often the companion and one of the causes of public misery. It may be affirmed without the risk of exaggeration, that every accurate comparison of the state of different countries at the same time or of the same country at different times, is an approach to that state of things in which the manifest palpable interest of every government will be the prosperity of its subjects, which never has been and which never will be advanced by any other means than those of humanity and justice. The prevalence of justice would not indeed be universally ensured by such a conviction; for bad governments, as well as bad men, as often act against their own obvious interest as against that of others; but the chances of tyranny must be diminished when tyrants are compelled to see that it is folly. In the mean time the ascertainment of every new fact, the discovery of every new principle, and even the diffusion of principles known before, add to that great body of slowly and reasonably formed public opinion, which however weak at first, must at last with a gentle and scarcely sensible coercion compel every government to pursue its own real interest.

Concurrently with its 1600 A.D.-initiated two centuries of maritime and military struggle for world dominance, England was also developing a civilian army of the world's best-informed and Empire-backed scientific, economic, and managerial personnel for the most economically profitable realization of its grand, world-embracing strategies. To educate the army of civil servants was the responsibility of the East India Company College located just outside or London. (In 1980 it is as yet operating.) Its graduates went to all known parts of the planet to gather all possible data on the physical and human culture resources to be exploited as well as information on the local customs of all the countries, large and small, with whom Great Britain and the East India Company must successfully cope and trade.

In 1800 Thomas Malthus, later professor of political economics of the East India Company College, was the first human in history to receive a comprehensively complete inventory of the world's vital and economic statistics. The accuracy of the pre-Trafalgar 1800 inventory was verified by a similar world inventory taken by the East India Company in 1810. In a later -- post-Trafalgar -- book Malthus confirmed in 1810 his 1800 finding that world-around humanity was increasing its numbers at a geometrical progression rate while increasing its life-support production at only an arithmetical progression rate, ergo, an increasing majority of humans would have to live out their short years in want and misery.

"Pray all you want," said Malthus, "it will do you no good. There is no more!"….

As we described in our Introduction, Thomas Malthus, professor of political economics of the East India Company College, was the first economist ever to receive all the vital statistics and economic data from a closed-system world. Once the world is conceived of as a sphere -- a finitely closed system -- there was no longer an infinite number of possibilities, such as accompanied the misconception of the infinitely extended flat-out world. In an infinite world, with its infinity of possibilities, praying was felt to be "worthwhile."

Because Earth had been discovered by its high-seas masters to be a closed and finite system, the great pirate venturers who controlled the seas took their scientists around the world to discover and disclose to them its exploitable resources. Only because the Earth constituted a closed system could the scientists inspect, in effect, all the species, and only thus was Charles Darwin able to develop the closed-system theory of "evolution of species." Such a theory could not have existed before that. It would have had to include dragons and sea serpents. All the people in all the previous open-edged empires lived in a system within whose infinity anything could happen or exist. Paganism (or peasantism) wasn't illogical. Geometrically speaking, the pagans could have an infinite number of gods. There were also an infinite number of chances of upsetting the local pattern, which was a most satisfying idea if it happened that the individual didn't like the prevailing local pattern.

It seems strange that we were not taught about the historical, philosophical, and economic significance of the foregoing transition from an open-flat to a closed-sphere world system. Because the churches were strong and the great pirates wished to obscure both their monopoly of the riches of the now limited system and their grand world ocean strategy for its control, the significance of the concept of a closed world system was popularly unrealized. The power structure and its patronized educational systems "let well enough alone."….

In our tracing of the now completely invisible world power structures it is important to note that, while the British Empire as a world government lost the American Revolution, the power structure behind it did not lose the war. The most visible of the power-structure identities was the East India Company, an entirely private enterprise whose flag as adopted by Queen Elizabeth in 1600 happened to have thirteen red and white horizontal stripes with a blue rectangle in its upper lefthand corner. The blue rectangle bore in red and white the superimposed crosses of St. Andrew and St. George. When the Boston Tea Party occurred, the colonists dressed as Indians boarded the East India Company's three ships and threw overboard their entire cargoes of high-tax tea. They also took the flag from the masthead of the largest of the "East Indiamen" -- the Dartmouth.

George Washington took command of the U.S. Continental Army under an elm tree in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The flag used for that occasion was the East India Company's flag, which by pure coincidence had the thirteen red and white stripes. Though it was only coincidence, most of those present thought the thirteen red and white stripes did represent the thirteen American colonies -- ergo, was very appropriate -- but they complained about the included British flag's superimposed crosses in the blue rectangle in the top corner. George Washington conferred with Betsy Ross, after which came the thirteen white, five-pointed stars in the blue field with the thirteen red and white horizontal stripes. While the British government lost the 1776 war, the East India Company's owners who constituted the invisible power structure behind the British government not only did not lose but moved right into the new U.S.A. economy along with the latter's most powerful landowners.

By pure chance I happened to uncover this popularly unknown episode of American history. Commissioned in 1970 by the Indian government to design new airports in Bombay, New Delhi, and Madras, I was visiting the grand palace of the British fortress in Madras, where the English first established themselves in India in 1600. There I saw a picture of Queen Elizabeth I and the flag of the East India Company of 1600 A.D., with its thirteen red and white horizontal stripes and its superimposed crosses in the upper comer. What astonished me was that this flag (which seemed to be the American flag) was apparently being used in 1600 A.D., 175 years before the American Revolution. Displayed on the stairway landing wall together with the portrait of Queen Elizabeth I painted on canvas, the flag was painted on the wall itself, as was the seal of the East India Company.

-- Critical Path, by R. Buckminster Fuller


This knowledge is a control on subordinate agents for Government, as well as a control on Government for their subjects. And it is one of those which has not the slightest tendency to produce tumult or convulsion. On the contrary, nothing more clearly evinces the necessity of that firm protecting power by which alone order can be secured. The security of the governed cannot exist without the security of the governors.

Lastly, of all kinds of knowledge, political economy has the greatest tendency to promote quiet and safe improvement in the general condition of mankind; because it shows that improvement is the interest of the government, and that stability is the interest of the people. The extraordinary and unfortunate events of our times have indeed damped the sanguine hopes of good men, and filled them with doubt and fear. But in all possible cases the counsels of this science are at least safe. They are adapted to all forms of government; they require only a wise and just administration. They require, as the first principle of all prosperity, that perfect security of persons and property which can only exist where the supreme authority is stable.

On these principles, nothing can be a means of improvement which is not also a means of preservation. It is not only absurd but contradictory to speak of sacrificing the present generation for the sake of posterity. The moral order of the world is not so disposed. It is impossible to promote the interest of future generations by any measures injurious to the present; and he who labours industriously to promote the honour, the safety, and the prosperity of his own country, by innocent and lawful means, may be assured that he is contributing, probably as much as the order of nature will permit a private individual, towards the welfare of all mankind.

These hopes of improvement have survived in my breast all the calamities of our European world, and are not extinguished by that general condition of national insecurity which is the most formidable enemy of improvement. Founded on such principles, they are at least perfectly innocent. They are such as, even if they were visionary, an admirer or cultivator of letters ought to be pardoned for cherishing. Without them, literature and philosophy can claim no more than the highest rank among the amusements and ornaments of human life. With these hopes, they assume the dignity of being part of that discipline under which the race of man id destined to proceed to the highest degree of civilization, virtue, and happiness, of which our nature is capable.

On a future occasion I may have the honour to lay before you my thoughts on the principal objects of inquiry in the geography ancient and modern, the languages, the literature, the necessary and elegant arts, the religion, the authentic history and the antiquities of India, and on the mode in which such inquiries appear to me most likely to be conducted with success.

Note on “Preliminary Discourse.”
[See pages xix. xx.]

Population of Bombay.


The public has hitherto received little authentic information respecting the population of tropical countries. The following documents may therefore be acceptable, as contributions towards our scanty stock of knowledge on a subject which is curious and not unimportant.

No. I is an account of the deaths in the island of Bombay, from the year 1801 to the year 1808 inclusive, founded on returns made to the police office of the number of bodies buried or burnt in the island. These returns being made by native officers, subject to no very efficient check, may be considered as liable to considerable errors of negligence and incorrectness, though exempt from those of intentional falsehood.

The average deaths during the year would, by this account, be nine thousand/ but the year 1804, in which the deaths are nearly trebled, was a season of famine throughout the neighbouring provinces on the continent of India. Great multitudes sought refuge from death at Bombay; but many of them arrived in too exhausted a state to be saved by the utmost exertions of humanity and skill. This calamity began to affect the mortality in 1803, and its effects are visible in the deaths of 1805.

No. II is an account of the Mussulman population; distinguishing the sexes, and conveying some information respecting their age, occupation, and domestic condition. This document and that which follows are the more important, because we have only conjectural estimates of the whole population of the island, which vary from a hundred-and-sixty to a hundred-and-eighty thousand souls. By comparing the Mahometan deaths, on an average for the three years 1806, 1807, and 1808, as collected from No. I., with the whole number of Mahometans in this account, the deaths of the members of that sect appear to be to their whole numbers as 1 to 17-1/2.

No. III, is an account of the total number of Parsee inhabitants, distinguishing sexes and ages. From the same comparison as that stated in No. II. it appears that the deaths of the Parsees are nearly as 1 to 25.

Nos. IV. V. VI. and VII. contain accounts of population, births, and deaths of native Christians, from four of the parishes into which the island is divided. Their baptismal registers furnish an account of the number of births, which we have no easy and precise mode of ascertaining among the other inhabitants. Their account of deaths is also some check on that part of the general register of deaths which relates to them: and their returns of the population are a further aid towards the formation of a general rate of mortality. In No. IV. the births are to deaths as 1 to 16. In No. VI. births 1 to 30, deaths 1 to 15. In No. VII. births 1 to 43, deaths 1 to 22.

These proportions of births and deaths to population differ very considerably from each other, and some of them deviate widely from the result of the like inquiries in most other places. It is not easy to determine how far inaccuracy may have contributed to this deviation. The education of the native Roman Catholic clergy of Bombay is almost exclusively confined to monastic theology and ethics; even their respectable European superiors are fully occupied by their ecclesiastical duties, and are little accustomed to political arithmetic. On the other hand it must be remembered, that at Bombay, a population of 150,000 souls is confined to an island which is only eight miles in length and three miles in its utmost breadth. Such a population with so limited a space must be considered rather as that of a town than of a district of country. It is to be expected, or at least not to be wondered at, that it should not maintain itself without the influx of inhabitants from the neighbouring provinces. The very small proportions of births in No. VII. probably arises, in part, from the number of adventurous strangers who resort to the most thickly peopled part of the island, while the three former returns, which relate to places where the Christians are native inhabitants, show a proportion of births by no means so singular. That the proportion of deaths in No. VII. is the least among the Christian returns, is in all likelihood to be ascribed to the easy circumstances of many of the members of that congregation, the Christians of the other parishes being chiefly of the very lowest classes. Of the high rate of mortality in Nos. V. and VI. which relate to two small fishing villages, no specious explanation presents itself: -- of that, and indeed of every other part of the subject, we must expect explanations from the enlightened and accomplished men on the spot, who now possess better means of investigation than were in such hands when these imperfect returns were procured.

It must be observed, that many of the Parsees come to Bombay in search of fortune after having reached the age of manhood, and return with a competency to their native countries. Some of them are men of great wealth; many are in easy circumstances; and none are of the most indigent classes. From these circumstances, the comparatively low rate of their mortality and the smaller number of their females will be easily understood. The famine increased their mortality from 311 tin 1802, to 563 in 1804; an augmentation almost entirely to be attributed to deaths of the fugitive Parsees, who were attracted to Bombay by the well-known charity of their opulent fellow-religionists.

The Mahometans are much inferior in fortune to the Parsees; but they are not much engaged in the lowest sorts of labour, which are chiefly performed by the inferior casts of Hindus, and by some of the native Christians. The famine increased the deaths of the Mahometans from 1099 in 1802, to 2545 in 1804.

Of the Hindus, who form the great body of the people, we have unfortunately no enumeration; but the return of their deaths has one observable peculiarity. In the higher castes the bodies are burnt; in the lower they are buried. Though there be many individuals of the higher castes who occupy very humble stations, and are of what an European would call very low rank, there are scarcely any of the lowest castes in conditions of ease, not to say affluence: -- burning or burial affords therefore some criterion of their situation in life. The famine increased their mortality from 3669 in 1802, to 23,179 in 1804. Their deaths were augmented more than six-fold. But the different degree in which the famine acted on the women and children of the higher and lower castes is very striking. The deaths of the females of the higher castes are increased very little more than those of the men; the mortality of children is still less increased; but among the inferior castes, the mortality of women is increased fifteen times, and that of children nearly twelve times.

On the native Christians the operation of the famine was only to increase the burials from 184 to 201. This small increase probably affected only the poorest native Christians of Bombay; for there are very few Christians in the neighbouring provinces where the famine raged, and which poured into the island that crowd of fugitives which swelled the Hindu deaths to so tremendous an amount.

One of the most curious results which these documents afford, is that relating to the proportion of the two sexes, and to the extent in which polygamy prevails in India. An illustrious philosopher* [*De l’Esprit des Loix, liv. xvi, chap. 4.], misled by travelers, too much disposed to make general inferences from a few peculiar cases, and pleased to discover a seeming solution of the repugnant systems of domestic life adopted in Europe and in Asia, supposes the polygamy of Eastern nations to be the natural consequence of the superabundance of women produced in warm climates: -- Mr. Bruce attempts to support this theory by a statement of a most extraordinary nature. According to him; in Mesopotamia, Armenia, and Syria, the proportion of births is two women (and a small fraction) to one man; from Latakia to Sidon it is two and three-fourths to one man; from Suez to the Straits of Babelmandel the proportion is fully four to one man, which he believes holds as far as the Line and 30 degrees beyond it. * [* Fran. Buch. Mysore, iii. 8.] The confidence with which a private traveler makes a statement so minute respecting such countries is sufficient to deprive it of all authority. Without imputing intentional falsehood to Mr. Bruce, (which seems foreign to his character,) this statement may be quoted as an instance of that dogmatism, credulity, ostentation, and loose recollection, which have thrown an unmerited suspicion over the general veracity of one of the most enterprising of travelers as well as amusing of writers. It is singular that reflections of a very obvious sort did not check such statements and speculations. In a country where there were four women to one man, it is evident that nothing less than the practice of polygamy to the full extent of Mahomet’s permission could have provided for the surplus of females; but it ought to have been almost equally evident, that to support more than one wife and family must be beyond the power of the laborious and indigent classes. Though the necessaries of life be fewer, and attainable with less labour in warm than in cold climates, the effects of bad government more than counterbalance the bounty of nature. To suppose than an Egyptian Fellah could support three or four times as many women and children by his industry as a French or English labourer, would be the height of extravagance. Polygamy must in the nature of things be confined to the rich; and must therefore depend not on physical causes, but on those tyrannical systems of government which, sanctioned by base superstitions, have doomed one half of the human race to imprisonment and slavery. But facts are more important than any reasonings, however conclusive. By the report of Mr. Ravenshaw, contained in the very instructive Travels of Dr. Francis Buchanan * [*Travels, ii. 181. 2d edition.] , we learn, that in the southern part of the province of Canara the whole number of inhabitants was 396,672, of whom the males were 206,633, the females 190,039. The same excess of males above females is, he tells us, to be found in the Barra Mahl and other parts of the peninsula where accurate enumerations have been made. The return of deaths in the island of Bombay for nearly eight years establishes the same fact with respect to the whole population, and to each of the classes which compose it.

It is well known that the Mahometans are the only class of men in India who practice polygamy to any considerable extent. Out of 20,000 Mahometans in the island of Bombay, only about 100 have two wives, and only five have three; so inconsiderable is the immediate practical result of a system which, in its principles and indirect consequences, produces more evil than perhaps any other human institution, -- so insignificant is the number of those, for whose imagined gratification so immense a body of reasonable beings are degraded and enslaved.

It is remarkable, that the only apparent superiority of the number of females is in some of the returns of the Christian congregations, where polygamy is of course unknown. It is reasonable to refer this small exception to accidental causes, which further inquiry will probably discover.

In all the other castes the equality of the sexes apparent in the list of burials is a sufficient proof against the prevalence of polygamy; since it is well known how few natives of India are unmarried.

Polygamy arises from tyranny, not from climate; -- it degrades all women for the sake of a very few men. And the frame of society has confined its practice within such narrow limits, that it never can oppose any serious obstacle to beneficial changes in the moral habits, domestic relations, and religious opinions of the natives of India.

***

VIII. A Treatise on Sufism, or Mahomedan Mysticism.
by Lieutenant James William Graham, Linguist to the 1st Battalion of the 6th Regiment of Bombay Native Infantry. ….

9. Anecdotes or Narrations promised in the Introduction.

The following narrations may not be uninteresting or unamusing: they are related as being the true state of Sufiism in its fourth or grand state, where the spirit has got the victory over the body, by the mortifying thereof, faith, incessant prayer, and contemplation of the Almighty; it can then work deeds and miracles, like the unembodied spirit or angels as we may conceive: -- they are universally believed by orthodox Mussulmans, and are popular circumstances; as such I relate them.

Narration 1.

A very wonderful personage among the Sufis is Munsoor Halaj, who claimed divinity or the fourth state and stage of this mystical system; he used to say and continually repeat the words anul huq, that is, “I am the truth,” meaning God, being one of his grand epithets. The circumstance took place thus – He had observed his sister go out very frequently at night: thinking this rather strange, as she went out alone, he was resolved to watch her and see where she went to: he did so, and found she went to a company of celestial spirits, being the Hoor or virgins of paradise, who were administering nectar or the immortal beverage of theirs to her: seeing this, and thinking that after she had drunk she might leave a drop or two at the bottom, he went, took up the cup, and drank the drop or two which did remain, though his sister did every thing to prevent him, saying that he would not be able to contain it or restrain the effects thereof, that it would be the occasion of much trouble coming to him, and ultimately his death; which was verified by the sequel; for from that time he was continually exclaiming, “I am the truth,” as aforementioned; or in other words more impressive, the meaning and sense of the letter being the same, “I am God.” This was of course very offensive to the ahil Sheraa, or observers of the canonical law, who sentenced him thereby to be impaled alive. When the people came to take him for that purpose, he said, before they arrived, that they were coming to apprehend him, and that he should be impaled alive; that he did not suffer, for man did not know any thing of him. When they had taken him to the stake, and were putting him on it, they could not effect it, for he appeared in a sitting posture in the air at a small distance over the stake; and this was repeated several times: the story goes, that his spirit then ascended to the imperial vault of heaven, when he saw the Prophet (Mahomed); that he spoke to him, and asked if he should permit himself to suffer under these circumstances. The Prophet showed him a hole in a wall, and said it was ordained and written in the book of fate, that that place (the hole in the wall) was to be as a sign or niche for the stake on which he (Munsoor) was to be impaled alive. The Prophet acknowledged that he had arrived to the state of wasilit, and that saying “I am God” was just and true; but, for the sake of Shiryat and religion, that he should permit himself to suffer, otherwise there would be an end to religion, and men would be led astray and pay no attention to practical worship, or ever worship the invisible God in spirit, but take men and visible objects, possessing his spirit, for their adoration. On this, Munsoor Halaj’s spirit descended, and permitted the body to take the course of nature. When he was then about to be impaled he called a disciple of his to him, and imparted the secret to him, by making him then acquainted with the different states, and moreover told him, that after he had quitted the body they would turn it and throw the ashes thereof into the sea, that the same voice would issue forth, that is, An ul huq, “I am the truth,” and that the sea would boil and swell to a great height and overflow all the land. In order to prevent that, he directed him to go to his place, and take a godhra of his (a kind of old patched counterpane of shreds, which Fuqeers frequently have to lie down upon and throw over their shoulders), and place it on the rising waves of the sea; when they would cease, and return to their former state. At the time of his being impaled, this same voice was heard; after he was dead, the same; and when they had burnt the body and thrown the ashes thereof into the sea, the same voice issued forth; -- that element not being able to contain the divine particle so fully, boiled and rose to an immense height, when it was overflowing the land, but was suppressed by the disciple throwing the godhra over it. – There is a distich or two made upon this occasion by one Shibli a poet, and Sufi of the same order, that is Mejezoob; he is down in the small list of Mejezoob, Sheikh Aboobeker Shibli; -- he is represented asking the Almighty why Munsoor suffered; and the reply is annexed thus: --

Question. Shibli put this question to the palace of the gracious lord, -- Why did the prince put Munsoor on the impaling stake?

Answer. Munsoor was acquainted with every thing, (but) was a friend who discovered secrets and mysteries:

Whoever makes public mysteries and hidden things, this is his punishment.

Image

Ibn Mansur Al Hallaj, the "Qu'ranic Christ," making the dangerous and fatal "ejaculation," 'ANA' L HAQ (I AM the Truth)
IF HALLAJ HAD SAID
"ALLAH AL HAZ -- GOD (IN HIS TRANSCENDENTAL ASPECT) IS THE
TRUTH, OR "HUWA AL HAQ" (HE IS THE TRUTH) IT WOULD HAVE BEEN
A COMMON STATEMENT. HOWEVER AL HALLAJ DECLARED THAT
GOD ALONE EXISTS: THEREFORE HE IS THE ONE SUBJECT AND THUS
HE ALONE CAN WITNESS HIS EXISTENCE.

-- Toward the One, by Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan

***

Take the famous utterance, 'I am God.' Some men reckon it as a great pretension; but 'I am Gael' is in fact a great humility. The man who says 'I am the servant of God' asserts that two exist, one himself and the other God. But he who says 'I am God' has naughted himself and cast himself to the winds. He says, 'I am God': that is, 'I am not, He is all, nothing has existence but God, I am pure non-entity, I am nothing.' In this the humility is greater.

-- Discourses of Rumi, translated by A. J. Arberry

***

Image
[Gozer] Are you a God?

-- Ghostbusters, directed by Ivan Reitman


***

List of the Members of the Bombay Literary Society.

The Hon. Jonathan Duncan.
The Rt. Hon. Lord Viscount Valentia.
The Hon. Sir James Mackintosh.
General O. Nicolls.
Helenus Scott, Esq.
George Keir, Esq.
Robert Drummond, M.D.
S.M. Treipland, Esq.
William Dowdeswell, Esq.
Henry Salt, Esq.
Lieut.-colonel William Brookes.
Lieut.-colonel Joseph Boden.
Lieut.-colonel T.C. Harris.
Colonel Jasper Nicolls.
Major Edward Moor.
Charles Forbes, Esq.
William Erskine, Esq.
Robert Steuart, Esq.
Francis Wrede, Esq.
Robert Henshaw, Esq.
Major D. Price.
William Boag, Esq.
Lieut.-colonel A. Hay.
Colonel Alexander Walker.
Lieut.-colonel C.B. Burr.
Lieut. E.S. Fressell.
John Pringle, Esq.
Alexander Mackonochie.
Dom Pedro de Alcantara, bishop of Antiphile, and apostolical vicar in the dominions of the Great Mogul.
Lewis Corkran, Esq.
Thomas Lechmere, Esq.
Benjamin Heyne, M.D.
Captain Thomas Arthur.
James Milne, M.D.
Hugh Bell, Esq.
Edward Nash, Esq.
James Hallett, Esq.
James Morley, Esq.
Joseph Cumberlege, Esq.
T.M. Keate, Esq.
Major-general Charles Reynolds.
Reverend Arnold Burrows.
William Sandwith, Esq.
Captain David Seton.
Reverend N. Wade
William Taylor Money, Esq.
P.C. Baird, Esq.
Dr. James Skene.
Charles C. Mackintosh, Esq.
Samuel Manesty, Esq.
Ollyett Woodhouse, Esq.
Luke Ashburner, Esq.
Sir George Staunton, Bart.
Gideon Colquhoun, Esq.
J.G. Ravenshaw, Esq.
Edward Hawke Locker, Esq.
Jonathan Thorpe, Esq.
David White, M.D.
John Leyden, M.D.
Claudius James Rich, Esq.
John Taylor, M.D.
Captain Thomas Gordon Caulfield, R.N.
George Cumming Osborne, Esq.
William Newnham, Esq.
George Sotheby, Esq.
Hugh George Macklin, Esq.
David Deas Inglis, Esq.
Captain Francis Irvine.
Major William Hamilton.
Captain William Miles.
John Hine, Esq.
C.T. Ellis, Esq.
Captain A. Robertson.
Charles Daw, Esq.
Reverend W. Canning.
James Inverarity, Esq.
William A. Morgan, Esq.
Capital M. Williams.
Captain A. Gregory.
Stephen Babington, Esq.
John Wedderburn, Esq.
James Henderson, Esq.
Captain R.H. Hough.
James Calder, Esq.
Lieut.-general the Hon. Sir John Abercromby, K.C.B.
Dougal Christie, Esq.
Captain Edward Frederick.
Hill Morgan, M.D.
Andrew Jukes, M.D.
Brigadier-general Sir John Malcolm, K.C.B.
Lieutenant James Macmurdo.
David Craw, Esq.
William Mackie, Esq.
Captain C. Tyler, R.N.
Captain John Briggs.
Lieutenant J.W. Graham.
James Farish, Esq.
Hon. M.S. Elphinstone.
Byram Rowles, Esq.
Major Henry Rudland.
Hon. Sir John Newbolt.
Lieut.-colonel William Franklin.
John Copland, Esq.
Charles Norris, Esq.
Captain W. Bruce.
Edward William Hunt, Esq.
Captain B. Hall, R.N.
Lieutenant Samuel Hallifax.
Charles Northcote, Esq.
Captain Sir William Wiseman, Bart. R.N.
William Baillie, Esq.
Lieutenant John Jopp.
Lieutenant William Miller.
Reverend R. Jackson.
Lieut.-colonel John Griffiths.
The Hon. Sir A. Anstruther.
Colonel Urquhart.
Major John Lyall.
Mr. Benjamin Hammer.
Thomas Palmer, Esq.
Lieutenant John Wade.
Captain Heard.
Richard Jenkins, Esq.
Benjamin Noton, Esq.
Lieutenant John Hawkins.
T.G. Gardiner, Esq.
Captain L.C. Russell.
Captain Josiah Stewart.
Captain John Powell.
J.H. Pelly, Esq.
Mr. Archdeacon Barnes.
The Hon. T.S. Raffles.
J. Crawford, Esq.
Richard Woodhouse, Esq.
John Hector Cherry, Esq.
Mr. R. Hereford.
R.G. Morris, Esq.
Captain E.H. Bellassis.
David Malcolm, Esq.
Edward Charles Macnaghton, Esq.
The Lord Bishop of Calcutta.
J.S. Buckingham, Esq.
Theodore Forbes, Esq.
Mr. Asselin de Cherville.
Captain James Revitt Carnac.
James Staveley, Esq.
Sutherland Meek, M.D.

President

William Taylor Money, Esq.

Vice Presidents

Ollyett Woodhouse, Esq.
The Rev. Archdeacon George Barnes.

Secretaries

Stephen Babington, Esq.
John Wedderburn, Esq.

Treasurer.

Messrs. Forbes and Co.

THE END
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Re: Freda Bedi, by Wikipedia

Postby admin » Sun Dec 15, 2019 5:48 am

East India Company College [Haileybury]
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 12/14/19

A Glimpse of Old Haileybury.

Mr. Edward Lockwood, an old Haileybury student, and an Indian civilian of twenty years standing, whose name is recorded in my private memoranda as having attended my lectures in 1854-55-56, was applied to for his reminiscences, but instead of responding, has published a book on the “Early days of Marlborough College,” in which he devotes a short chapter to a “Glimpse of Old Haileybury.” It is written in a lively manner, with much kindliness of feeling and good-humoured pleasantry. Probably his style might strike an ill-natured critic as somewhat too flippant, but his banter is sprinkled with many grains of good sense and wisdom, the value of which would become more apparent if they were separated from the chaff. I append a brief glimpse of his glimpse: --

His opinion evidently is that old Haileybury was abolished because “it had been weighed in the balance and found wanting,” and he clearly considers that the time spent there was wasted, except for the best men at the head of the Terms. He admits that, had he responded to the invitation to contribute a few reminiscences of College life to the present volume, his contribution would have presented little more than a picture of merry days and jovial nights, when wine, tobacco, singing in chorus, and noisy revelry were freely indulged in, as a set off to the dullness of lectures on subjects which few could understand, and to the abstruseness of examination-questions which no ordinary student was expected to answer. In short, he is strongly of opinion that the education given at Haileybury was a bad preparation for the work of an Indian civilian, and that, instead of learning Greek, Latin, Sanskrit, and how to extract cube roots, a lad destined for India should be made to devote himself to the acquisition of a knowledge of the Vernaculars, and should, moreover, give a good deal of attention to agriculture and land-surveying.


Mr. Lockwood’s interesting account of Patna during the mutiny, and of his own plucky demeanour during that terrible crisis, strikes one as furnishing a proof that even a rollicking career at Haileybury might have had its uses in generating habits of light-heartedness, cheerfulness, and courage – qualities which enabled Mr. Lockwood to maintain an attitude of perfect coolness and composure under the momentary expectation of a general massacre. Let me add that the stress laid by Mr. Lockwood on the importance of a thorough knowledge of Indian Vernaculars, commends itself entirely to my approval, and I repeat here what I have stated before, that, in my opinion, the forcing of Sanskrit as a sine qua non on all Haileybury students indiscriminately, was an unfortunate mistake (see note 4, page 52).

M. M-W.

Appendix I.: Documents Relative to the Alleged Unsatisfactory State of the Discipline at the East-India College in the Early Years of Its Establishment.

Extracts from Mr. Malthus’s Pamphlet.


It appears that in the year 1817 the rumours which were everywhere rife as to the unsatisfactory state of the discipline at Haileybury College, led one of its most eminent Professors – the celebrated political Economist, Professor T.R. Malthus – to write a pamphlet in its defence. From that pamphlet,1 [1. A copy of this pamphlet, which I have before quoted in my reminiscences, was recently found by the Rev. H.V. Le Bas among his father’s papers, and has been obligingly lent to me. It was published by Mr. John Murray of Albemarle Street, in 1817, and is so interesting that it ought to be rescued from oblivion. entitled “Statements respecting the East-India College in refutation of the charges brought against it,” I have already made some quotations, and I now subjoin others.

The following is given at pp. 82, 83, as a summary of the charges made against the College by Mr. Hume at a Court of Proprietors held on the 18th of December, 1816:--

Mr. Hume affirmed that, instead of the College being a place where young men were formed in their morals, prepared in their character, and qualified in their education, it was the disgrace of England, and of every person connected with it; that it was incessantly the scene of riot, disorder and irregularity, and that the inhabitants, who lived in the neighbourhood, were in a state of perpetual dread and alarm from the wanton excesses committed by the students.


In reply to this accusation, Mr. Malthus maintains in his pamphlet that Mr. Hume seems to have sought for the character of the College from fathers irritated at the merited punishment of their sons, and from some Hertfordshire county gentlemen, tremblingly alive about their game. Such disappointed fathers, says Mr. Malthus, “are the very last persons that should be heard as authorities, and as to the country gentlemen, they have been (with one or two exceptions) from the very first, enemies of the College. They prophesied early that the building would become a barrack, and I can readily enter into their feelings in not liking an establishment of eighty young men from sixteen to twenty in their immediate neighbourhood. But I can affirm from my own knowledge that these young men are more free from vice than the undergraduates at our Universities, and I really believe, than the head classes of our great schools.” In proof of this Mr. Malthus quotes a portion of a speech made by Lord Minto at Calcutta in 1810, as follows: --

It is with peculiar pleasure that I do justice to the Hertford College, by remarking that the official reports and returns of our [Fort William] College will show that the students who have been translated from Hertford to Fort William, stand honourably distinguished for regular attendance; for obedience to the statutes and discipline of the College; for orderly and decorous demeanor; for moderation in expense, and consequently in the amount of their debt; and, in a word, for those decencies of conduct which denote men well born, and characters well trained. I make this observation with the more satisfaction, as I entertain an earnest wish to find it proved that the preliminary tuition and general instruction afforded to the succeeding generations of the Company’s servants at Hertford will be found of extensive and valuable influence for India.


From other passages, however, of Mr. Malthus’s pamphlet it is evident that he does not think the discipline of Haileybury perfect, and that he attributes its defects to certain inherent difficulties in the constitution of the College – difficulties to which I have already referred in my Reminiscences (see especially pp. 86, 100-106).

For example, the following remarks occur in different parts of the pamphlet: --

With regard to the discipline [of the East-India College] it will be readily allowed that it has not been in all its parts so successful. It is well-known that disturbances have occasionally taken place, which at the moment, have shown in a considerable body of the students a total disregard of the rules and regulations.

On the occasion of the last of the three disturbances which occurred during the period of the six years, when all cases of breach of discipline, involving rustication or expulsion, had to be referred to the Directors, the proceedings were marked by an extraordinary want of firmness and decision, indicating in the most striking manner the effects of private and contending interests. This disturbance occurred in 1812.1 [1.The disturbance, which occurredin 1811, is described in the next extract.] The Court took the management of its entirely into their own hands. They detained a large body of students in town for above a month; and after entering into the most minute details, and subjecting all the parties to repeated examinations at the India-house, came to no final decision. The case was then referred back again to the College Council, who were desired to select for expulsion a certain number of those concerned, who should appear to them to have been the most deeply engaged as ringleaders, and the least entitled to a mitigation of sentence on the score of character. When this was done, and a sentence of expulsion passed in consequence on five students, a subsequent vote of the Court restored them all to the service, and they were sent out to India without even completing the usual period of residence at the College (!!!!). It is now (in 1817) but a short time since the Principal and Professors of the East-India College have been legally invested with those powers in the management of the discipline which are found necessary at great schools and Universities, and which ought, therefore, unquestionably to have been given to them at the commencement of the Institution.

Yet what is the task they have to accomplish? They have not only to overcome by a steady and uniform system of discipline the natural difficulties inherent in the Institution, but, by a union of conciliation, firmness, and strict impartiality, to mitigate and gradually extirpate the spirit of insubordination, which, by long unskillful treatment, has infected the Institution; and this is to be done, not only without the cordial co-operation of all the natural patrons and protectors of the College, but with a spirit of direct hostility in a considerable body of the Directors and Proprietors. Language is publicly used, and reports generally circulated, calculated to fill the minds of the students with the most unfavourable prejudices. In general, when a parent sends his son to a school or to the University, he endeavours to impress him with a respect for the place to which he is going, and for the authorities to which he will be subject. It is to be feared that some young men come to the East-India College with very different impressions – with the impression of having heard the College abused and its downfall prognosticated by those whom they must, of course, look up to as the persons that ought to influence their feelings and direct their conduct (compare p. 83 of this volume).


Extract from a pamphlet entitled, “A letter ot the Chairman, Deputy-Chairman, and Court of Directors of the East-India Company, on the subject of their College at Haileybury. By a Civilian”:1 [1. A copy of this pamphlet, published by Richardson in 1823 (27 pp. 8vo.), is in the Library at the India Office. Tracts, Vol. 43.] –

What has been termed a row at the College may be exemplified by what took place in the year 1811. The insubordination on that occasion consisted principally in noise, partly also in acts of mischief, committed within the buildings where the students reside, and continuing for two or three hours of the night.

Not a single Professor came forward to express disapprobation; -- no attempt was made to re-establish authority. The disorder remained entirely unopposed, and the promoters of it undetected, till at length tired nature effected that which the reigning powers did not attempt, and the students retired to rest soon after midnight. On the following day all business was suspended. Eleven Directors went down in deputation from Leadenhall-street, and, after due deliberation, determined to turn loose upon London upwards of forty young men, collected from all parts of the kingdom, who had each voluntarily acknowledged his own guilt. There they were detained, to the interruption of their studies, and the corruption of their morals, for more than two months, during which time a vain attempt was made to induce them to criminate each other, since no other evidence appeared against them.

The affair terminated in the expulsion of six individuals, who were not particularly marked as ringleaders, but were selected chiefly on the ground of their general bad conduct; while the rest were condemned to lose two years’ rank in India, a punishment the nature of which they could not understand, and the weight of which they could not feel for many years.1 [1. The manner in which loss of rank principally affects a civilian is, that his turn to receive a pension from the Civil Fund, which is offered according to the date of his appointment, arrives so much the later. Thus, this absurd and unjust punishment visits the aged for the errors of his youth, by depriving him of a benefit not bestowed by the Company, to which he is entitled, from the subscription which he has paid as its price.]

The cause of these occasional ebullitions is to be sought in the anomalous nature of the Institution.

Extract from the London “Evening Mail” for October 19, 1822:2 [2. This newspaper was published at The Times office, and was to a great extent a reprint of The Times.]

The East India College near Hertford, an establishment not uniformly remarkable for the efficacy of its discipline, has again within the last fortnight become the scene of insubordination, and it is singular enough that Mr. Christian, who was himself for some time a Professor at this College, and must consequently feel an interest in its well-being, and was then and is still, a magistrate of the county, and a resident in the neighbourhood, did not direct his attention to the late tumultuary disturbance. It seems that a short time since, in the absence through indisposition of Dr. Le Bas – a person dignified with the lofty appellation of Dean of the College – the Rev. H. Walter laid some fresh imposition or restriction upon some of the boys for refractory conduct. This imposition was so little relished by the youths (whose ages are from 14 to 18), that they beset Mr. Walter by all those little annoyances which schoolboys so well can practice. The first direct act of insubordination manifested was in consequence of the shutting of one of the College gates at what the boys deemed too early an hour in the evening. After shattering the lock with gunpowder, the youths next contrived to insert a blacking bottle, filled with powder, into one of the drains in the College square; this was also exploded, by means of a match or train, near midnight. Then bodies of the students distributed themselves in given positions, from which they sallied forth, broke the college lamps, and shattered several panes of glass in the house of the learned Professor, Mr. Walter, and the very Reverend the Dean, Mr. Le Bas. Only one of the rioters was caught in the act. There are between seventy and eighty students, and of these about twenty, upon whom suspicion fell, have been sent home to undergo a species of indefinite rustication. The penalty thus inflicted, though of uncertain extent at present, is considered by the parties as a sort of holiday; and many of them, from the interest of their own connexions, expect to be shortly recalled ….

It would seem then, that experience refutes the utility of this establishment as a place of education and discipline; the insubordination it has manifested exceeds that in any other establishment throughout the kingdom.


As a per contra statement I add the following extract from a scarce pamphlet, published by Kingsbury, Parbury & Allen in 1826, and to be found at the India Office Library (Tracts, Vol. 91), giving the substance of

A speech delivered in the Court of East-India Proprietors, on the 27th February, 1824, by Robert Grant, on the occasion of a motion made by the Hon. D. Kinnaird to the effect “that Haileybury College should be abolished.”

Mr. Robert Grant in this speech deprecated any change in the collegiate system then prevailing, and contended that a degree of discipline was enforced at Haileybury far beyond the usual standard of Academic strictness. He had consulted an Oxonian friend, and received the following reply: --

… What would an under-graduate member of the strictest college in Oxford feel, were he compelled, like the members of the East-India College, to attend chapel every morning and evening, to dine in hall every day, and to be within gates every evening soon after dusk, and to be in his own room alone every night at eleven o’clock? At Hertford the use of wine is forbidden, yet at our Universities the use of it is freely indulged to young men who come up to college, not two years later in life than the students of the East-India College. Riding on horseback, or driving a gig, hunting and shooting, are sports most rigorously forbidden at the East-India College; and if a young man is unable to take long walks, or to use athletic exercise, he has no source of recreation. How different is this from our Universities! Those persons who clamour to take away the name of College, and call the East-India College a school, would find, on examining the subject, that the college is already in reality that sort of school to which they would reduce it, as the remedy for every defect. Let men who have passed through an English University examine the discipline of the East-India College, and they will be found to confess, that the disturbances which arise there are such as might be expected from the enforcing a strict discipline upon young men, some of whom will not bear the restraint, whilst others, though apparently in the college with their own consent, have both a dislike to appointments in a distant land, and an aversion to the severe studies of the place….

M. M.-W.


Appendix II: The College of Fort William in Its Connexion with the East India College, Haileybury.

On the 18th of August, 1800, the Marquis Wellesley, Governor-General of India, wrote a minute in Council containing his reasons for establishing a College at Fort William, Calcutta.

It was a long document which, when printed, occupied nearly 43 pages 4to. I subjoin a brief summary: --

The age at which writers usually arrive in India [N.B., this was written in 1800] is from sixteen to eighteen. Some of them have been educated with a view to the Indian Civil Service, but on utterly erroneous principles; their education being confined to commercial knowledge and in no degree extended to liberal studies. On arrival in India they are either stationed in the interior, where they ought to be conversant with the languages, laws, and customs of the natives, or they are employed in Government offices where they are chiefly occupied in transcribing papers. Once landed in India their studies, morals, manners, expenses and conduct are no longer subject to any regulation, restraint, or guidance. Hence they often acquire habits destructive to their health and fortunes.

Under these circumstances the General has determined to found a College at Fort William in Bengal for the instruction of the junior Civil Servants in such branches of literature, science, and knowledge as may be deemed necessary to qualify them for the discharge of their duties; and, considering that such a College would be a becoming public monument to commemorate the Conquest of Mysore, he has dated the law for the foundation of the College on the 4th of May, 1800, the first anniversary of the reduction of Seringapatam.

A suitable building is to be erected at Garden Reach. There will be a Provost, Vice-Provost, and a complete staff of Professors both of European and Oriental subjects.1 [1. A list of these was printed. I select the following: -- Provost, Rev. David Brown; Vice-Provost, Rev. C. Buchanan (both of these were Chaplains of the H.E.I.C.S.); Sanskrit and Hindu Law, H.T. Colebrooke; British Law, Sir George Barlow, Bart.; Greek and Latin Classics, Rev. C. Buchanan; Persian, Francis Gladwin; Assistant in Persian and Arabic, Mathew Lumsden; second Assistant in Persian, Capt. Charles Stewart; Sanskrit and Bengali, Rev. William Carey; Hindustani, John Gilchrist.] Statutes are to be drawn up, and all Indian civilians on first arriving in India, even those destined for Bombay and Madras are to be educated at this College, which will be called the College of Fort William.


The statutes were promulgated by the first Provost (the Rev. David Brown), on April 10, 1801, and when printed occupied 12 pages 4to. The students were then located in provisional buildings, and the first Disputation in Oriental languages was held on the 6th of February, 1802; a speech being delivered on the occasion by Sir George Barlow, the acting Visitor. All this was done without the knowledge of the Court of Directors in London, who, when they heard of the foundation of the College, passed a resolution against it, on the ground of the enormous and indefinite expenditure which it might involve. They complimented the Marquis on his able minute, and acknowledged the necessity for obtaining a higher class of civil servants by raising the standard of their education and giving them an improved special training, but they only expressed their approbation of part of his plan. In fact a compromise was arranged (see note to line 6 of page 27 of this volume), and it was decided that although the proposed collegiate Building at Garden Reach was not to be erected, an Institution to be called “The East-India College” should be founded in Hertfordshire, which was to give a good general education, combined with instruction in the rudiments of the Oriental languages, while Lord Wellesley’s Institution was to be allowed to continue at Calcutta in a less comprehensive form under the name of Fort William College, with a local habitation in “Writers’ Buildings,” the name given to a long house with good verandahs looking south at the north end of Tank Square (now Dalhousie Square).

It was thus brought about that Fort William College became a kind of continuation of Haileybury, and that its work was restricted to the imparting of fuller instruction in Oriental subjects, the groundwork of which had been laid at Haileybury. And no doubt it was originally intended that all junior civilians who had passed through the Haileybury course should repair to the College in Calcutta for such instruction. Moreover, the process of sifting, which began at Haileybury, was continued at the Forst William Institution. At any rate, it occasionally happened that the worst of those “bad bargains,” which Haileybury, in its too great leniency, had spared, were eliminated from the service at Calcutta.

Yet, according to Mr. Malthus, the discipline at Fort William College was for some time in a most unsatisfactory state. He mentions that far too large a number of young civilians, whose ages ranged from 16 to 19, were collected at Calcutta between 1801 and 1808 (Haileybury being then barely founded, or at least not in actual working order), and that much dissipation and irregularity existed among them (Pamphlet, pp. 55-56).

Unquestionably the establishment of Haileybury had a beneficial effect in abridging the period of residence at Calcutta, as the following extract from Mr. Malthus’ pamphlet proves: --

In 1811 twenty students left Fort William College qualified for official situations. Of the twelve who had been previously at Haileybury, six left after six month’s residence, two after eight months, one after nine months, one after two years, two after three years. Of the eight who had not been at Haileybury three left after two and a quarter years, one after three years, one after three and a quarter years, two after four years, one after four and a half years.


Still, the co-existence of Haileybury in connexion with Fort William College does not seem to have caused much improvement in the state of the discipline at the latter college; for at p. 38 of Mr. Malthus’ pamphlet we read: --

In the last public examination [N.B., this was written in 1817] at the College in India, of which the account has arrived, five students were expelled. Notwithstanding the opportunities afford to them during a protracted stay at Calcutta, they had not acquired such a knowledge of two Oriental languages as would enable them to pass the examination necessary to qualify them for an official situation.


It appears, then, from the above extracts that, after the founding of Haileybury, the period of residence at Fort William College was sometimes completed by good men in six months. On the other hand, in the case of inferior men, it was sometimes protracted for three or four years, or even more. It appears, too, that for many years those who were transferred from Haileybury to Fort William lived a collegiate life there somewhat similar to that at Haileybury; that is to say, they had rooms assigned to them in “Writers’ Buildings,” and were subject to some sort of collegiate discipline. Moreover, it is clear that, for three or four years, even Bombay and Madras civilians were required to present themselves at Calcutta and go through their period of Indian probation at Fort William.1 [1. Mr. W.S. Seton-Karr has lent me a curious and scarce volume entitled “Roebuck’s Annals of the College of Fort William.” There I find reports of the results of all the examinations from 1801 to 1818, and it may be proved from these reports that civilians destined for Bombay and Madras gained prizes at Fort William in the years 1801-1804, and notably among them was a connexion of my own, Mr. John Romer, who was for some time a Judge in the Bombay Presidency.] As to Bengal civilians their residence there went on, I believe, till about the year 1835. So far as I have been able to ascertain, it was not till after that year that they were allowed to reside with their friends or in “chummeries,” or in lodgings anywhere in the town.2 [2. Mr. Seton-Karr tells me then in 1842 he and Mr. R.N. Cust and Mr. Montresor took a good three-storied house in Middleton Row, Calcutta, and there “chummed” together during their period of probation.] Even after that date, however, they had to go to “Writers’ Buildings” (where there was a good Library and Examination Room) for their monthly and final examinations.3 [3. Mr. Seton-Karr informs me, that in 1842 the two examiners (Colonel Ouseley, and Capt. Marshall) had offices in “Writers’ Buildings,” and that monthly examinations were held there, but that a considerable portion of the building was then let out as merchants’ offices.]

The annual Fort William “Disputations” (corresponding to the Haileybury “Visitations”), which took place in early years, were generally held at Government House, the Governor-General being the “Visitor,” but I find that in one year (1802) these “Disputations” – accompanied as they always were by a public distribution of prizes, and a speech from the Governor-General – took place in the Examination-room of the College Buildings.

It was not till January 24, 1854, that the College of Fort William was abolished. That year saw both the first introduction of the Indian Civil Service competitive system into England, and at the same time a change in the method of dealing with Indian civilians on their first arrival in India. Nevertheless, even after that year, examinations continued to be held in India under Boards of Examiners appointed by the Government, but not under collegiate regulations or in any special building.

Monier Monier-Williams.

Appendix III.

I.


The object of this Establishment is, to provide a supply of persons duly qualified to discharge the various and important duties required from the Civil Servants of the COMPANY, in administering the Government of India.

Within the last thirty or forty years, a great change has taken place in the state of the COMPANY’S affairs in that County: the extension of empire has been followed by a great increase of power and authority; and persons of the same description, who, before, had acted in the capacity of Factors and Merchants, are now called upon to administer, throughout their respective districts, an extensive System of Finance: and to fill the important offices of Magistrates, Ambassadors, and Provincial Governors.

II.

As this extension of dominion in India hath been gradual, the wants thence arising have not hitherto been provided in any way fitted to supply them: for though the private and solitary studies of individuals have enabled them to discharge, with ability and honour, the duties devolved upon them; yet the growing exigencies of territories so enlarged have loudly called for an Establishment at home, which, upon a wise and well-adapted system, might provide and prepare, in the most direct manner, a succession of Civil Servants, for their destined functions.

The necessity of such an Establishment, so generally felt in England, induced the COMPANY to expect that some Institution would have arisen, immediately applicable to the supply of their wants. But all hopes from other quarters having been disappointed, they judged it to be a duty incumbent upon themselves to devise and to institute a Plan, that might not only fill up the time of those Young Persons designed for the Civil Service of India with general advantage; but should also afford the best means of qualifying them to discharge the duties of their stations there; and to send them thither early enough to engage in all the concerns of active life.

This Plan consists of a COLLEGE, for the reception of Students at the age of fifteen, to remain till they are eighteen; or till they are sent by the COURT OF DIRECTORS to their respective destinations.

The Students will be instructed, by Courses of Lectures, upon a plan similar to that adopted in the Universities.

III.

After having thus provided for the acquisition of Learning in general, it is further intended to furnish them with the means of instruction in the Elements of Oriental Literature. For this purpose they will not only be taught the Rudiments of the Asiatic Languages, more especially the Arabic and Persian; but be made acquainted with the History, Customs, and Manners of the different Nations of the East: and as the study of Law and Political Economy is to form an essential part in the general system of education, it will be required that, in the Lectures upon these subjects, particular attention be given to the explanation of the Political and Commercial relations subsisting between INDIA and GREAT BRITAIN.

IV.

Among the variety of studies which may be pursued with peculiar advantage in this Country, it is not to be expected that any very great portion of their time can be allotted to the acquiring a knowledge of the SEVERAL Languages of the East; but it is presumed that the main object of the Institution will be attained, if the Students be well grounded in the Rudiments of the TWO Languages already specified; and that, on their leaving the College, such instructions be given them as may enable them to prosecute their Oriental studies during their passage to India.

V.

The College is to be under the direction and authority of a Principal and several Professors, according to the following arrangement: --

THE REV. SAMUEL HENLEY, D.D., Principal.

Professors of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy: Rev. B. Bridge, A.M.; Rev. W. Dealtry, A.M.

Professors of Humanity and Philology: Rev. E. Lewton, A.M.; J.H. Batten, Esq., A.M.

Professor of History and Political Economy: Rev. T.R. Malthus, A.M.

Professor of General Polity and the Laws of England: Edward Christian, Esq., A.M.

Professor of Oriental Literature:

The following are attached to the College, viz: --

Mons. De Foligny, French Master.

Mr. __. Medland, Drawing Master.

Mr. Henry Angelo, Fencing Master.

Mr. __. Bridgman, Dancing Master.

Besides the general superintendence of the College, it will be the office of the Principal more especially to watch over the moral and religious conduct of the students; to instruct them in the principles of Ethics and Natural Theology; and in the evidences, doctrines, and duties of Revealed Religion. Whilst in this respect he is considered as discharging the duty of a Professor in Divinity, so, in the ordinary exercise of his clerical function, he will be required, in conjunction with such Professors as are in holy orders, to preach in the College Chapel, and, at the stated seasons, to perform the solemn rites of the established Church.

VI.

The Lectures of the Professors may be arranged under four distinct heads, in the following manner: --

1. Oriental Literature.

1. Practical Instruction in the Rudiments of the Oriental Languages, more especially the Arabic and Persian.

2. A Course of Lectures to illustrate the History, Customs and Manners of the People of India.

2. Mathematics and Natural Philosophy.

1. A Course of Practical Instruction, in the Elements of Euclid, Algebra, and Trigonometry; on the most useful properties of the Conic Sections, the nature of Logarithms, and the principles of Fluxions.

2. A Course of Lectures on the four branches of Natural Philosophy; Mechanics, Hydrostatics, Optics, and Astronomy; illustrated by occasional Experiments: and, if it should be thought necessary or proper, the Principia of Sir Isaac Newton will form a part of this course.

It is here of importance to observe, that the more abstruse parts of pure Mathematics will be utterly excluded from these Lectures, as altogether inconsistent with the object of the Institution. The Mathematical Lectures will be made entirely subservient to the purposes of Natural Philosophy. The Lectures in Natural Philosophy will have for their scope and end, the arts and objects of common life: and to render this department of these Lectures more extensively useful, as soon as a proper collection of Specimens shall be procured, it is intended to give the Students some elementary instructions in Chemistry, Mineralogy, and Natural History.

3. Classical & General Literature.

1. A Course of Lectures to explain the Ancient Writers of Rome and Greece, more particularly the Historians and Orators.

2. A Course of Lectures on the Arts of Reasoning and Composition; and on such other subjects as are generally understood by the “Belles Lettres.”

These Lectures will be altogether plain and practical. Peculiar care will be taken to make the Students well acquainted with the English Language, and with the merits of its most approved Writers. They will be exercised also in every species of composition appropriate to their future occupations.

4. Law, History & Political Economy.

1. A Course of Lectures on general History, and on the History and Statistics of the Modern Nations of Europe.

2. A Course of Lectures on Political Economy.

3. A Course of Lectures on general Polity, on the Laws of England, and Principles of the British Constitution.

VII.

The College Year is to be divided into Two Terms, each consisting of Twenty Weeks. In the last week of the second Term of each year, Public Examinations of all the Students will be holden by the Professors in the different departments of Literature and Science, as arranged in the preceding section, under the superintendence of the Principal.

1. IN ORIENTAL LITERATURE.

2. IN MATHEMATICS & NATURAL PHILOSOPHY.

3. IN CLASSICAL & GENERAL LITERATURE.

4. IN LAW, HISTORY & POLITICAL ECONOMY.

At the conclusion of the Examinations, the Principal and Professors will, at a general meeting appointed for the purpose, arrange the Students in four separate Lists, according to their respective merits in these departments. A Copy of these Lists will be transmitted by the Principal to the Honourable COURT OF DIRECTORS, for insertion in the Public Records of the COMPANY. On this occasion, the Honourable the CHAIRMAN, DEPUTY CHAIRMAN, COLLEGE COMMITTEE, and such other of the DIRECTORS as may think proper, will attend, to distribute among the most deserving Students in the several Classes, such Prizes and Medals as may be agreed upon with the Principal by the College Committee.

VIII.

Having thus pointed out that provision has been made for the literary and intellectual improvement of the Students, it remains to add some observations on the Moral and Religious Discipline of the College. Concerning this important subject a Code of Regulations has already been presented to the Honourable COURT OF DIRECTORS, subject to such improvements and corrections as time and experience may hereafter suggest. But as the efficacy of these regulations will entirely depend upon the actual exertions of those Professors who, in subordination to the Principal, are more immediately concerned in the discipline of the College, it may be proper to mention, that the Persons selected for this purpose have, for many years, filled situations of trust and authority in the two Universities: and they have undertaken to carry into effect these regulations, under the strongest impressions of the importance of the charge committed to them.

IX.

The compensation to be made to the COMPANY by the Students of the College at the commencement of each Term, is Fifty Guineas; for which they will be supplied with every requisite accommodation during that term, a few articles excepted of private convenience. The utmost attention will be given, in every instance, to the economy of the Institution, consistent with the comfort of its Members. All extravagance among the Students will be discouraged: and, on this account, it is much to be desired that their pecuniary allowances may be moderate; as a misjudged liberality in this respect might be highly injurious.

The first opening of the College to receive Students having been fixed for the 3d of February 1806, the Collegiate year is considered as thence commencing. The former Term will end on the 19th of June, and the latter will begin on the 1st of August. In future years, the 2d of February and the 1st of August will begin, and the 19th of June and the 21st of December terminate, the two respective Terms.

X.

The foregoing Plan, it is presumed, is founded upon the soundest principles of wisdom and judgment; and may be eventually expected to produce the happiest effects upon the concerns of the COMPANY in the East. The education of those destined to fill the important offices of Magistrates, Ambassadors, Provincial Governors, and other high situations, should certainly be founded on the firm basis of learning and science; on a knowledge of the principles of ethics and civil jurisprudence; of general history, and the laws of nations. To this should be added a more particular acquaintance with the language, history, and manners of those nations among whom they are to exercise their respective functions. The cultivation and improvement of their intellectual powers should be accompanied with such a course of moral discipline as may tend to excite and confirm in them habits of application, prudence, integrity, and justice: and to render this system of education fully efficient, it is essential that it be inculcated and enforced under the sanction and influence of the Christian Religion. An Institution conducted upon these principles may reasonably be expected, under the favour of Providence, to be productive of a benign and enlightened policy toward the Native Subjects of British India, to improve their moral condition, and to diffuse the happy influences of Christianity throughout the Eastern World.

College School.

Besides the COLLEGE above described, the COMPANY patronize a School subordinate to it, and under the superintendence of the PRINCIPAL, into which Boys may be admitted at an early eage, and in which they will be taught the Elements of general Learning, and such other accomplishments as are the usual objects of instruction in the larger Seminaries of this Country. Especial attention will be paid also to such parts of education as may serve to qualify them for Public Business and for the higher departments of Commercial Life.

Through this School be designed as introductory to the College, it is not to be understood that the COMPANY is pledged to make it the sole channel of an appointment to the College itself; but it is nevertheless proper to observe, that those who shall have passed through both Institutions will enjoy the advantage of an uniform system of education, begun in early youth, and continued to their departure for the duties of their public stations.

Notwithstanding that an intimate connection is intended to subsist between the College and the School, it is nevertheless to be understood, that, whilst the College is exclusively appropriated to persons designed for the Civil Service of the COMPANY abroad, the School will be open to the Public at large.

The Rev. M.H. Luscombe, A.M. of the University of Cambridge, is appointed Head Master of the School; to whom the Annual Sum of Seventy Guineas is to be paid for each Pupil; which, without any additional charge, will include, besides the usual course of Classical Instruction, the French Language, Writing, Arithmetic, Mathematics, Drawing, and Dancing.

-- Memorials of Old Haileybury College, by Frederick Charles Danvers, Sir Monier Monier-Williams, Sir Steuart Colvin Bayley, Percy Wigram, Brand Sapte


Image
The former East India Company College, now Haileybury and Imperial Service College

The East India Company College, or East India College, was an educational establishment situated at Hailey, Hertfordshire, nineteen miles north of London, founded in 1806 to train "writers" (administrators) for the Honourable East India Company (HEIC). It provided general and vocational education for young gentlemen of sixteen to eighteen years old, who were nominated by the Company's directors to writerships in its overseas civil service. It closed in 1858.

The college buildings survive and are now occupied by Haileybury and Imperial Service College.

The college's counterpart for the training of officers for the company's Presidency armies was Addiscombe Military Seminary, Surrey.

History

Charles Grant, Chairman of the British East India Company and Member of Parliament, was closely involved in the foundation of the college. It was first located in Hertford Castle but it was evident that a purpose-built seat of learning would be more suitable and in October 1805 the company purchased an estate just outside Hertford Heath for the sum of £5,930 for this objective. The foundation stone of the new buildings were laid on 12 May 1806. The buildings cost the East India Company £92,000 at the time of their erection to the designs of the architect William Wilkins (who later designed the National Gallery in London). The grounds were landscaped by Humphry Repton, his most notable work here being the terraced area to the front of Wilkins' main range and ponds to the west of this.[1] Repton submitted his final account for work undertaken here just eight days before a carriage accident which left him crippled.[1] The new buildings were occupied by students in 1809.[2]

The East India Company had been incorporated in 1600 as a commercial entity. For two hundred years its administrators had been recruited, largely by patronage, to oversee commercial transactions in Asia. By 1800 they had become the de facto government for millions of people in those areas, but without much training for the role. The college was intended to address these shortcomings. In fifty years it trained over two thousand so-called "writers" to administer the Indian subcontinent.

The curriculum was wide, detailed, and targeted to the career responsibilities. It included political economy, history, mathematics, natural philosophy, classics, law and humanity and philology. Languages included Arabic, Urdu (Hindustani), Bengali, Marathi, Sanskrit, Telugu and Persian. Among the tutors were some of the finest minds of the day, many from Oxford and Cambridge, with lavish annual salaries as much as £500.[3]


The college was customarily referred to as "Haileybury" in contemporary accounts, debates in the House of Lords and the House of Commons and by the administrators of the East India Company and the Colonial Civil Service. From 1839 the College had a journal known as The Haileybury Observer.[4]

The East India Company itself was seen as too powerful. There was pressure for meritocracy to replace recruitment by patronage. Graduates of universities in Great Britain should have the chance to serve in India, without needing to pass through the college. In 1855, Parliament passed an act "to relieve the East India Company from the obligation to maintain the College at Haileybury". King's College, London, hosted the first open competitive examinations for appointment to the Indian Civil Service.

Closure and later use of buildings

In the aftermath of the Indian Mutiny of 1857, and in anticipation of the winding-up of the affairs of the East India Company itself, the college was closed in January 1858. This left the puzzle of what to do with the imposing buildings. For a brief period, they became a military depot for troops destined for India, and during this interregnum the college's Master, Henry Melvill, and Registrar, the Reverend James William Lucas Heaviside, continued to live in their residences on the site and oversaw the maintenance of the buildings. In 1861, the estate was sold at public auction, when it was bought by the British Land Company for £15,000.[5]

A Hertford publisher, Stephen Austin,[6] who had been the official printer to the East India Company’s College and had thus become one of the leading printers of books in various Oriental languages, ...

Mr. Stephen Austin

In connexion with the mention made above of Mr. Stephen Austin, of Hertford, I amy say that he took so deep an interest in actively promoting (through the agency of his son, Mr. Vernon Austin) the inception of the present volume of Haileybury Memorials, and was moreover himself so closely connected with the life of the College, almost from its first foundation, and furthermore rendered such essential services to the College by publishing at his own risk many useful Class-books and important Oriental works (besides the College Magazine),1 [1. See “College Literature” (p. 225 of this volume) by Sir Steuart Bayley.] that it is only due to his memory to make a few extracts from the biographical notice of him which appeared in the Hertfordshire Mercury on 28th May, 1892: --

Mr. Stephen Austin was born in 1804. He was the grandson of the Stephen Austin who was apprenticed to George Kearsley, of Ludgate Hill, London, the printer and publisher of the newspaper known as The North Briton, which was started by John Wilkes, M.P. for Aylesbury and Alderman of London, in opposition to the Administration of Lord Bute, an opposition which was continued against the successive representatives of his policy, and which eventually culminated in the celebrated letters of “junius.”

Mr. Stephen Austin and his father were the appointed printers and booksellers to the East-India Company’s College, the work of which while Haileybury was being built, was carried on at Hertford Castle. Mr. Stephen Austin retained that position until the Company was dissolved in 1858; and it was under the auspices of the authorities of that institution that he commenced the printing and publishing at Hertford of works in various Oriental languages. Up to that time great difficulty had been experienced in procuring the different Oriental books required by the students in their studies; those that were obtainable were only to be had at great cost, while the type used was so bad, and the paper of such indifferent quality, that the books were oftentimes almost illegible. It was somewhat of a revolution, therefore, when “The Hitopadesa” was printed with new Sanskrit type at Hertford in 1847, as at that date there were not more than one or two Oriental printers in England, and thenceforward during successive years a great number of books printed in Sanskrit, Bengali, Arabico, Persian, Pushtoo, Hindustani, Hindi, Hebrew, and other Eastern languages were issued from the Press of Stephen Austin, which in due time acquired a world-wide reputation for Oriental printing. Indeed many of the finest specimens of Oriental typography extant bear his name. (Witness the beautiful edition of Sir M. Monier-Williams’ translation of the Sakoontala now exhibited in one of the cases in the British Museum.) The skill and taste displayed in these productions were acknowledged by the presentation to Mr. Austin of gold medals by her Majesty the Queen and the Empress of the French, by the award of medals of the first class at the International Exhibitions held in London and Paris, etc., and by testimonials from many of the most eminent Oriental scholars of Europe and India; and in the year 1883 the “Congres International des Orientalistes” [International Congress of Orientalists] presented their diploma to Mr. Austin for services rendered to Oriental literature.

While referring to Haileybury we may record the fact that the retention of the old College as a place of education, was greatly due to Mr. Austin’s exertions. After the extinction of the East-India Company, the building and estate of Haileybury were put up to auction in London by order of the Secretary of State, and were purchased as a speculation by the British Land Company. For some considerable time efforts were made by them to find a purchaser for it, and there were rumours of the old College, which had been the home of learning and the nursery of men whose names will for all time be emblazoned on the pages of the history of Her Majesty’s Indian Empire, being turned into an asylum, a workhouse, or some other such purpose. To Mr. Austin’s mind this seemed little short of desecration, and he determined therefore to do what he could to save the old place from the fate that seemed to be awaiting it.

After the establishment of the present Haileybury College the Council publicly recognized Mr. Austin’s services by presenting him, at a numerously attended meeting, with a handsome service of plate bearing the inscription, “Presented to Stephen Austin by the Council of Haileybury in acknowledgment of the services rendered by him towards the establishment of the College, A.D. 1862.”


During the present year, 1893, some friends of the late Mr. Stephen Austin, having expressed their desire that there should be some memorial of his long connexion with Haileybury – Old and New – a memorial of him has been placed in the School Library in the form of a separate case of books, specially lettered as the “Stephen Austin Memorial.” The Council of the College contributed one hundred guineas towards the Memorial.

It is well known that Stephen Austin was the founder in 1834 and Proprieter of the newspaper called Hertford Mercury (afterwards Hertfordshire Mercury), from which I have given numerous extracts in the foregoing pages.

-- Memorials of Old Haileybury College, by Frederick Charles Danvers, Sir Monier Monier-Williams, Sir Steuart Colvin Bayley, Percy Wigram, Brand Sapte


... led a campaign to ensure the buildings were returned to some sort of academic purpose, and in 1862 the site reopened as the public school Haileybury College. This was formally constituted by a royal charter dated 30 August 1864. During the Victorian era, the difference between the two periods of education on the site was referred to as "Old Haileybury" and "New Haileybury".

In its early years, the new Haileybury College retained close links to those involved in colonial administration, and in 1942 it merged with the struggling Imperial Service College to become Haileybury and Imperial Service College.

Administrators

Principals


The college had four principals:

• 1806–1815: Samuel Henley[7]
• 1815–1837: Joseph Batten[8]
• 1837–1843: Charles Webb Le Bas[8]
• 1844–1858: Henry Melvill, afterwards Canon of St. Paul's[9]

Deans

The position of dean was filled by one of the professors:

• 1813: William Dealtry, MA
• 1814–1838: Charles Webb Le Bas, MA
• 1838–1850: James Amiraux Jeremie (Professor of Classics)
• 1850–1857: W. E. Buckley

Registrars

The position of registrar was filled by one of the professors:

• 1813: William Dealtry
• 1814–1816: Bewick Bridge
• 1816–1830: Edward Lewton
• 1831–1834: Henry George Keene
• 1834–1837: James Michael
• 1838–1857: Fred Smith

Professors

Languages


• Alexander Hamilton taught Sanskrit and Bengali (1806-18).[10]
• Charles Stewart taught Hindustani (Urdu) and Persian (1806-).
• Graves Chamney Haughton (1817–27) FRS previously of Fort William College, Calcutta, taught Hindustani, Persian, Arabic, Bengali and Sanskrit.
• Francis Johnson taught Sanskrit, Bengali and Telugu (1824–55).[11]
• Mirza Muhammed Ibrahim, a Persian, held a permanent appointment as a professor of Arabic and Persian (1826–44)
• Monier Monier-Williams taught Sanskrit, Bengali and Telugu (1844–58).
• Edward Backhouse Eastwick was Professor of Hindustani, Hindi and Marathi (1845–57).[12]
• Major J. W. J.Ouseley, Professor of Persian and Arabic (previously Professor of the Arabic and Persian Languages in the College of Fort-William, Calcutta) (1844–57)[13][14][15]

Law

• Edward Christian (1806–18)
• James Mackintosh was Professor of Law and General Politics 1818-24.
• William Empson,[16] was Professor of Law (1824–52).
• John Farley Leith QC (1872–80), later Member of Parliament for Aberdeen

Political Economy

• Thomas Malthus taught from 1805-34.
• Richard Jones was Professor of History and Political Economy (1834–55).
• The Rt Hon Sir James Stephen also taught political economy (1855–57)

Mathematics and Natural Philosophy

• William Dealtry was Professor of Mathematics 1806-13.[17] He had been Second Wrangler in 1796.
• Bewick Bridge (1767–1833) was Professor of Mathematics 1806-16.
• Charles Webb Le Bas (1813–37)
• Charles Babbage applied unsuccessfully for a job in 1816.
• Henry Walter (1816–30)
• William Sturgeon lectured on science in 1824.
• Frederick Smith (1831–50) of Peterhouse College, Cambridge
• J. W. L. Heaviside (1838–57) previously of Trinity College, and then Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, where he graduated Second Wrangler and a Smith's Prize winner in 1830, and tutored until he moved to Haileybury.

Classical and General Literature

• Edward Lewton (1806–30)
• Joseph Hallett Batten (1806–15)
• James Amiraux Jeremie (also Dean) (1830–50), elected in 1850 Regius Professor of Divinity at Cambridge.
• W.E.Buckley (1850–57) previously tutor and fellow at Brasenose College, Oxford and Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford (1844–50), and a member and subsequently vice-president of the Roxburghe Club.

Other

• Henry George Keene, who served at the Battle of Seringapatam with the first Lord Harris (his uncle), and whose American wife, though she came of a New England family, was related to Lord Cornwallis. His son became a Fellow of the University of Calcutta and a prolific writer.[13][14]
• Horace Hayman Wilson, Examiner in Sanskrit (1837–57)

Assistants in the Oriental Department included Maulavi Abdal Aly (1809–12), Maulavi Mirza Khedel (1809–19), The Revd. Robert Anderson (1820–25), and David Shea (1826–36). Moonshy Ghoolam Hyder and Thomas Medland taught oriental writing.[13][14]

Notable alumni

• Sir Edward Colebrooke, 4th Baronet[18]
• John Russell Colvin
• Ashley Eden
• Henry Bartle Frere
• John Peter Grant
• Sir John Lawrence
• Charles Merivale
• Monier Monier-Williams
• John Muir (indologist)
• Sir William Muir
• Richard Paternoster
• Charles Pelham Villiers
• Sir Richard Temple, 1st Baronet
• Charles Trevelyan
• Charles John Wingfield
• Allan Octavian Hume

References

1. Desmond, R. G. C. (1978). "A Repton Garden at Haileybury". Garden History. 6 (2): 16–19. JSTOR 1586693.
2. Danvers et al. 1894, p. 18.
3. "The East India College". Haileybury. Archived from the original on 22 December 2016. Retrieved 26 May 2018.
4. college, East India (26 May 2018). "The Haileybury observer". Books.google.co.uk. Retrieved 26 May 2018.
5. Richard Rhodes James, The Road from Mandalay: A Journey in the Shadow of the East (2007), p. 191
6. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2016-06-01. Retrieved 2016-05-18.
7. Moriarty, G. P.; Haigh, John D. (revised) (2007) [2004]. "Henley, Samuel (1740–1815)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/12933. (subscription required)
8. Minchin, James George Cotton (1901). Our Public Schools: their influence on English history. London: Swan Sonnenschein.
9. Boase, G. C.; Matthew, H. C. G. (revised) (2004). "Henley, Samuel (1740–1815)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/18540. (subscription required)
10. Rosane Rocher, ‘Sanskrit for Civil Servants 1806-1818’, Journal of the American Oriental Society 122, 2002, p. 381-390.
11. ODNB article by Cecil Bendall, ‘Johnson, Francis (1795/6–1876)’, rev. Parvin Loloi, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [1], accessed 21 Sept 2007.
12. ODNB article by Stanley Lane-Poole, ‘Eastwick, Edward Backhouse (1814–1883)’, rev. Parvin Loloi, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [2], accessed 20 Sept 2007.
13. Sir Richard Temple (1882). Men and Events of My Time in India. London: John Murray. p. 18. Retrieved 9 Oct2007.
14. F. C. Danvers, M Monier-Williams; et al. (1894). Memorials of Old Haileybury College. Westminster: Archibald Constable. Quoted in A Dictionary of Public Administration by Shriram Maheshwari.
15. The Mulfuzāt Timūry (Autobiographical Memoirs) of the Moghul Emperor Timūr p 16 accessed 9 Oct 2007
16. ODNB article by Joanne Shattock, ‘Empson, William (1791–1852)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [3], accessed 20 Sept 2007
17. ODNB article by M. C. Curthoys, ‘Dealtry, William (1775–1847)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [4], accessed 20 Sept 2007.
18. Binns, Sheila (2014). Sir Edward Colebrooke of Abington and Ottershaw, Baronet and Member of Parliament: The Four Lives of an Extraordinary Victorian. Guildford, Surrey: Grosvenor House Publishing Ltd. p. 16. ISBN 978 17814 86948.

Further reading

• Danvers, Frederick Charles; Martineau, Harriet; Monier-Williams, Monier; Bayley, Steuart Colvin; Wigram, Percy; Sapte, Brand (1894). Memorials of old Haileybury College. Westminster: Archibald Constable.
• Farrington, Anthony, ed. (1976). The Records of the East India College, Haileybury, & other institutions. London: H.M.S.O.

External links

• Death record of Joseph Batten
• Persian Professor in Britain: Mirza Muhammed Ibrahim at the East India Company's College, 1826-1844 by Michael H. Fisher
• "Haileybury College" . New International Encyclopedia. 1905.
• "Haileybury College" . Encyclopedia Americana. 1920.
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Fort William College [East India College Calcutta]
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Appendix II: The College of Fort William in Its Connexion with the East India College, Haileybury.

On the 18th of August, 1800, the Marquis Wellesley, Governor-General of India, wrote a minute in Council containing his reasons for establishing a College at Fort William, Calcutta.

It was a long document which, when printed, occupied nearly 43 pages 4to. I subjoin a brief summary: --

The age at which writers usually arrive in India [N.B., this was written in 1800] is from sixteen to eighteen. Some of them have been educated with a view to the Indian Civil Service, but on utterly erroneous principles; their education being confined to commercial knowledge and in no degree extended to liberal studies. On arrival in India they are either stationed in the interior, where they ought to be conversant with the languages, laws, and customs of the natives, or they are employed in Government offices where they are chiefly occupied in transcribing papers. Once landed in India their studies, morals, manners, expenses and conduct are no longer subject to any regulation, restraint, or guidance. Hence they often acquire habits destructive to their health and fortunes.

Under these circumstances the General has determined to found a College at Fort William in Bengal for the instruction of the junior Civil Servants in such branches of literature, science, and knowledge as may be deemed necessary to qualify them for the discharge of their duties; and, considering that such a College would be a becoming public monument to commemorate the Conquest of Mysore, he has dated the law for the foundation of the College on the 4th of May, 1800, the first anniversary of the reduction of Seringapatam.

A suitable building is to be erected at Garden Reach. There will be a Provost, Vice-Provost, and a complete staff of Professors both of European and Oriental subjects.1 [1. A list of these was printed. I select the following: -- Provost, Rev. David Brown; Vice-Provost, Rev. C. Buchanan (both of these were Chaplains of the H.E.I.C.S.); Sanskrit and Hindu Law, H.T. Colebrooke; British Law, Sir George Barlow, Bart.; Greek and Latin Classics, Rev. C. Buchanan; Persian, Francis Gladwin; Assistant in Persian and Arabic, Mathew Lumsden; second Assistant in Persian, Capt. Charles Stewart; Sanskrit and Bengali, Rev. William Carey; Hindustani, John Gilchrist.] Statutes are to be drawn up, and all Indian civilians on first arriving in India, even those destined for Bombay and Madras are to be educated at this College, which will be called the College of Fort William.


The statutes were promulgated by the first Provost (the Rev. David Brown), on April 10, 1801, and when printed occupied 12 pages 4to. The students were then located in provisional buildings, and the first Disputation in Oriental languages was held on the 6th of February, 1802; a speech being delivered on the occasion by Sir George Barlow, the acting Visitor. All this was done without the knowledge of the Court of Directors in London, who, when they heard of the foundation of the College, passed a resolution against it, on the ground of the enormous and indefinite expenditure which it might involve. They complimented the Marquis on his able minute, and acknowledged the necessity for obtaining a higher class of civil servants by raising the standard of their education and giving them an improved special training, but they only expressed their approbation of part of his plan. In fact a compromise was arranged (see note to line 6 of page 27 of this volume), and it was decided that although the proposed collegiate Building at Garden Reach was not to be erected, an Institution to be called “The East-India College” should be founded in Hertfordshire, which was to give a good general education, combined with instruction in the rudiments of the Oriental languages, while Lord Wellesley’s Institution was to be allowed to continue at Calcutta in a less comprehensive form under the name of Fort William College, with a local habitation in “Writers’ Buildings,” the name given to a long house with good verandahs looking south at the north end of Tank Square (now Dalhousie Square).

It was thus brought about that Fort William College became a kind of continuation of Haileybury, and that its work was restricted to the imparting of fuller instruction in Oriental subjects, the groundwork of which had been laid at Haileybury. And no doubt it was originally intended that all junior civilians who had passed through the Haileybury course should repair to the College in Calcutta for such instruction. Moreover, the process of sifting, which began at Haileybury, was continued at the Forst William Institution. At any rate, it occasionally happened that the worst of those “bad bargains,” which Haileybury, in its too great leniency, had spared, were eliminated from the service at Calcutta.


Yet, according to Mr. Malthus, the discipline at Fort William College was for some time in a most unsatisfactory state. He mentions that far too large a number of young civilians, whose ages ranged from 16 to 19, were collected at Calcutta between 1801 and 1808 (Haileybury being then barely founded, or at least not in actual working order), and that much dissipation and irregularity existed among them (Pamphlet, pp. 55-56).

Unquestionably the establishment of Haileybury had a beneficial effect in abridging the period of residence at Calcutta, as the following extract from Mr. Malthus’ pamphlet proves: --

In 1811 twenty students left Fort William College qualified for official situations. Of the twelve who had been previously at Haileybury, six left after six month’s residence, two after eight months, one after nine months, one after two years, two after three years. Of the eight who had not been at Haileybury three left after two and a quarter years, one after three years, one after three and a quarter years, two after four years, one after four and a half years.


Still, the co-existence of Haileybury in connexion with Fort William College does not seem to have caused much improvement in the state of the discipline at the latter college; for at p. 38 of Mr. Malthus’ pamphlet we read: --

In the last public examination [N.B., this was written in 1817] at the College in India, of which the account has arrived, five students were expelled. Notwithstanding the opportunities afford to them during a protracted stay at Calcutta, they had not acquired such a knowledge of two Oriental languages as would enable them to pass the examination necessary to qualify them for an official situation.


It appears, then, from the above extracts that, after the founding of Haileybury, the period of residence at Fort William College was sometimes completed by good men in six months. On the other hand, in the case of inferior men, it was sometimes protracted for three or four years, or even more. It appears, too, that for many years those who were transferred from Haileybury to Fort William lived a collegiate life there somewhat similar to that at Haileybury; that is to say, they had rooms assigned to them in “Writers’ Buildings,” and were subject to some sort of collegiate discipline. Moreover, it is clear that, for three or four years, even Bombay and Madras civilians were required to present themselves at Calcutta and go through their period of Indian probation at Fort William.1 [1. Mr. W.S. Seton-Karr has lent me a curious and scarce volume entitled “Roebuck’s Annals of the College of Fort William.” There I find reports of the results of all the examinations from 1801 to 1818, and it may be proved from these reports that civilians destined for Bombay and Madras gained prizes at Fort William in the years 1801-1804, and notably among them was a connexion of my own, Mr. John Romer, who was for some time a Judge in the Bombay Presidency.] As to Bengal civilians their residence there went on, I believe, till about the year 1835. So far as I have been able to ascertain, it was not till after that year that they were allowed to reside with their friends or in “chummeries,” or in lodgings anywhere in the town.2 [2. Mr. Seton-Karr tells me then in 1842 he and Mr. R.N. Cust and Mr. Montresor took a good three-storied house in Middleton Row, Calcutta, and there “chummed” together during their period of probation.] Even after that date, however, they had to go to “Writers’ Buildings” (where there was a good Library and Examination Room) for their monthly and final examinations.3 [3. Mr. Seton-Karr informs me, that in 1842 the two examiners (Colonel Ouseley, and Capt. Marshall) had offices in “Writers’ Buildings,” and that monthly examinations were held there, but that a considerable portion of the building was then let out as merchants’ offices.]

The annual Fort William “Disputations” (corresponding to the Haileybury “Visitations”), which took place in early years, were generally held at Government House, the Governor-General being the “Visitor,” but I find that in one year (1802) these “Disputations” – accompanied as they always were by a public distribution of prizes, and a speech from the Governor-General – took place in the Examination-room of the College Buildings.

It was not till January 24, 1854, that the College of Fort William was abolished. That year saw both the first introduction of the Indian Civil Service competitive system into England, and at the same time a change in the method of dealing with Indian civilians on their first arrival in India. Nevertheless, even after that year, examinations continued to be held in India under Boards of Examiners appointed by the Government, but not under collegiate regulations or in any special building.

Monier Monier-Williams.

-- Memorials of Old Haileybury College, by Frederick Charles Danvers, Sir Monier Monier-Williams, Sir Steuart Colvin Bayley, Percy Wigram, Brand Sapte


But it would be unpardonable not to speak of the College at Calcutta, of which the original plan was doubtless the most magnificent attempt ever made for the promotion of learning in the East. I am not conscious that I am biased either by personal feelings or literary prejudices, when I say that I consider that original plan as a wise and noble proposition, of which the adoption in its full extent would have had the happiest tendency to secure the good government of India, as well as to promote the interest of science. Even in its present mutilated state we have seen, at the last public exhibition, Sanscrit declamations by English youth; a circumstance so extraordinary*, [*It must be remembered that this Discourse was read in 1804. In the present year, 1818, this circumstance could no longer be called extraordinary. From the learned care of Mr. Hamilton, late Professor of Indian Languages at the East India College, a proficiency in Sanscrit is become not uncommon in an European Institution.] that, if it be followed by suitable advances, it will mark an epoch in the history of learning.

-- Transactions of The Literary Society of Bombay, With Engravings


The Asiatic Society was founded by civil servant Sir William Jones on 15 January 1784 in a meeting presided over by Sir William Jones, Justice of the Supreme Court of Judicature at Fort William at the Fort William in Calcutta, then capital of the British Raj, to enhance and further the cause of Oriental research. At the time of its foundation, this Society was named as "Asiatick Society". In 1825, the society dropped the antique k without any formal resolution and the Society was renamed as "The Asiatic Society". In 1832 the name was changed to "The Asiatic Society of Bengal" and again in 1936 it was renamed as "The Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal". Finally, on 1 July 1951, the name of the society was changed to its present one. The Society is housed in a building at Park Street in Kolkata (Calcutta). The Society moved into this building during 1808. In 1823, the Medical and Physical Society of Calcutta was formed and all the meetings of this society were held in the Asiatic Society.

-- The Asiatic Society [Asiatic Society of Bengal / Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal], by Wikipedia


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Fort William, Calcutta

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Fort William College, Calcutta (Kolkata). puronokolkata.com

Fort William College, Calcutta (variant College of Fort William) (1800 - 1854) was an academy of Oriental studies and a centre of learning. Founded on 10 July 1800, within the Fort William complex in Calcutta by Lord Wellesley, then Governor-General of British India. The statute of foundation was passed on 4 May 1800, to commemorate the first anniversary of the victory over Tipu Sultan at Seringapatam.[1] Thousands of books were translated from Sanskrit, Arabic, Persian, Bengali, Hindi, and Urdu into English at this institution. This college also promoted the printing and publishing of Urdu books.

Languages

The College of Fort William emerged as both a centre of research and a publication unit, a cradle of creativity as well as scholarship. Planned originally to train probationer British civilians in the languages and cultures of the subjugated country, the college rendered services tantamount to those of a university in promoting modern Indian literatures, Bengali in particular… Under the leadership of William Carey, the College could also claim credit for drawing together Sanskrit pandits and Perso-Arabic munshis to reshape Bengali prose… The variety of the College’s publication also deserve note. From colloquies and popular stories, chronicles and legends, to definitive editions of literary texts.[2]

-- Majumdar, Swapan[3]


Fort William College aimed at training British officials in Indian languages and, in the process, fostered the development of languages such as Bengali and Urdu.[4] The period is of historical importance. In 1815, Ram Mohan Roy settled in Calcutta. It is considered by many historians to be the starting point of the Bengali Renaissance.[5]:212 Establishment of The Calcutta Madrassa in 1781, the Asiatic Society in 1784 and the Fort William College in 1800, completed the first phase of Kolkata’s emergence as an intellectual centre.[2]

Teaching of Asian languages dominated: Arabic, Urdu, Persian, Sanskrit, Bengali. Later, Marathi and even Chinese were added.[6] Each department of the college was staffed by notable scholars. The Persian department was headed by Neil B. Edmonstone, Persian translator to the East India Company's government since 1794. His assistant teacher was John H. Harington, a judge of Sadar Diwani Adalat and Francis Gladwin, a soldier diplomat. For Arabic studies, there was Lt. John Baillie, a noted Arabist. The Urdu department was entrusted to John Borthwick Gilchrist, an Indologist of great repute. Henry Thomas Colebrooke, the famous orientalist, was head of the Sanskrit department. William Carey, a non-civilian missionary and a specialist in many Indian languages, was selected to head the department of vernacular languages.[7] While notable scholars were identified and appointed for different languages, there was no suitable person in Calcutta who could be appointed to teach Bengali. In those days, the Brahmin scholars learnt only Sanskrit, considered to be the language of the gods, and they did not study Bengali. The authorities decided to appoint Carey, who was with the Baptist Mission in Serampore. He, in turn, appointed Mrityunjoy Vidyalankar as head pandit, Ramnath Bachaspati as second pandit and Ramram Basu as one of the assistant pandits.[8]

Along with teaching, translations were organized. The college employed more than one hundred local linguists.[6] There were no textbooks available in Bengali. On 23 April 1789, the Calcutta Gazette published the humble request of several natives of Bengal for a Bengali grammar and dictionary.[8]

Location

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Fort William College, The Exchange, Calcutta, c1800 Jan, by অযান্ত্রিক

The college was located at the corner of Council House Street and the parade ground, (now named Maidan). After the college closed the building had a series of occupancies. First it was The Exchange of Messrs. Mackenzie Lyall & Co., then offices of the Bengal Nagpur Railway,[9]:271 and lastly the Raj Bhavan ('Government House').[9]:544

Library

The College library of Fort William was an important centre of learning and housed a magnificent collection of old manuscripts and many valuable historical books from across South Asia. Multiple MS copies were printed.[6] [10] When the college was dissolved in 1854, the books of the collection listed for preservation were transferred to the newly formed Calcutta Public Library, now the National Library.[6]

Hurdles

The court of directors of the British East India Company were never in favour of a training college in Calcutta, and for that reason there was always a lack of funds for running the college. Subsequently, a separate college for the purpose, the East India Company College at Haileybury (England), was established in 1807. However, Fort William College continued to be a centre of learning languages.[6][7]

With the British settling down in the seat of power, their requirements changed. Lord William Bentinck announced his educational policy of public instruction in English in 1835, mostly to cater to the growing needs of administration and commerce.[5]:236 He clipped the wings of Fort William College, and the Dalhousie administration formally dissolved the institution in 1854.[7]

Eminent scholars

Fort William College was served by a number of eminent scholars. They contributed enormously towards development of Indian languages and literature. Some of them are noted below:

• William Carey (1761–1834) was with Fort William College from 1801 to 1831. During this period he published a Bengali grammar and dictionary, numerous textbooks, the Bible, grammar and dictionary in other Indian languages.[11]:112
• Matthew Lumsden (1777–1835)
• John Borthwick Gilchrist (June 1759 – 1841)
Mrityunjay Vidyalankar (c. 1762 – 1819) was First Pandit at Fort William College. He wrote a number of textbooks and is considered the first 'conscious artist' of Bengali prose.[12] Although a Sanskrit scholar he started writing Bengali as per the needs of Fort William College. He published Batris Singhasan (1802), Hitopodesh (1808) and Rajabali (1808). The last named book was the first published history of India. Mrityunjoy did not know English so the contents were possibly provided by other scholars of Fort William College.[8]
• Tarini Charan Mitra (1772–1837), a scholar in English, Urdu, Hindi, Arabic and Persian, was with the Hindustani department of Fort William College. He had translated many stories into Bengali.[11]:196
• Lallu Lal (also spelt as Lalloolal or Lallo Lal), the father of Hindi Khariboli prose, was instructor in Hindustani at Fort William College. He printed and published in 1815 the first book in the old Hindi literary language Braj Bhasha, Tulsidas’s Vinaypatrika.[4]
• Ramram Basu (1757–1813) was with the Fort William College. He assisted William Carey, Joshua Marshman and William Ward in the publication of the first Bengali translation of the Bible.[4]
• Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar (1820–1891) was head pandit at Fort William College from 1841 to 1846. He concentrated on English and Hindi while serving in the college.[11]:64 After discharging his duties as academician, and engagements as a reformer he had little time for creative writing. Yet through the textbooks he produced, the pamphlets he wrote and retelling of Kalidasa’s Shakuntala and Shakespeare’s A Comedy of Errors he set the norm of standard Bengali prose.[2]
• Madan Mohan Tarkalankar (1817–1858) taught at Fort William College. He was one of the pioneers of textbook writing.[11]:391

References

1. Danvers, FC; M. Monier-Williams; et al. (1894). Memorials of Old Haileybury College. Westminster: Archibald Constable and Company. p. 238.
2. Majumdar, Swapan, Literature and Literary Life in Old Calcutta, in Calcutta, the Living City, Vol I, edited by Sukanta Chaudhuri, pp. 107–9, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-563696-1.
3. Reader in Comparative Literature at Jadavpur University and Director of the Indian Cultural Centre at Suva, Fiji. Ref: Calcutta, the Living City, Vol. I, edited by Sukanta Chaudhuri, p. vii, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-563696-1.
4. Sarkar, Nikhil, Printing and the Spirit of Calcutta, in Calcutta, the Living City, Vol. I, edited by Sukanta Chaudhuri, pp. 130–2, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-563696-1.
5. Sengupta, Nitish, 2001–02, History of the Bengali-speaking People, UBS Publishers’ Distributors Pvt. Ltd., ISBN 81-7476-355-4.
6. Diehl, Katharine Smith. "College of Fort William". College of Fort William. Katharine Smith Diehl Seguin, Texas. Retrieved 19 February 2007.
7. Islam, Sirajul (2012). "Fort William College". In Islam, Sirajul; Jamal, Ahmed A. (eds.). Banglapedia: National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh (Second ed.). Asiatic Society of Bangladesh.
8. Mukhopadhyay, Prabhatkumar, Rammohun O Tatkalin Samaj O Sahitya, 1965, pp. 47–51, Viswa Bharati Granthan Bibhag (in Bengali).
9. Cotton, H.E.A., Calcutta Old and New, 1909/1980, General Printers and Publishers Pvt. Ltd.
10. Pritchett, Frances. "Selected publications of Fort William College" (PDF). First Editions recommended for preservation. Columbia University. Retrieved 19 February 2007.
11. Sengupta, Subodh Chandra and Bose, Anjali (editors), 1976/1998, Sansad Bangali Charitabhidhan(Biographical dictionary) Vol I, ISBN 81-85626-65-0 (in Bengali).
12. Acharya, Poromesh, Education in Old Calcutta, in Calcutta, the Living City, Vol I, edited by Sukanta Chaudhuri, pp. 108–9, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-563696-1.

Further reading

• Bowen, John (October 1955). "The East India Company's Education of its Own Servants". Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society. New Series. London: The Royal Asiatic Society. 87: 105–123. doi:10.1017/S0035869X00114029.
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Re: Freda Bedi, by Wikipedia

Postby admin » Sun Dec 15, 2019 9:42 pm

Fort William, India
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 12/15/19

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Image
Fort William, Kolkata, India
Fort William, a view from the inside, c. 1828
Image
Coordinates 22.5577°N 88.3380°E
Type: Fortress, garrisoned and armoured Army Headquarters.
Site information
Controlled by: British East India Company
Siraj Ud Daulah
Indian Army (Current)
Site history
Built: 1696-1702
In use: 1781 - present
Battles/wars: Battle of Plassey
Garrison information
Garrison Eastern Command

Fort William is a fort in Calcutta (Kolkata), built during the early years of the Bengal Presidency of British India. It sits on the eastern banks of the River Hooghly, the major distributary of the River Ganges. One of Kolkata's most enduring Raj-era edifices, it extends over an area of 70.9 hectares.

The fort was named after King William III.[1] In front of the Fort is the Maidan, the largest park in the city. An internal guard room became the Black Hole of Calcutta.

History

Image
A view of Calcutta from Fort William (1807).

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Plan (top-view) of Fort William, c. 1844

Main article: History of Kolkata

There are two Fort Williams. The original fort was built in the year 1696 by the British East India Company under the orders of Sir John Goldsborough which took a decade to complete.[2][3] Sir Charles Eyre started construction near the bank of the Hooghly River with the South-East Bastion and the adjacent walls. It was named after King William III in 1700. John Beard, Eyre's successor, added the North-East Bastion in 1701, and in 1702 started the construction of the Government House (Factory, see Factory (trading post)) at the centre of the fort. Construction ended in 1706. The original building had two stories and projecting wings. In 1756, the Nawab of Bengal, Siraj Ud Daulah, attacked the Fort, temporarily conquered the city, and changed its name to Alinagar. This led the British to build a new fort in the Maidan.

Robert Clive started rebuilding the fort in 1758, after the Battle of Plassey (1757); construction was completed in 1781 at a cost of approximately two million pounds. The area around the Fort was cleared, and the Maidan became "the Lungs of Kolkata". It stretches for around 3 km in the north-south direction and is around 1 km wide.


The Old Fort was repaired and used as a customs house from 1766 onwards.

Today Fort William is the property of Indian Army. The headquarters of Eastern Command is based there, with provisions for accommodating 10,000 army personnel. The Army guards it heavily, and civilian entry is restricted.

Much of Fort William is unchanged, but St Peter's Church, which used to serve as a chaplaincy centre for the British citizens of Kolkata, is now a library for the troops of HQ Eastern Command.

Presidency of Fort William

Main article: Bengal Presidency

Structure

The Fort is built of brick and mortar in the shape of an irregular octagon with an area 5 km². Five of its sides face landward, and three towards the Hooghly River. The design is that of a star fort, suited to defence against cannon firing solid shot,and dates from before the advent of explosive shells. A dry moat 9 m deep and 15 m broad surrounds the fort. The moat can be flooded but is designed as an area in which to use enfilade (or "flanking") fire against any attackers reaching the walls. There are six gates: Chowringhee, Plassey, Calcutta, Water Gate, St Georges and the Treasury Gate. There are similar forts at places like Thalassery in Kerala.[4] It has a 9-hole golf course currently.

Gallery

Image
Fort William 1735

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Fort William, Calcutta, 1756[5]

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Fort William 1760

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First English Chapel, Fort William, Calcutta. Raised in 1714, with contribution of Rs. 1000 by the East India Company (p. 197, March 1824)[6]

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St Peter's Church, Fort William by William Prinsep 1835

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The interior of the Arsenal, Fort William by William Prinsep 1835

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Main entrance, Fort William 2013

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South gate, Fort William 2013

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St. Peter's Church, Fort William, Kolkata

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Semaphore Tower, Fort William, Kolkata

See also

• Fort William College

References

1. Krishna Dutta (2003). Calcutta: A Cultural and Literary History. p. 71. ISBN 9781902669595.
2. Sudip Bhattacharya, Unseen Enemy: The English, Disease, and Medicine in Colonial Bengal, 1617 – 1847, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 30 Jun 2014, p.54
3. "Fort William Kolkata India - History of Fort William". http://www.makemytrip.com. Retrieved 27 December 2018.
4. Nandakumar Koroth, History of Forts in North Malabar
5. Grant, James (1873). British Battles On Land and Sea. Volume II. Cassell & Company, Limited. p. 69.
6. "The Gentleman's Magazine, and Historical Chronicle". The Gentleman's Magazine, and Historical Chronicle. 94 (1): 197. February 1824. Retrieved 13 December 2017.
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Re: Freda Bedi, by Wikipedia

Postby admin » Mon Dec 16, 2019 11:59 pm

Christopher Hills
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 12/16/19



Image
Christopher Hills
Christopher Hills, 1993
Born: 9 April 1926, Grimsby, Lincolnshire, United Kingdom
Died: 31 January 1997 (aged 70), Boulder Creek, California, United States
Nationality: British, American
Known for Spirituality, aquaculture
Notable work: Over 30 books on food from sunlight, spirulina chakras, consciousness, divining, world peace, creative conflict resolution, Movement Yoga, Nutrition
Patron(s): Jawaharlal Nehru

Christopher Hills (April 9, 1926 – January 31, 1997) was an English-born author, philosopher, and scientist, described as the "Father of Spirulina"[1] for popularizing spirulina cyanobacteria as a food supplement. He also wrote 30 books on consciousness, meditation, yoga and spiritual evolution, divining, world government, aquaculture, and personal health.

Hills was variously headlined by the press as a "Western Guru Scientist",[2] "Natural Foods Pioneer",[3] "Evolutionary Revolutionary"[4] and a "Modern Merlin".[5]

As a successful commodities trader and art patron in Jamaica, he retired from business at an early age to follow a spiritual quest that took him around the world as a speaker, author, entrepreneur and pioneer of algae as one of the most efficient sources of food and fuel for humanity.


Early biography

Born in Grimsby, England to a family of fishermen, Hills grew up sailing the bleak and turbulent North Sea. In 1940 he enrolled as a cadet in nautical school and joined the British Merchant Navy during World War II. At sea, Hills had several life and death experiences that formed his views on karma, divinity and destiny. On one occasion a rogue wave swept him off the deck hundreds of yards (metres) away from the vessel, but another wave picked him up and threw him back onto the ship,[6] cutting open his forehead but saving him from freezing to death. As German U-boats sank 2,828 merchant ships, he watched tanker crew colleagues incinerated in the flaming oil-slicked Atlantic.[7] At the end of the war, as navigating officer for an Esso oil tanker, Hills found himself docked in Curaçao, where he set up shop as a commodities trader with branch offices in Venezuela and Aruba.

Encountering problems with South American contract law when a client reneged on a deal, Hills moved to Jamaica, where business was conducted under the British judicial system. There with the help of plantocrat philanthropist Percy Junor [Percival Sigismund Junor, Justice of the Peace, Business Man, Financier, Planter and Philanthropist][8] he founded commodity companies specializing in sugar, bananas, insurance, telegraph communications and agricultural spices pimento, nutmegs and ginger. Financing for the first export corporation came from British businessman Andrew Hay,[9] then husband of best-selling motivational author Louise Hay[10] who in the 1950s was a high-fashion model and Hills family friend.[11]

Andrew Mackenzie Hay, 73, Trade Expert
by Eric Pace
New York Times
May 18, 2001

Andrew Mackenzie Hay, an importer and expert on international trade who was once married to the socialite Sharman Douglas, died in his sleep on May 2 at his home in Portland, Ore. He was 73 and had lived in Portland since 1982.

He had been ill, but the exact cause of death was unclear, said his wife, Catherine.

Mr. Hay, the son of a British banker, had become an American citizen, a New Yorker and the president of Calvert Vavasseur & Company, a food importing concern,....

Complaint

Respondent Calvert, Vavasseur & Company, Inc., hereinafter referred to as Calvert-Vavasseur, is a corporation organized and existing under the laws of the State of New York, with its principal office and place of business located at 19 Rector Street, New York, New York.

Calvert-Vavasseur is a subsidiary of J.H. Vavasseur & Company, Ltd., London, England, and acts as a selling agent in the United States for two other subsidiaries of J.H. Vavasseur & Company, Ltd., Red V Coconut Products, Ltd., Manila, Philippine Islands and Red V Coconut Products Company, Inc., which latter corporation is also named as a respondent herein. Calvert-Vavasseur engages in the dessicated and sweetened coconut business in the United States through another subsidiary of J.H. Vavasseur & Company, Ltd., Wood & Selick Coconut Company, Inc., which is also named as a respondent herein.

Respondent Red V Coconut Products Company, Inc., hereinafter referred to as Red V, is a corporation organized and existing under the laws of the State of New Jersey, with its principal office and place of business located at 19 Rector Street, New York, New York.

Respondent Wood & Selick Coconut Company, Inc., hereinafter referred to as Wood & Selick, is a corporation organized and existing under the laws of the State of New York, with its principal office and place of business located at 19 Rector Street, New York, New YOrk.

Par. 2. The respondents hereinbefore named and described, either directly or indirectly through subsidiary or affiliated corporations, or operating divisions or units, are engaged in the importation, sale and distribution of Philippine dessicated coconut, and in the processing, sale and distribution, or sale and distribution of sweetened coconut….

Par. 5. The Philippine Islands supply practically all of the dessicated coconut imported, sold and distributed commercially in the United States. In 1958 total dessicated coconut imports into the United States amounted to 99,704,781 pounds, valued at $14,349,832, of which 98,361,868 pounds, valued at $14,195,960, or more than 98 percent on a quantity and value basis, were imported from the Philippine Islands.

Par. 6. For a number of years, respondent General Foods, through its foreign subsidiary, Franklin Baker Company of the Philippines, and respondent Calvert-Vavasseur, through its Philippine affiliate, Red V Coconut Products, Ltd., have produced, processed and exported from the Philippine Islands approximately 75 percent of all Philippine dessicated coconut imported, sold and distributed commercially in the United States….

Respondent Glidden engages in the importation, sale and distribution of Philippine desiccated coconut, and in the processing, sale and distribution of sweetened coconut, through its operating division, Durkee Famous Foods. For a number of years, Glidden has purchased and imported its total requirements of Philippine desiccated coconut on a contract basis from Red V Coconut Products, Ltd., an affiliated corporation of respondent Calvert-Vavasseur. Glidden, through its Durkee Famous Foods Division, operates a coconut processing plant at Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, which supplies its total requirements of sweetened coconut. This plant also produces and supplies on a contract basis the total sweetened coconut requirements of respondent Calvert-Vavasseur….

Par. 9. Each and all of the respondents, either directly or indirectly through subsidiary or affiliated corporations or operating divisions or units, acting between and among themselves, for a number of years last past and continuing to the present time, have maintained and now maintain and have in effect a conspiracy, combination, agreement and understanding to pursue, and they have pursued, a planned common course of action between and among themselves to adopt and adhere to certain practices and policies which hinder, lessen, restrict, restrain, suppress and eliminate competition in the importation, processing, sale and distribution of Philippine desiccated coconut and sweetened coconut in commerce, in violation of Section 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act.

Par. 10. Pursuant to and in furtherance of said conspiracy, combination, agreement, understanding and planned common course of action, each and all of the respondents, either directly or indirectly through subsidiary or affiliated corporations or operating divisions or units, acting between and among themselves, for a number of years last past and continuing to the present time, have engaged in and carried out by various methods and means the following acts, practices, systems and policies, among others:

(a) Agreed to fix, stabilize and maintain, and have fixed, stabilized and maintained, uniformly identical F.O.B. port of entry base prices and price schedules for all types or cuts of Philippine desiccated coconut imported, sold and distributed by respondents in the United States.

(b) Agreed to adopt, maintain and use, and revise from time to time, and have adopted, maintained and used, and revised from time to time, a system of established price differentials, composed of freight to and handling and storage charges at specified warehouse distribution points throughout the country, which each of the respondents by agreement applies to the fixed and stabilized uniformly identical F.O.B. port of entry base prices and price schedules for Philippine desiccated coconut, in calculating, determining and establishing uniformly identical prices and terms of delivery on all types or cuts of Philippine desiccated coconut sold and delivered anywhere in the United States.

© Agreed to fix, stabilize and maintain, and have fixed, stabilized and maintained, uniformly identical base prices and price schedules for all types or cuts of sweetened coconut processed, sold and delivered by respondents anywhere in the United States.

etc.

-- Federal Trade Commission Decisions, Volume 59, by United States. Federal Trade Commission


by 1968, when he married Sharman Douglas, known as ''Charmin' Sharman,'' a well-known friend of Princess Margaret's whose father was Lewis W. Douglas, the American ambassador to Britain in the late 1940's. They were divorced in 1977.

Principal of McGill University

In August 1937, [Lewis Williams] Douglas was approached by Sir Edward Beatty about becoming principal of McGill University in Montreal, Canada. Bored with his job at American Cyanamid, Douglas accepted and was installed on January 7, 1938. Douglas would subsequently refer to his time as McGill as the happiest in his life. As principal, he struggled to address the deficit in the university budget and to counteract what he perceived as the socialist leanings within the social science faculty of the university. By reducing expenditures and soliciting private donations he succeeded in restoring McGill to financial health, and launched a public lecture series designed to promote conservative viewpoints.

-- Lewis Williams Douglas, by Wikipedia


Some historians assert creating a "Manchurian Candidate" subject through "mind control" techniques was a goal of MKUltra and related CIA projects.[32] Alfred McCoy has claimed the CIA attempted to focus media attention on these sorts of "ridiculous" programs, so the public would not look at the primary goal of the research, which was developing effective methods of torture and interrogation. Such authors cite as one example the CIA's KUBARK interrogation manual refers to "studies at McGill University", and most of the techniques recommended in KUBARK are exactly those researcher Donald Ewen Cameron used on his test subjects (sensory deprivation, drugs, isolation, etc.).[30]

-- Project MKULtra, by Wikipedia


Mr. Hay was also president of the British-American Chamber of Commerce from 1966 to 1968.

The British American Council
by http://www.babcsf.org/about/history/

The original organization was incorporated in 1954 as the British American Trade Centre, with the aim of promoting and assisting trade between the UK and the US.

The first President was C E C (Euan) Rabagliati, and the Consul-General in San Francisco at the time was KJM White.

Membership fees in 1954 were as follows:

▪ Sponsor Membership $250.00 US per annum
▪ Individual Membership $100.00 US per annum

(Worth noting when you look at the cost of membership 50 years later!)

Original Board Members included representatives of BOAC, Bechtel, Barclays, Wells Fargo and Orient & Pacific Lines.

In November 1957, the organization changed its name to the British American Chamber of Commerce and Trade Centre. Chalmers Graham, a founding partner of Graham and James (now Squire, Sanders and Dempsey LLP), spearheaded the Chamber's growth for several years.

For a period in the 1980s, the organization was known as the British American Chamber of Commerce San Francisco. It was changed in the 1990s to the British American Chamber of Commerce Northern California, to reflect the growth of the organization within the Bay Area, specifically in Silicon Valley. Mostyn Lloyd, OBE, served as Executive Director from 1990 to 2006 and was a driving force in bringing our Annual Christmas Lunch attendance from a mere 200 people to the 1000 that it is today.

Peter Gardiner, OBE, served as President for 10 years and was elected the first President of an umbrella network, British American Business Council (BABC) when it was formed in 1994. This umbrella organization helps steer the largest transatlantic business network, comprising nearly 30 independent BABC chapters in all major business centers across North America, and the United Kingdom, including the BABC in Northern California.

The BACC elected its first woman President, Kathleen Kimura, MBE, in 2001. Kathleen currently serves on our Board, Chairs the Annual Christmas Lunch and represents BABC Northern California and all other West Coast chapters within the umbrella organization.

In 2004, a re-branding changed our name to the British American Business Council Northern California to more closely align our organization with fellow chapters spread across the BABC international network.

With offices and staff in downtown San Francisco, and a Board comprising representatives of the Bay Area’s internationally minded business community, the BABC Northern California provides business networking, seminars and services in San Francisco, Silicon Valley and the East Bay.


In 1968, he was named a Commander of the Order of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth II, in recognition of his contributions to British-American trade.

He went on to become president of an American organization of exporters and importers from 1977 to 1979.

Mr. Hay was born in London, and he received a master's degree in economics from Cambridge University.
He served three years in the British Army as an officer in the Intelligence Corps.


His earlier marriages, to Jennifer Dimoline and to an author named Louise [Louise Lynn Hay/Helen Vera Lunney] who still uses the name Hay, also ended in divorce.

In addition to his wife, the former Catherine Newman, whom he married in 1977, he is survived by a brother, Dr. David, who lives in Hampshire, England; and a nephew, Crispin Hay of London.


In 1950 Christopher Hills married a young English woman, Norah Bremner, deputy headmistress of Wolmer's School in Kingston. Her father, Bernard E. Bremner B.E.M.,[12] was the Magistrate, Chief of Customs, and Mayor[13] of King's Lynn, Norfolk who in 1951 co-founded the King's Lynn Festival[14] with concert pianist[15] Ruth Roche, Baroness Fermoy. Lady Fermoy, wife of Baron Fermoy, is Diana, Princess of Wales' maternal grandmother.[16] The Hillses had two sons, both born in Jamaica. The family frequently sailed to England for events such as the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II and Mayor Bremner's presenting Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother with Freedom of the Borough,[17] which encompassed the royal family's home at nearby Sandringham.

Jamaica business leader

From 1949 to 1967, Christopher and Norah Hills became influential forces in Jamaica's commerce, art, politics and culture.[18]

Image
Governor of Jamaica Sir Hugh Foot opening a 1957 Hills Galleries exhibition showing works by Mallica "Kapo" Reynolds with Christopher Hills

Believing that Jamaica's strength lay in its agriculture, Christopher Hills co-founded the Jamaica Agriculture & Industrial Party (AIP)[19] as an alternative to the two major political parties: Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) and People's National Party (PNP), both of which he felt were too busy warring with each other to look out for the middle class and the country people who were the backbone of Jamaica's rural economy. Despite competing vigorously in the polls, the Hills couple were nevertheless close friends with JLP leader Sir Alexander Bustamante and Norman Manley, head of the PNP, who both served as Jamaican Prime Ministers. Norman Manley in fact had been best man at the Hills' wedding.[20]

In 1951 Christopher and Norah Hills founded Hills Galleries Ltd, which, in cooperation with the Prime Minister's wife Edna Manley,[21][22] became a nexus of the Jamaican art movement.
The Gallery & Antiques showroom[23] at 101 Harbour Street, Kingston was built on the site of Simon Bolivar's Jamaica residence where, in 1815, the revolutionary wrote his famous letter Carta de Jamaica.[24]

Throughout the 1950s and 1960s Hills Galleries supplied and exhibited local celebrity artists Ian Fleming and Noël Coward, enjoyed the patronage of British royals[25][26][27] and such high-profile clients as Sadruddin Aga Khan, Winthrop Rockefeller,[28] Elizabeth Taylor,[29][30] Lady Bird Johnson, Grace Kelly and Errol Flynn. Hills Galleries was also the main agent for Rowney's, Grumbacher and Winsor & Newton art supplies in the West Indies.[31] Through multiple exhibitions, the Hillses nurtured or launched the careers of a plethora of talented Jamaican artists, such as Gaston Tabois,[32] Kenneth Abendana Spencer, Carl Abrahams, Barrington Watson,[33] Albert Huie,[34][35] Gloria Escoffery, Karl Parboosingh, Vernon Tong and the revivalist preacher/painter/sculptor Mallica Reynolds.[36]

Christopher Hills opened a Hills Galleries branch on Jamaica's north coast at Montego Bay, mooring his yacht, the Robanne[37] at Round Hill, a popular resort for foreign leaders and industrialists vacationing in the Caribbean. It was there he met then Vice President Lyndon Johnson and CBS president William S. Paley, who in 1956, sponsored a Hills Galleries exhibition of Jamaican art at Barbizon Plaza[38][39] in New York City, which awoke U.S. art collectors to Jamaica's dynamic sphere of artistic talent. The exhibition was described by the Daily Gleaner as "Epochal in the establishment of a market for West Indian art."[40] The Hills family spent weekends and holidays at Port Antonio visiting friends and clients including their neighbor, novelist Robin Moore at Blue Lagoon.[41] There Hills met Baron Hans Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza who asked Hills to curate part of his art collection.[42] For five years many classic works of the baron's international art acquisitions decorated the walls of the Hills' home. Von Thyssen also granted Hills' children access to his private island at San San near Port Antonio.[43]

In 1955 Hills had just returned from sailing the Robanne to Havana when he met Adlai Stevenson who had given a speech honoring a visit to Jamaica by Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon. At the gallery Stevenson fell in love with Hills' George III period Sheraton bow-fronted desk,[44] immediately purchasing it for his own office in Chicago.[45] Over dinner, Hills shared his observations of simmering revolution in Cuba, while he and Stevenson compared their concepts of justice, democracy, conflict and dictatorships — a conversation that inspired Hills to publish his ideas for uplifting the world's underprivileged masses in his landmark volume Rise of the Phoenix.[46]


Rastafari movement

Hills also became an advocate for Jamaica's Rastafari movement, who were being oppressed in the late fifties.[47] He gave Rastafarians jobs as woodcarvers, free paints to poor artists, such as the now-famed Ras Dizzy and bailed them out of Spanish Town Prison while encouraging rasta brethren to sustain themselves through art and music. Christopher and Norah Hills were personally thanked for their years of support for struggling rastas by Mortimo Planno, the Rasta teacher of Bob Marley and one of the few Rastafarian elders[48] to have met with Emperor Haile Selassie in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Hills also "reasoned" Gandhian non-violence with Leonard Howell, the original "Gong"[49] activist who founded Pinnacle, a Rastafarian community farm at Sligoville, a few miles from Hills' home. In 1958 Pinnacle was raided in a brutal crackdown by the authorities, ostensibly for growing marijuana, but in fact Rastafarianism at that time was regarded by The Crown as a threat to social harmony. Hills interceded with the Prime Minister but, with an election coming, law & order politics prevailed and many sustainable farming families had to leave the land. For his support, Hills was given the moniker "The First White Rasta". Unlike his skeptical friends and business colleagues, he saw Rastafarian spirituality as a righteous way of life, indeed growing out his hair and beard in solidarity and also in keeping with his emerging interest in the sadhus and enlightened sages of India who had much in common with the vegetarian mystical Rastafarians.[50]

Spiritual awakening

By 1960 Christopher Hills had accumulated a large metaphysical library on frequent trips to Samuel Weiser Books in New York, while writing his own books, Kingdom of Desire, Power of the Doctrine and The Power of Increased Perception. At 30 he retired from business[51] and began to research multiple spiritual paths and the physics of what Einstein called Unified field theory. Prolific research papers and lectures came out of Hills' laboratory in the Blue Mountains (Jamaica) on subjects such as bioenergetics, hypnosis, tele-thought, biophysics, effects of solar radiation on living organisms, resonant systems of ionosphere, and capacitor effects of human body on static electricity and electron discharge of the nervous system. In 1960 he began a 30-year project to document the effects of sound and color on human consciousness and states of health.[52]

Global outreach

With Norah Hills running the galleries, Hills set forth on a two-year journey travelling in Asia, Europe, Pakistan and India, meeting with members of the UN and calling on politicians, scientists and religious leaders. UNESCO hired him to shoot 1,000 photographs of their projects in faraway countries, which appeared in an exhibit at United Nations headquarters.

Hills' global odyssey's itinerary grew out of publishing his views on conflict resolution and alternative government in a manifesto, Framework for Unity, that was circulated to The Commission for Research in the Creative Faculties of Man, a network he had founded of thinkers around the world which, in 1961, included Prof. Oliver Reiser, Humphry Osmond, Dr. Andrija Puharich, David Ben-Gurion, and Lady Isobel Cripps, among its 500 members.

After teaming up with his good friend and noted lawyer Luis Kutner (co-founder of Amnesty International), Hills decided to search the world for a spot to establish a Center where a dedicated community could live and test his World Constitution for Self-Government by Nature's Laws, which he published in a book with an introduction by Bertrand Russell.[53]


Friendship with Nehru

Working his way on a speaking tour through Europe in the direction of India, Hills decided to make a precarious expedition to the remote Himalayan Hunza Valley[54] where he had long been curious about the diet and extraordinary longevity of the Pashtun, Balti and Uzbek hill tribes. In Pakistan, Hills was the guest of Professors Duranni and Walid Uddin at Peshawar's College of Engineering. Visiting Sufi holy men and Islamic scholars in Karachi, he met Zulfikar Ali Bhutto to discuss possible Indo-Pakistan cooperation in algae cultivation in the climatically suitable Gujrat-Sind border region, which is where Bhutto and his ancestors were from. Later, when Bhutto was overthrown in a military coup, Hills orchestrated urgent appeals to General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq for clemency, but, like many westerners protesting Bhutto's imprisonment, was ignored, and Bhutto was hanged.

In the 1950s Hills became known to Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru[55] through his friend the Deputy leader of India's Congress Party, Surendra Mohan Ghose, a Bengali revolutionary and relative of Sri Aurobindo. Hills invited Ghose to Jamaica,[56] to speak at the 1961 Commonwealth Parliamentary Conference, and together they formed a partnership to promote World Union and global famine relief through algae aquaculture.[57] S.M. Ghose[58] was one of the founders of Auroville, an experimental sustainable-living International Village in Tamil Nadu. In 1962 Ghose took Hills to Sri Aurobindo Ashram for a personal audience with Aurobindo's successor, spiritual head of the ashram, Mirra Alfassa, known as "The Mother". Later Ghose arranged for Christopher Hills' son, John Hills, to give the keynote address at the World Parliament of Youth in Puducherry in 1971.

Image
Christopher Hills with Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru at Teen Murti Bhavan, New Delhi

In 1959 Hills had lobbied Nehru to approve a government in exile for the Dalai Lama fleeing persecution in Tibet and to grant full refugee status to exiled Tibetans. He had become connected to the Tibetans through his study of Buddhism and in 1960 provided funding for the Young Lama's Home School[59] in Dalhousie, Himachal Pradesh founded by his English friend Freda Bedi, one of Gandhi's handpicked satyagrahis[60] who became Gelongma Karma Kechog Palmo,[61] the first Western woman to take ordination in Tibetan Buddhism.[62] Freda Bedi is the mother of film and television star Kabir Bedi.[63] In 1968 Hills contributed to Freda Bedi's building of the Karma Drubgyu Thargay Ling nunnery at Tilokpur in the Kangra Valley and helped organize her journey to the West with the 16th Gyalwa Karmapa, Rangjung Rigpe Dorje in 1974.

When Hills arrived in India, he found Nehru besieged by border disputes with China and discussion inevitably turned to Hills' theories of conflict resolution and how to avoid war.[64] Their connection also evolved out of the fact that India was experiencing famine in some states. With dependence on wheat shipments from the United States, Hills helped lobby President Lyndon Johnson for an increase in wheat aid, which was granted. But when Hills mentioned his research with algae as a food source, then Nehru became interested and offered to support cultivation in India. (PDF will be posted)

While in New Delhi, Hills spent time with the prime minister at Teen Murti Bhavan, enjoying Jawaharlal Nehru's rose gardens and meeting his daughter Indira Gandhi. Hills was the guest of Indian industrialist G.D. Birla, where on his first day in India, he had met Swami Shantananda, an enlightened sage and a remarkably politically connected guru with whom Hills would travel throughout India for two years, much like a roaming sanyassin. On one of his "pilgrimages", Hills was taken by Shantanananda and Nehru's Parliamentary Secretary S.D. Upadhyaya to Brindavan for a private audience with India's highest female yogini Sri Anandamayi Ma, from whom he felt a "genuine sublime holiness" and received one of the most significant blessings in his life.[65]

In Patna, Bihar, Hills, along with Dr Raynor Johnson, were the only Europeans to attend the 1961 Science & Spirituality Conference, where seeds were sown for Hills' decade of cooperation with hundreds of Indian scientists and yogis, many of whom eventually journeyed to visit Hills' centers in the West and who comprised many of the delegates for a 1970 Yoga conference Hills staged in New Delhi.

In 1963, the Sri Aurobindo Ashram and Gandhi Peace Foundation sponsored another conference in Patna, hosted by Dr. Rajendra Prasad, Mahatma Gandhi's longtime right-hand disciple and first President of India. Prasad was supposed to speak at the conference but became ill, and Hills' guru Shantananda was leading prayers for him every day at the Sadaqat Ashram in Patna. Prasad requested to meet Hills, whose goals for World Union he had heard about from Nehru. Hills considered Prasad the most spiritual of the founders of Independent India, and their meeting was a profound encounter in which Prasad gave his blessing for Hills' global endeavors, but then the president lost consciousness, tightly holding onto Hills' hand.[66] Apparently Prasad never recovered, and at the time, there was a controversy that the man who, through satyagraha, had resisted multiple British governments and Viceroys and been jailed by them for so many years, had said his last words to an Englishman.

Microalgae International

In earlier travels from Jamaica to Japan, Hills had formed an aquaculture research company with his friend and colleague, biologist Dr Hiroshi Nakamura, Dean of Tokyo Women's University. Dr Nakamura was a noted scientist[67] and a colleague of Emperor Hirohito (himself a marine biologist) who asked Nakamura to research alternative food sources for Japan after the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki had devastated food supplies. The goal of Hills and Nakmura's organization Microalgae International Union, was to develop strains of algae as a way of harnessing the sun's energy for biofuels and human nutrition and as a solution to World Hunger.[68] Presented with M.I.U.'s feasibility studies, Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru endorsed Hills' proposal for bringing the cultivation of protein-rich Chlorella algae to the villages of India.[69]

With India's Home Minister, Gulzari Lal Nanda, Hills had co-founded the Institute of Psychic and Spiritual Research in New Delhi. A devout Gandhian, Nanda feared social upheaval and possible communal violence if poor and hungry villagers started migrating to India's cities so he threw his support behind Hills' plan for developing rural economies via small footprint aquaculture that could help villages become sustainable. A detailed plan for a pilot project in the Rann of Kutch was approved by the Indian government. However, the initiative became mired in bureaucracy when Nehru died in 1964. Nanda became acting prime minister but only until the new Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri was nominated to succeed Nehru. Shastri continued working with Hills and had his staff prepare a budget request for Parliament to fund the chlorella algae project. However, because it competed with traditional agricultural interests, the aquaculture project became victim to political jockeying as well as an outbreak of war with Pakistan. With Shastri's mysterious death[70] at the 1966 India-Pakistan peace conference in Tashkent, the project lost its key sponsor.

Nevertheless, the networks Hills had established with the founders of modern India proved valuable when his son, John Hills, was introduced by Nanda and S.M. Ghose to Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, who helped the younger Hills[71] garner support among India's Congress party and religious leaders for India's largest conference of Western scientists and Indian yogis.[72]

Centre House, London

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Members of Centre House community with Hatha Yoga teacher Malcolm Strutt and Yoga Master B.K.S. Iyengar

Three years after Jamaica's 1962 declaration of Independence from Britain, the Hills family moved to London, at the suggestion of two of his mentors, Bertrand Russell and Sir George Trevelyan, 4th Baronet. They helped Hills find and purchase a six-story Edwardian building in London's leafy Kensington. There Christopher Hills and others, including Kevin Kingsland, founded Centre House, a self-discovery and human-potential community[73] known as a nucleus of yoga and spirituality in the emerging New Age movement throughout the late sixties and seventies. Seekers came from all over the world to study with visiting gurus, such as Swami Satchidananda, Muktananda, B.K.S. Iyengar, Sangharakshita and John G. Bennett as well as Sanskrit scholar Dr. Rammurti Mishra,[74] Christmas Humphreys, Tibetan lamas, chief Druids, homeopathic doctors and scientists studying meditation, telepathy and neuroplasticity in Hills' Yoga Science laboratory. It was here Christopher Hills wrote his magnum opus, Nuclear Evolution[75] - recognized as a definitive treatise on the chakras as they relate to the human endocrine system, light frequencies and human personality. Yoga Journal described the book as, "Synthesizing a vast amount of information ranging from the structure of DNA to the metaphysics of consciousness" and also as, "A giant step forward in integrating science with religion in a meaningful way."[76]

Centre House was an experiment in group consciousness where the majority of residents were well-educated students, teachers and scientists interested in the convergence of science and spirituality. For a while the large basement kitchen was a macrobiotic restaurant, first run by Craig Sams,[77]:141 then called Gandalf's Garden which counted John Lennon amongst its health-conscious patrons. Its founder, Muz Murray (Ramana Baba),[78] was one of the early residents of Centre House and there published the first issues of Gandalf's Garden magazine, a publication chronicling the vitality of London's New Age scene. Kevin Kingsland went on to found the Centre for Human Communication in Devon and Grael Associates (a Community Company)..

World Conference on Scientific Yoga, New Delhi

In December 1970 Christopher Hills, his son John, and Kevin Kingsland organized the world's first World Conference on Scientific Yoga (WCSY)[79] in New Delhi, bringing 50 Western scientists together with 800 of India's leading swamis, yogis and lamas to discuss their research and establish a network for the creation of a World Yoga University.

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John Hills discusses the World Conference on Scientific Yoga program with Dhirendra Brahmachari and Amrit Desai in New Delhi

The conference generated some controversy[80] when Indian politics intersected with religion,[81] particularly the concept of Christ Yoga, a book Hills had written linking Christ's teachings to those of Buddha and the Vedas. But the conclave nevertheless emerged as a milestone in the soon-to-be-booming migration of Indian yogis to the West. John Hills,[82] helped by his father's prior relationship with Nehru, worked with India's Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and the Nehrus' yoga master Dhirendra Brahmachari to steer a fractious committee of MPs, ministers and often competitive spiritual leaders from disparate religions and castes into creating a uniquely diverse and widely hailed program of events.[83] Presenters from the West included transpersonal psychology pioneer Dr. Stanislav Grof and Dr. Sidney Jourard who compared their research in lively sessions with Indian scholars, scientists, philosophers and yogis such as B.K.S. Iyengar, Shri K. Pattabhi Jois, Jiddu Krishnamurti, Swami Satchidananda, Padma Bhushan Murugappa Channaveerappa Modi,[84] R.R. Diwaker, Swami Rama, Acharya Dharma Deva Vidya Martand, Kaivalyadhama Health and Yoga Research Center and yoga hospital founder Dr. G. S. Melkote, M.P.[85]

The actor James Coburn, a yoga and martial arts practitioner, described the World Conference on Scientific Yoga as "Very rewarding for me, definitely worth the time and money getting here."[86]

During the conference, Dhirendra Brahmachari presided over the wedding of organizer Kevin Kingsland and yoga teacher Venika Mehra. James Coburn also attended. Kevin and Venika Kingsland went on to establish various Centres for Human Communication in the UK, USA and India, teaching yoga, human communication and promoting community consciousness.

Post-conference, the select delegates' presentations were published in CHAKRA magazine, founded with the help of Tantra scholar Ajit Mookerjee and Indian art patron Virendra Kumar and edited by John Hills whose first venture in publishing was mentored by Baburao Patel M.P., editor of Filmindia and Mother India magazines.[87]

The conference was deemed a success and Christopher Hills was elected by a majority of the delegates to establish a World Yoga University somewhere on the planet. A mission that would take him from the United Kingdom to the United States.[88]

University of the Trees

As the spiritual axis shifted to America, Christopher Hills visited his friend Laura Huxley[89] who urged him to move to the United States where he settled in Boulder Creek, California, and became a U.S. citizen. There, amidst the ancient redwoods, he founded in 1973,[90] an accredited college, University of the Trees, an alternative education and research center for the social sciences to study the laws of nature and their relation to human consciousness.[90] Students lived on campus and studied subjects as diverse as Radionics and dowsing (Hills was a well-known diviner[91]), meditation, hatha yoga, the Vedas, and early forms of social networking he called "Group Consciousness".

The campus housed University of the Trees Press which published Christopher Hills' writings and the research of a number of resident students who obtained degrees at the university and wrote books on light & color frequencies and the science of Radionics. A small workshop produced pendulums for dowsing and a line of negative ion generators. With the buildup of the vitamin business surrounding discoveries that spirulina had significant weight loss benefits University of the Trees became one of the largest employers in the San Lorenzo Valley[92] and leased more than 10 buildings in Boulder Creek for housing students and warehousing for Light Force,[93] a burgeoning nutritional products brand based on spirulina.

From this base in California, Hills extended his hospitality to a pantheon of visiting scientists, writers, philosophers and scholars such as Alan Watts, Edgar Mitchell, Barbara Marx Hubbard, Allen Ginsberg, Thelma Moss, Hiroshi Motoyama, Haridas Chaudhuri, Sri Lanka president Ranasinghe Premadasa, Menninger Foundation's Swami Rama, Dr. Evarts G. Loomis, Viktoras Kulvinskas, Max Lüscher, Marcia Moore, Bernard Jensen and countless others in the fields of human potential, holistic health, aquaculture, religion, quantum physics and alternative medicine.

Supersensonics

Within the campus, Hills founded an experimental laboratory, managed by physicist Dr. Robert Massy,[94] to develop his theories on the Electro Vibratory Body – documenting what Hills' colleague Stanford University's William A. Tiller Ph.D,[95] calls "subtle energies" or "psychoenergetics". Shortly before he died radionics pioneer George de la Warr donated a substantial portion of his research files, library and instruments to Christopher Hills. In 1975 Hills wrote the book Supersensonics: The Science of Radiational Paraphysics, widely considered "The Bible of dowsing"[96] The book sheds new light on divining, telepathy, The I Ching, Egypt's Pyramids, Biblical miracles and discusses the value of low level extrasensory phenomena vs higher levels of insight, wisdom and consciousness. New Age Journal magazine called Supersensonics "A short course in miracles for scientist and seeker alike."[97]

International philanthropy

With the Cold War in full swing liberation from the evils of totalitarianism was a constant theme in Hills writings. He lobbied hard against the KGB's persecution of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and the internal exile with police surveillance of Andrei Sakharov and the denial of an exit visa for Natan Sharansky's emigration to Israel.

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Award presented to Christopher Hills for his humanitarian services during the Soviet–Afghan War

Christopher Hills' lifelong crusade against dictatorships and Man's inhumanity was manifested in the book Rise of the Phoenix while his passionate beliefs against deficit spending were set forth in a book on the global economy—The Golden Egg.[98] A recurring theme throughout all Christopher Hills' approaches to world, local and family problems was a process he developed called "Creative Conflict"—the same principles of solving differences between individuals, political parties and even nations that Hills had debated with Adlai Stevenson, Nehru and Luis Kutner.

Throughout the seventies and eighties Hills focused on international affairs, particularly the emergence of democracy in the Soviet Republics, eventually traveling to Russia to meet with Mikhail Gorbachev where he joined the Soviet Peace Committee. U.S. Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush bestowed awards on Hills for his commitment to democratic freedom and his humanitarian support for victims of oppression.

The Christopher Hills Foundation donated more than $9 million worth of spirulina products to charitable organizations in the U.S. and abroad. When the Soviet Union had occupied Afghanistan, Hills learned from his friends in Peshawar that Afghan freedom fighter Ahmad Shah Masoud's mujahadeen troops as well as Tajik and Pashtun tribals were starving because supply routes had been cut by Russian forces. Hills donated and shipped $300,000 worth of spirulina, which was packed in by mules with help from Senator Charlie Wilson to sustain the Afghans.[99]

In 1989 Sri Lanka president Ranasinghe Premadasa, struggling to find a formula to end the Sri Lankan Civil War, traveled to Boulder Creek to meet with Hills and learn more about his conflict resolution concepts. The two men shared a spiritual connection and established a close friendship. Premadasa then brought the Ceylon conflict closer to a democratic solution than any other Sri Lankan president had. However, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam hierarchy had split and in 1993 a faction assassinated Premadasa in a suicide bombing that killed 23 people.[100]

Spirulina: food from sunlight

Hills and Nakamura had a vision of feeding the world from lakes, seas and backyard aquaculture and in 1975 they authored a book, Food from Sunlight which published all their proprietary research as open source for the world to use in the cause against global famine and malnutrition. Their company, Microalgae International, invested in research and technology to find a super food for solving World Hunger. Early research focused on chlorella but its cellular structure was too small to be collected without expensive centrifuges. However, in 1967, while Dr Nakamura was living at Centre House, they discovered that women at Lake Chad were harvesting an algae in baskets to make dihé, a highly nutritious sun-baked biscuit. After studying the lakes of Africa, Hills and Dr Nakamura developed seed culture for a strain of 70% protein algae called spirulina that they had collected from Lake Aranguachi in Ethiopia. Later, in 1981, Dr Hills made an expedition to Lake Chiltu at the invitation of Mr. Wollie Chekal, Minister of Trade for the Ethiopian Revolutionary Government and brought back a new set of spirulina samples to his California laboratory for hybridizing an optimal strain for commercial cultivation.

For millennia spirulina had been a food staple for natives of Lake Chad and also for the Aztecs but Hills funded much of the early experimentation needed for its successful modern day mass cultivation, described in Dr Nakamura's book Spirulina: Food for a Hungry World.[101]

To manufacture spirulina nutritional products Hills started the Light Force company in Santa Cruz, California, which was one of the early models for multi-level marketing. Customers began reporting weight loss and health benefits from spirulina and the success story was featured in The National Enquirer.[102] Sales skyrocketed into the millions of dollars propelling Light Force to 50,000 distributors worldwide. To grow that much spirulina Hills formed joint ventures with Koor Foods in Eilat, Israel,[103] Taiwan Aqua in Taipei and Sosa Texcoco at Lake Texcoco in Mexico. Hills also had an association with Cyanotech on the Big Island of Hawaii which grew a very pure Pacifica brand of spirulina. By 1995 more than 5,000 tons of spirulina a year were being imported for Light Force products. To encourage domestic research and production Hills purchased a 150-acre farm and built raceway ponds filled from the land's own natural geothermal aquifer in Desert Hot Springs, California. Professor Nakamura's student and protégé Dr Kotaro Kawaguchi relocated from Japan as chief research scientist and working with Sebastian Thomas, an algae cultivation expert from India, they refined desert-grown spirulina into consumable powder using the world's first 90,000 sq ft (8,400 m2) solar heated dryer.

While a staff of 40 ran the Southern California "Green Gold Farms," harvesting its own U.S.-grown spirulina for Light Force, Hills built a 13,000-square-foot (1,200 m2) home/laboratory on a mountain in the redwoods of Boulder Creek, California, dedicated to researching neutraceuticals and as a gathering place for scientists, innovators and spiritual "map makers". Three years after moving to the new home Norah Hills died from Alzheimers eliciting an outpouring of affection from the many who had seen her as the "divine mother" and a significant force in all that Christopher Hills had achieved.

Santa Cruz sanctuary

At the property he built a Hollywood quality video production studio to produce films on Enlightenment and, through new media, to inspire people to celebrate what he called the "Divine Goddess".[104] The studio is run today by his second wife, artist/producer Penny Slinger Hills.

In 1996, after three decades of globetrotting, Hills visited Vietnam to invest in a naturally carbonated underground spring water venture. He contracted an obscure virus which caused a deterioration of his health. Light Force and the research company Biogenics were sold to Royal Body Care which continued to market the products.

Christopher Hills died at home January 31, 1997[90] leaving his wife Penny Slinger Hills, two sons, John Hills and Anthony Hills and four grandchildren. He believed that "Algae biomass was God's way of providing an inexhaustible source of energy from the sun". Today millions of health conscious people enjoy the health benefits of spirulina in myriad products worldwide. Recent innovations have moved algae to the front burner as researchers recognize its efficiency as a carbon sequestration mechanism and alternative biofuel.

Hills' legacy of bio-innovation and commitment to hunger relief is being carried forward by the Christopher Hills Foundation.

Bibliography

Christopher Hills wrote over 30 books. The following are a selection of his works:

• The Power of Increased Perception—Philosophical Library New York, 1958
• Kingdom of Desire—Philosophical Library New York, 1959
• Supersenonics—The Science of Radiational Paraphysics, ISBN 0-916438-18-X (1975)
• Nuclear Evolution: Discovery of the Rainbow Body (2nd ed.), ISBN 0-916438-12-0 (1977) (hardcover)
• Food from Sunlight—Planetary Survival for Hungry People, ISBN 0-916438-13-9 (1978)
• Rise of the Phoenix—Universal Government by Nature's Laws, ISBN 0-916438-04-X (1979)
• The Golden Egg, ISBN 0-916438-32-5 (1979)
• Creative Conflict—The Secret to Heart-to-Heart Communication, ISBN 0-916438-36-8 (1980)
• The Christ Book, ISBN 0-916438-32-5 (1982)
• Spirulina—Food for a Hungry World, ISBN 0-916438-47-3 (1982)
• Instruments of Knowing—Human Biological Sensitivity, ISBN 0-916438-22-8 (1985)
• The Book of Vision, ISBN 978-0-916438-63-0 (1995)

Christopher Hills Foundation is a 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to empowerment of rural economies and feeding the world's hungry.

References

1. San Jose Mercury News obituary, February 2, 1997:- "Spirulina Czar"
2. Western Guru Scientist – Holistic Health & Medicine magazine, 1988
3. Natural Foods Pioneer – Los Angeles Times, Feb 10, 1997
4. "Evolutionary Revolutionary" – Monterey Peninsula Herald, Jan 29, 1977
5. Modern Merlin, Hills Seeks Answers in the Mountains – Oakland Tribune, 1978
6. The Movie of Life – Early Morning Meditations series, volume MM3
7. Thirty thousand men of the British Merchant Navy were killed. Battle of Wits, p. 280, ISBN 0-684-85932-7
8. "Indisputably one of Jamaica's most successful self-made men" - Sunday Gleaner, March 8, 1972
9. "Andrew Mackenzie Hay, 73, Trade Expert". The New York Times. 18 May 2001.
10. "The Queen of the New Age". The New York Times. 4 May 2008.
11. Louise Hay Interview http://www.telegraph.co.uk, 23 April 2007.
12. "32 Years in Civil Defence" Mr. Bremner a leading figure in civil defence since 1930 awarded the British Empire Medal, Eastern Daily Press, pg 5, Oct 11, 1962
13. "Mr. and Mrs. B.E. Bremner, Mayor and Mayoress of Lynn" Lynn News, July 27, 1954
14. "History of King's Lynn Civic Society".
15. The Times (London), Thursday, 8 July 1993; p. 4 col. D and p. 19 col. A
16. Williamson, D The Ancestry of Lady Diana Spencer In: Genealogist’s Magazine, 1981; vol. 20 (no. 6) p. 192-199 and vol. 20 (no. 8) p. 281-282
17. "Kings Lynn Ceremony". Getty Images. 26 July 1954.
18. Music Awards, Christopher Hills Challenge Cup - The Daily Gleaner, July 4, 1955
19. "Statistics Support Call for Third Party" - Daily Gleaner, September 13, 1949
20. Given in Marriage by Mr. N. W. Manley K.C. - Daily Gleaner, July 31, 1950
21. "She changed Jamaica for the better" - Globe and Mail, June. 16, 2009
22. "Edna Manley: The Mother of Modern Jamaican Art" - Woman's Art Journal, Vol. 7, No. 2 (Autumn 1986 - Winter 1987) pp. 36-40
23. Hills Galleries - Daily Gleaner March 3, 1954
24. "The Selected Writings of Simón Bolívar". The Colonial Press Inc. 1951.
25. "Queen Mother and Lady Fermoy visit Jamaica" - Daily Gleaner, February 22, 1965
26. "Lady Morley opens Hills Galleries exhibition" - Daily Gleaner, November 21, 1962, p 20
27. "Of Beauty and Majesty", Princess Margaret's visit - Daily Gleaner, February 24, 1955
28. Knodler Gallery New York - "Jamaican Paintings Join Top Bracket" - Daily Gleaner, July 15, 1958
29. "Hills Dine with Elizabeth Taylor, Eddie Fisher" - Sunday Gleaner, March 31, 1960
30. "Elizabeth Taylor buys three Gaston Tabois paintings from Hills Galleries: "Village Street", "Rock River", "Rio Cobre Dam" - Daily Gleaner, March 26, 1960, p 18
31. "Dealer's Art" - Daily Gleaner, February 22, 1960
32. "Gaston Tabois First Solo Show at Hills Galleries, 1955". Daily Gleaner. 2 December 2012.
33. Tamara Scott-Williams, "Barrington Watson: A life in paint", Jamaica Observer, 16 October 2011.
34. "Albert Huie, First solo exhibition at Hills Galleries 1955". The Jamaica Gleaner. 24 December 2000.
35. "Huie More Than a Superb Craftsman" - Sunday Gleaner Magazine, October 28, 1973
36. Hills Galleries "This Is Jamaica" exhibit - Daily Gleaner, July 31, 1962
37. "Artists sail to Round Hill exhibit aboard Christopher Hills' yacht the 40-ton Robanne" - Daily Gleaner, April 17, 1956, p 12
38. New York Socialites Appreciate Jamaica's "Intuitive Art" - Sunday Gleaner, March 3, 1956
39. Art & Artists - New York Times, March 2, 1956
40. A World of Glory to Record. Review by George Campbell - Daily Gleaner, March 26, 1956
41. "Robin Moore's Big Marlin Bet" Telepathy experiment, Supersenonics - The Science of Radiational Paraphysics, 0-916438-18-X (1975) p 593
42. "Industrialist Who Built Fabled Art Collection, Dies at 81". The New York Times. 28 April 2002.
43. "Pellew Island". Jamaica Environment Trust. 5 March 2012.
44. "Jamaican Mementoes" - Daily Gleaner, September 18, 1955
45. Adlai Stevenson paid $328.00 with Northern Trust Company personal check No.5162 ($2,884 in today's dollars)
46. Rise of the Phoenix - Universal Government by Nature's Laws, 0-916438-04-X (1979)
47. "Rasta Spirit Knows no Boundaries" - Daily Gleaner, June 22, 1960
48. "Revered Rastafarian leader". The Independent. 25 April 2006.
49. Bob Marley named his record label Tuff Gong after Leonard "The Gong" Howell
50. "Back to Africa" movement, Christopher Hills' speech at Addis Ababa - Kingston Gleaner July 22, 1960.
51. "The Business of Art" - Business Sketch Magazine, July 1961
52. Nuclear Evolution: Discovery of the Rainbow Body (2nd ed.), ISBN 0-916438-12-0, pp. 108, 190, 431
53. Christ Yoga of Peace - Centre Publications, 1966
54. "Hunza – Dreamland of the Hillside Farmer". Sunday Gleaner, Feb. 3, 1963
55. "The Nehru I Knew" – Sunday Gleaner, full page, May 31, 1964.
56. S.M. Ghose, Commonwealth Parliamentary Conference – Daily Gleaner, Nov 7, 1961
57. Food from Sunlight - Planetary Survival for Hungry People, 0-916438-13-9 (1978)
58. "Indian Leader to announce World Centre project" – Daily Gleaner, November 4, 1964
59. Cave in the Snow: A Western Woman's Quest for Enlightenment, Vicki Mackenzie, 1999, ISBN 1-58234-045-5
60. Andrew Rawlinson, "The Book of Enlightened Masters". Open Court, 1997, ISBN 0-8126-9310-8, p. 181
61. The Revolutionary Life of Freda Bedi, Vicki Mackenzie, 2017, ISBN 9781611804256
62. "Remembering Freda". Mid-Day Magazine. 27 March 2015.
63. "Internationally acclaimed Indian actor". IMDb. 1971–2016.
64. Creative Conflict - The Secret of Heart-to-Heart Communication, 0-916438-36-8 (1980)
65. The One I Love, ISBN 0-916438-51-1, p. 96
66. The President's Last Words – The One I Love, ISBN 0-916438-51-1, p. 153
67. "SPIRULINA - Food From The Sun's Light". Yoga Journal. May–June 1982. p. 44.
68. Spirulina - Food for a Hungry World, 0-916438-47-3 - Micro Algae International Union, pp. 5, 69, 85
69. Food from Sunlight, 0-916438-13-9, pp. 103–109
70. "Mystery of Prime Minister Shastri's Death". Indian Express. 2 August 2009.
71. "Young British Yogi Plans World Meet", Hindustan Times, Sept 17, 1970, p.5
72. "World Conference on Scientific Yoga" – Times of India, Nov. 30, 1970
73. "The Superman Project", News of the World, Dec 5, 1966
74. Rammurti S. Mishra - Yoga Sutras: The Textbook of Yoga Psychology
75. Nuclear Evolution: Discovery of the Rainbow Body (2nd ed.), ISBN 0-916438-12-0
76. Yoga Journal magazine - The Rainbow Body, March 1978
77. Green, Jonathon (1988). Days In The Life: Voices from the English Underground 1961-1971. Heinemann. ISBN 978-1-448-10444-4. I remember Christopher Hills, who ran the Centre House, calling down one day, 'Can you please not smoke marijuana - we can smell it on the third floor.' After that we put in a guest book which said, 'I am not in possession of any kind of drugs,' and everyone signed it including Yoko Ono
78. "Gandalf's Garden publisher Muz Murray aka Ramana Baba".
79. "World Yoga Conference" – Times of India, Nov. 30, 1970
80. "Masters of Emotions – Yogis Wind Up Parley By Losing Tempers", Los Angeles Times, Dec 24, 1970
81. "Yogis Act Unyogalike", The Daily Herald, Dec 24, 1970
82. "Young British Yogi Plans World Meet", Hindustan Times, Sept 17, 1970, p.5
83. Time magazine, Dec 27, 1970 – "World Conference on Scientific Yoga"
84. "Man With A Vision". The Deccan Herald. 20 December 2005. Archived from the original on 12 February 2012.
85. "Members Bioprofile". Lok Sabha. 26 December 2008. Archived from the originalon 3 July 2011.
86. "Yogi Film Moghul" – Times of India, Dec 23, 1970
87. "Editor's Welcome" - CHAKRA Magazine, Vol 1, March–May, 1971
88. "Yoga University Seeks Site" - San Mateo Times, March 4, 1972
89. "Laura Huxley Obituary". The Guardian. 17 December 2007.
90. "Christopher Hills; Natural Foods Pioneer, Microbiologist". Los Angeles Times. Feb 10, 1997.
91. "Incredible Feat" – National Enquirer, June 22, 1976, p. 14 (Diviner finds stolen loot for Santa Cruz Police)
92. "From Counterculture to Mainstream" – Santa Cruz Sentinel (Cover), Aug 19, 1984
93. "Spirulina – Miracle Pill or Mind Pill? " – The Press Democrat, September 24, 1981, p. 11
94. "Revealing Look Into World Of Luminous Revelations", The Times, San Mateo, September 22, 1977
95. Robert Koehler (June 2, 2004). "What the #$*! Do We Know!? (Film review)". Variety. Retrieved April 3, 2012.
96. Supersenonics: The Science of Radiational Paraphysics, 0-916438-18-X (1975)
97. New Age Journal, July/August, 1976
98. The Golden Egg – 0-916438-32-5 (1979)
99. Hills received a Humanitarian Award from the Afghan National Islamic Council, 1985
100. "Assassination Clues Point to Tamil Rebels". Los Angeles Times. 3 May 1993.
101. Spirulina - Food for a Hungry World, 0-916438-47-3
102. "Doctors Praise Safe Diet Pill" – National Enquirer (Cover), June 2, 1981, p. 23
103. Hills-Koor Red Sea Negev Algae Partnership - How to Feed the Hungry, 1981
104. The Visionary State - 0-811848-35-3 (2006)

External links

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Re: Freda Bedi, by Wikipedia

Postby admin » Tue Dec 17, 2019 6:24 am

Bengal Presidency
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 12/16/19

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Bengal Presidency (1757–1912)
Bengal Province (1912–1947)
Presidency & province of British India
1765–1947
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Flag of Bengal Presidency
Flag
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Coat of arms of Bengal Presidency
Coat of arms
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The presidency at its greatest extent
Capital Calcutta

The Bengal Presidency (1757–1912), later reorganized as the Bengal Province (1912–1947), was once the largest subdivision (presidency) of British India following the dissolution of the Mughal Bengal, with its seat in Calcutta (now Kolkata). It was primarily centred in the Bengal region. At its territorial peak in the 19th century, the presidency extended from the present-day Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan in the west to Burma, Singapore and Penang in the east. The Governor of Bengal was concurrently the Viceroy of India for many years. Most of the presidency's territories were eventually incorporated into other British Indian provinces and crown colonies. In 1905, Bengal proper was partitioned, with Eastern Bengal and Assam headquartered in Dacca and Shillong (summer capital). British India was reorganised in 1912 and the presidency was reunited into a single Bengali-speaking province.

The Bengal Presidency was established in 1765, following the defeat of the last independent Nawab of Bengal at the Battle of Plassey in 23 June 1757, and the Battle of Buxar in 22 October 1764. Bengal was the economic, cultural and educational hub of the British Raj. During the period of proto-industrialization, Bengal made direct significant contributions to the Industrial revolution in Britain, although it was soon undertaken by the Kingdom of Mysore ruled by Tipu Sultan as South Asia's dominant economic power.[1]

It was the centre of the late 19th and early 20th century Bengali Renaissance and a hotbed of the Indian Independence Movement.

The Partition of British India in 1947 resulted in Bengal's division on religious grounds, between the Indian state of West Bengal and the Pakistani province of East Bengal, which first became East Pakistan in 1955 under Pakistani rule and finally the nation of Bangladesh in 1971.

Administrative changes and the Permanent Settlement

See also: Cornwallis in India

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British conquest after the defeat of the last independent Nawab of Bengal at the Battle of Plassey in 1757

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The Victoria Memorial, Kolkata, built in honour of Queen Victoria, Empress of India

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A steam engine of the Bengal Provincial Railway, 1905. Bengal was the sixth earliest region in the world to have a railway network in 1854, after Britain, the United States, Italy, France and Spain.[2]

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Contemporary map from 1858

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Administrative divisions of Lower Bengal, the directly administered part of the presidency

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Map showing the result of the partition of Bengal in 1905. The western part (Bengal) gained parts of Orissa, while the eastern part (Eastern Bengal and Assam) regained Assam that had been made a separate province in 1874.

Under Warren Hastings (British Governorships 1772–1785) the consolidation of British imperial rule over Bengal was solidified, with the conversion of a trade area into an occupied territory under a military-civil government, while the formation of a regularised system of legislation was brought in under John Shore. Acting through Lord Cornwallis, then Governor-General, he ascertained and defined the rights of the landholders over the soil. These landholders under the previous system had started, for the most part, as collectors of the revenues, and gradually acquired certain prescriptive rights as quasi-proprietors of the estates entrusted to them by the government. In 1793 Lord Cornwallis declared their rights perpetual, and gave over the land of Bengal to the previous quasi-proprietors or zamindars, on condition of the payment of a fixed land tax. This piece of legislation is known as the Permanent Settlement of the Land Revenue. It was designed to "introduce" ideas of property rights to India, and stimulate a market in land. The former aim misunderstood the nature of landholding in India, and the latter was an abject failure.

The Cornwallis Code, while defining the rights of the proprietors, failed to give adequate recognition to the rights of the under-tenants and the cultivators. This remained a serious problem for the duration of British Rule, as throughout the Bengal Presidency ryots (peasants) found themselves oppressed by rack-renting landlords, who knew that every rupee they could squeeze from their tenants over and above the fixed revenue demanded from the Government represented pure profit. Furthermore, the Permanent Settlement took no account of inflation, meaning that the value of the revenue to Government declined year by year, whilst the heavy burden on the peasantry grew no less. This was compounded in the early 19th century by compulsory schemes for the cultivation of opium and indigo, the former by the state, and the latter by British planters (most especially in Tirhut District in Bihar). Peasants were forced to grow a certain area of these crops, which were then purchased at below market rates for export. This added greatly to rural poverty.

So unsuccessful was the Permanent Settlement that it was not introduced in the North-Western Provinces (taken from the Marathas during the campaigns of Lord Lake and Arthur Wellesley) after 1831, in Punjab after its conquest in 1849, or in Oudh which was annexed in 1856. These regions were nominally part of the Bengal Presidency, but remained administratively distinct. The area of the Presidency under direct administration was sometimes referred to as Lower Bengal to distinguish it from the Presidency as a whole. Officially Punjab, Agra and Allahabad had Lieutenant-Governors subject to the authority of the Governor of Bengal in Calcutta, but in practice they were more or less independent. The only all-Presidency institutions which remained were the Bengal Army and the Civil Service. The Bengal Army was finally amalgamated into the new British-Indian Army in 1904–5, after a lengthy struggle over its reform between Lord Kitchener, the Commander-in-Chief, and Lord Curzon, the Viceroy.

1905 Partition of Bengal

Main articles: Partition of Bengal (1905) and Eastern Bengal and Assam

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Eastern Bengal and Assam

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Bihar and Orissa Province

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A jute mill in Narayanganj, 1906. East Bengal accounted for 80% of the world's jute supply.[3]

The partition of the large province of Bengal, which was decided upon by Lord Curzon, and Cayan Uddin Ahmet, the Chief Secretary of Bengal carried into execution in October 1905. The Chittagong, Dhaka and Rajshahi divisions, the Malda District and the States of Hill Tripura, Sylhet and Comilla were transferred from Bengal to a new province, Eastern Bengal and Assam; the five Hindi-speaking states of Chota Nagpur, namely Changbhakar, Korea, Surguja, Udaipur and Jashpur State, were transferred from Bengal to the Central Provinces; and Sambalpur State and the five Oriya states of Bamra, Rairakhol, Sonepur, Patna and Kalahandi were transferred from the Central Provinces to Bengal.

The province of West Bengal then consisted of the thirty-three districts of Burdwan, Birbhum, Bankura, Midnapur, Hughli, Howrah, Twenty-four Parganas, Calcutta, Nadia, Murshidabad, Jessore, Khulna, Patna, Gaya, Shahabad, Saran, Champaran, Muzaffarpur, Darbhanga, Monghyr, Bhagalpur, Purnea, Santhal Parganas, Cuttack, Balasore, Angul and Kandhmal, Puri, Sambalpur, Singhbhum, Hazaribagh, Ranchi, Palamau, and Manbhum. The princely states of Sikkim and the tributary states of Odisha and Chhota Nagpur were not part of Bengal, but British relations with them were managed by its government.

The Indian Councils Act 1909 expanded the legislative councils of Bengal and Eastern Bengal and Assam provinces to include up to 50 nominated and elected members, in addition to three ex officio members from the executive council.[4]

Bengal's legislative council included 22 nominated members, of which not more than 17 could be officials, and two nominated experts. Of the 26 elected members, one was elected by the Corporation of Calcutta, six by municipalities, six by district boards, one by the University of Calcutta, five by landholders, four by Muslims, two by the Bengal Chamber of Commerce, and one by the Calcutta Trades Association. Eastern Bengal and Assam's legislative council included 22 nominated members, of which not more than 17 be officials and one representing Indian commerce, and two nominated experts. Of the 18 elected members, three were elected by municipalities, five by district and local boards, two by landowners, four by Muslims, two by the tea interest, one by the jute interest, and one by the Commissioners of the Port of Chittagong.[5]

The partition of Bengal proved highly controversial, as it resulted in a largely Hindu West Bengal and a largely Muslim East. Serious popular agitation followed the step, partly on the grounds that this was part of a cynical policy of divide and rule, and partly that the Bengali population, the centre of whose interests and prosperity was Calcutta, would now be divided under two governments, instead of being concentrated and numerically dominant under the one, while the bulk would be in the new division. In 1906–1909 the unrest developed to a considerable extent, requiring special attention from the Indian and Home governments, and this led to the decision being reversed in 1911.

Reorganisation of Bengal, 1912

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Administrative divisions of the province following re-organisation (Manbhum and Sylhet not included)

At the Delhi Durbar on 12 December 1911, King George V announced the transfer of the seat of the Government of India from Calcutta to Delhi, the reunification of the five predominantly Bengali-speaking divisions into a Presidency (or province) of Bengal under a Governor, the creation of a new province of Bihar and Orissa under a lieutenant-governor, and that Assam Province would be reconstituted under a chief commissioner. On 21 March 1912 Thomas Gibson-Carmichael was appointed Governor of Bengal; prior to that date the Governor-General of India had also served as governor of Bengal Presidency. On 22 March the provinces of Bengal, Bihar and Orissa and Assam were constituted.[6]

The Government of India Act 1919 increased the number of nominated and elected members of the legislative council from 50 to 125, and the franchise was expanded.[7]

Bihar and Orissa became separate provinces in 1936. Bengal remained in its 1912 boundaries until Independence in 1947, when it was again partitioned between the dominions of India and Pakistan.

Dyarchy (1920–37)

British India's Montagu-Chelmsford Reforms of 1919, enacted in 1921, expanded the Bengal Legislative Council to 140 members to include more elected Indian members. The reforms also introduced the principle of dyarchy, whereby certain responsibilities such as agriculture, health, education, and local government, were transferred to elected ministers. However, the important portfolios like finance, police and irrigation were reserved with members of the Governor's Executive Council. Some of the prominent ministers were Surendranath Banerjee (Local Self-government and Public Health 1921-1923), Sir Provash Chunder Mitter (Education 1921–1924, Local Self-government, Public Health, Agriculture and Public Works 1927–1928), Nawab Saiyid Nawab Ali Chaudhuri (Agriculture and Public Works) and A. K. Fazlul Huq (Education 1924). Bhupendra Nath Bose and Sir Abdur Rahim were Executive Members in the Governor's Council.[8]

Provincial Autonomy

The Government of India Act 1935 made the Bengal Presidency into a regular province, enlarged the elected provincial legislature and expanded provincial autonomy vis a vis the central government. In the elections held in 1937, the Indian National Congress won a maximum of 54 seats but declined to form the government. The Krishak Praja Party of A. K. Fazlul Huq (with 36 seats) was able to form a coalition government along with the All-India Muslim League.[9][10]

Minister / Portfolio

A. K. Fazlul Huq / Prime Minister of Bengal, Education
Khawaja Nazimuddin / Home
Nalini Ranjan Sarkar / Finance
Bijoy Prasad Singh Roy / Revenue
Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy / Commerce and Labour
Khwaja Habibullah / Agriculture and Industry
Srish Chandra Nandy / Irrigation, Communications and Works
Prasanna Deb Raikut / Forest and Excise
Mukunda Behari Mallick / Cooperative, Credit and Rural Indebtedness
Nawab Musharraf Hussain / Judicial and Legislature
Syed Nausher Ali / Public Health and Local Self Government


Huq's government fell in 1943 and a Muslim League government under Sir Khawaja Nazimuddin as Prime Minister was formed. After the end of World War II, elections were held in 1946 where the Muslim League won a majority of 113 seats out of 250 in the assembly and a government under Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy was formed.[11]

Minister / Portfolio
Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy / Prime Minister of Bengal, Home
Mohammad Ali Bogra / Finance, Health, Local Self-government
Syed Muazzemuddin Hosain / Education
Ahmed Hossain / Agriculture, Forest and Fisheries
Nagendra Nath Ray / Judicial and Legislative Department
Abul Fazal Muhammad Abdur Rahman / Cooperatives and Irrigation
Shamsuddin Ahmed / Commerce, Labour and Industries
Abdul Gofran / Civil Supplies
Tarak Nath Mukherjee / Irrigation and Waterways
Fazlur Rahman / Land, Land Revenue and Jails
Dwarka Nath Barury / Works and Building


See also

• List of governors of Bengal
• Advocate-General of Bengal

References

1. Parthasarathi, Prasannan (2011), Why Europe Grew Rich and Asia Did Not: Global Economic Divergence, 1600–1850, Cambridge University Press, ISBN 978-1-139-49889-0
2. "Railway".
3. "Bast and Other Plant Fibres".
4. Ilbert, Sir Courtenay Peregrine (1907). "Appendix II: Constitution of the Legislative Councils under the Regulations of November 1909", in The Government of India. Clarendon Press. pp. 431.
5. Ilbert, Sir Courtenay Peregrine (1907). "Appendix II: Constitution of the Legislative Councils under the Regulations of November 1909", in The Government of India. Clarendon Press. pp. 432–5.
6. Ilbert, Sir Courtenay Peregrine (1922). The Government of India, Third Edition, revised and updated. Clarendon Press. pp. 117–118.
7. Ilbert, Sir Courtenay Peregrine (1922). The Government of India, Third Edition, revised and updated. Clarendon Press. p. 129.
8. The Working Of Dyarchy In India 1919 1928. D.B.Taraporevala Sons And Company.
9. Jalal, Ayesha (1994). The Sole Spokesman: Jinnah, the Muslim League and the Demand for Pakistan. Cambridge University Press. pp. 26–27. ISBN 978-0-521-45850-4.
10. Sanaullah, Muhammad (1995). A.K. Fazlul Huq: Portrait of a Leader. Homeland Press and Publications. p. 104. ISBN 9789848171004.
11. Nalanda Year-book & Who's who in India. 1946.

Works cited

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Bengal". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.
• C. A. Bayly Indian Society and the Making of the British Empire (Cambridge) 1988
• C. E. Buckland Bengal under the Lieutenant-Governors (London) 1901
• Sir James Bourdillon, The Partition of Bengal (London: Society of Arts) 1905
• Susil Chaudhury From Prosperity to Decline. Eighteenth Century Bengal (Delhi) 1995
• Sir William Wilson Hunter, Annals of Rural Bengal (London) 1868, and Odisha (London) 1872
• P.J. Marshall Bengal, the British Bridgehead 1740–1828 (Cambridge) 1987
• Ray, Indrajit Bengal Industries and the British Industrial Revolution (1757–1857) (Routledge) 2011
• John R. McLane Land and Local Kingship in eighteenth-century Bengal (Cambridge) 1993

External links

• Coins of the Bengal Presidency
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