Page:Adam's reports on vernacular education in Bengal and Behar, submitted to Government in 1835, 1836 and 1838.djvu/75

of which the former has been published, and the latter exists only in manuscript, I have condensed, adding entire the tables which Dr. Buchanan compiled relating to this subject in those districts. The second source from which I have drawn materials is the records of the General Committee of Public Instruction, which furnish information in more scattered details and in a less precise and definite form, but which contain much that is valuable and interesting, principally communicated in answer to circulars sent to different public functionaries by Mr. H. H. Wilson, the Secretary to the Committee, about the period of its establishment. The third authority to which I have referred is Hamilton’s East India Gazetteer, (2nd edition, 2 volumes 1828,) and I have consulted this work as an independent authority, because it is known that the author in compiling it availed himself not only of publications generally accessible, but also of public and private manuscript documents that have never been given to the world. The fourth source from which I have obtained information is Missionary, College, and School Reports. The Associations that issue these reports have for the most part religious objects in view which are foreign to the purpose of this inquiry; but they have under various modifications sought to promote education by the establishment of schools and colleges, which cannot but be regarded as valuable auxiliaries to the other means employed for the general enlightenment of the country by the diffusion of knowledge. The fifth authority to which I have had recourse is a memoir, with supplement, compiled by the Searcher of Records at the India House, showing the extent to which aid had been afforded by the local Governments in India towards the establishment of Native schools in this country and published in the first Appendix to the Report from the Select Committee of the House of Commons on the Affairs of the East India Company, 16th August 1832. The memoir and supplement are chiefly occupied with details of Government institutions which are purposely excluded from this report, but they also contain several notices which I have not found elsewhere of philanthropic and private institutions. In addition to the principal sources of information, I have drawn several facts from works incidentally or partially treating the subject, whose authority will be acknowledged in the proper places. I have not introduced into this report any statement of facts resting on my observation and authority, but have merely attempted to bring into a methodised form the information previously existing in detached portions respecting the state of education. The details, therefore, which follow must be regarded as the results of the observations of others, and as depending upon their authority, and all that I have done is to connect them with each other and present them in consecutive order. I have not sought to multiply details except in so far as they are necessary to show the nature and extent of the educational means, apart from Government institutions,