fashion of Calcutta take their evening drive. In the north-eastern corner of the Maidan the Indian memorial to Queen Victoria, consisting of a marble hall, with a statue and historical relics, was opened by the prince of Wales in January 1906. The government acquired Metcalfe Hall, in order to convert it into a public library and reading-room worthy of the capital of India; and also the country-house of Warren Hastings at Alipur, for the entertainment of Indian princes. Lord Curzon restored, at his own cost, the monument which formerly commemorated the massacre of the Black Hole, and a tablet let into the wall of the general post office indicates the position of the Black Hole in the north-east bastion of Fort William, now occupied by the roadway. Government House, which is situated near the Maidan and Eden Gardens, is the residence of the viceroy; it was built by Lord Wellesley in 1799, and is a fine pile situated in grounds covering six acres, and modelled upon Kedleston Hall in Derbyshire, one of the Adam buildings. Belvedere House, the official residence of the lieutenant-governor of Bengal, is situated close to the botanical gardens in Alipur, the southern suburb of Calcutta. Facing the Maidan for a couple of miles is the Chowringhee, one of the famous streets of the world, once a row of palatial residences, but now given up almost entirely to hotels, clubs and shops.
Commerce.—Calcutta owes its commercial prosperity to the fact that it is situated near the mouth of the two great river systems of the Ganges and Brahmaputra. It thus receives the produce of these fertile river valleys, while the rivers afford a cheaper mode of conveyance than any railway. In addition Calcutta is situated midway between Europe and the Far East and thus forms a meeting-place for the commerce and peoples of the Eastern and Western worlds. The port of Calcutta is one of the busiest in the world, and the banks of the Hugli rival the port of London in their show of shipping. The total number of arrivals and departures during 1904–1905 was 3027 vessels with an average tonnage of 3734. But though the city is such a busy commercial centre, most of its industries are carried on outside municipal limits. Howrah, on the opposite side of the Hugli, is the terminus of three great railway systems, and also the headquarters of the jute industry and other large factories. It is connected with Calcutta by an immense floating bridge, 1530 ft. in length, which was constructed in 1874. Other railways have their terminus at Sealdah, an eastern suburb. The docks lie outside Calcutta, at Kidderpur, on the south; and at Alipur are the zoological gardens, the residence of the lieutenant-governor of Bengal, cantonments for a native infantry regiment, the central gaol and a government reformatory. The port of Calcutta stretches about 10 m. along the river. It is under the control of a port trust, whose jurisdiction extends to the mouth of the Hugli and also over the floating bridge. New docks were opened in 1892, which cost upwards of two millions sterling. The figures for the sea-borne trade of Calcutta are included in those of Bengal. Its inland trade is carried on by country boat, inland steamer, rail and road, and amounted in 1904–1905 to about four and three quarter millions sterling. More than half the total is carried by the East Indian railway, which serves the United Provinces. Country boats hold their own against inland steamers, especially in imports.
Municipality.—The municipal government of Calcutta was reconstituted by an act of the Bengal legislature, passed in 1899. Previously, the governing body consisted of seventy-five commissioners, of whom fifty were elected. Under the new system modelled upon that of the Bombay municipality, this body, styled the corporation, remains comparatively unaltered; but a large portion of their powers is transferred to a general committee, composed of twelve members, of whom one-third are elected by the corporation, one-third by certain public bodies and one-third are nominated by the government. At the same time, the authority of the chairman, as supreme executive officer, is considerably strengthened. The two most important works undertaken by the old municipality were the provision of a supply of filtered water and the construction of a main drainage system. The water-supply is derived from the river Hugli, about 16 m. above Calcutta, where there are large pumping-stations and settling-tanks. The drainage-system consists of underground sewers, which are discharged by a pumping-station into a natural depression to the eastward, called the Salt Lake. Refuse is also removed to the Salt Lake by means of a municipal railway.
Education.—The Calcutta University was constituted in 1857, as an examining body, on the model of the university of London. The chief educational institutions are the Government Presidency College; three aided missionary colleges, and four unaided native colleges; the Sanskrit College and the Mahommedan Madrasah; the government medical college, the government engineering college at Sibpur, on the opposite bank of the Hugli, the government school of art, high schools for boys, the Bethune College and high schools for girls.
Population.—The population of Calcutta in 1710 was estimated at 12,000, from which figure it rose to about 117,000 in 1752. In the census of 1831 it was 187,000, in 1839 it had become 229,000 and in 1901, 949,144. Thus in the century between 1801 and 1901 it increased sixfold, while during the same period London only increased fivefold. Out of the total population of town and suburbs in 1901, 615,000 were Hindus, 286,000 Mahommedans and 38,000 Christians.
Climate and Health.—The climate of the city was originally very unhealthy, but it has improved greatly of recent years with modern sanitation and drainage. The climate is hot and damp, but has a pleasant cold season from November to March. April, May and June are hot; and the monsoon months from June to October are distinguished by damp heat and malaria. The mean annual temperature is 79° F., with a range from 85° in the hot season and 83° in the rains to 72° in the cool season, a mean maximum of 102° in May and a mean minimum of 48° in January. Calcutta has been comparatively fortunate in escaping the plague. The disease manifested itself in a sporadic form in April 1898, but disappeared by September of that year. Many of the Marwari traders fled the city, and some trouble was experienced in shortage of labour in the factories and at the docks. The plague returned in 1899 and caused a heavy mortality during the early months of the following year; but the population was not demoralized, nor was trade interfered with. A yet more serious outbreak occurred in the early months of 1901, the number of deaths being 7884. For three following years the totals were (1902–1903) 7284; (1903–1904) 8223; and (1904–1905) 4689; but these numbers compared very favourably with the condition of Bombay at the same time.
History.—The history of Calcutta practically dates from the 24th of August 1690, when it was founded by Job Charnock (q.v.) of the English East India Company. In 1596 it had obtained a brief entry as a rent-paying village in the survey of Bengal executed by command of the emperor Akbar. But it was not till ninety years later that it emerged into history. In 1686 the English merchants at Hugli under Charnock’s leadership, finding themselves compelled to quit their factory in consequence of a rupture with the Mogul authorities, retreated about 26 m. down the river to Sutanati, a village on the banks of the Hugli, now within the boundaries of Calcutta. They occupied Sutanati temporarily in December 1686, again in November 1687 and permanently on the 24th of August 1690. It was thus only at the third attempt that Charnock was able to obtain the future capital of India for his centre and the subsequent prosperity of Calcutta is due entirely to his tenacity of purpose. The new settlement soon extended itself along the river bank to the then village of Kalikata, and by degrees the cluster of neighbouring hamlets grew into the present town. In 1696 the English built the original Fort William by permission of the nawab, and in 1698 they formally purchased the three villages of Sutanati, Kalikata and Govindpur from Prince Azim, son of the emperor Aurangzeb.
The site thus chosen had an excellent anchorage and was defended by the river from the Mahrattas, who harried the districts on the other side. The fort, subsequently rebuilt on the Vauban principle, and a moat, designed to form a semicircle
