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and more useful and beneficial. If the demand for the exquisite muslins of Dacca has been affected, native industry is still able to find profitable employment in weaving cloth of a less delicate texture from English spun and imported yarns. The growth of the jute trade has given an impetus to the manufacture of gunny bags over all the eastern and central districts. The spinning and weaving of the fibre into cotton bales and grain and sugar bags, and its preparation in the raw state for exportation, afford occupation to thousands; and in Calcutta and its neighbourhood many mills are established, in working which the natives have displayed great aptitude. Carpenters, blacksmiths, goldsmiths, potters, and oilmen, are settled in almost every village. The manufacture of beads of sorts, which are so universally worn as necklaces by the lower orders of Hindoos, is a very generally spread occupation. In this the women take a large part. The weaving of wicker and basket work is the special occupation of the Chamar or Moochee caste, and for these articles there is great demand in a community so given to agriculture. The native shoes are also always made by Moochees. The sola weed grows with the aoos and amun rice, and is manufactured into the sola hats or topees worn by Europeans, and into artificial flowers and ornaments for the native ceremonies. The different manufactures which are specially carried on in Bengal, and for which each part is most celebrated, are as follows: The manufactures of the Burdwan division are principally silk and indigo. Midnapore has also a specialité in small mats, which are much used for sleeping on. Several places in the division are famous for their weaving and the manufacture of metal pots and pans. There is a lac manufac tory at Elambazar in Beerbhoom. There are several rope manufactories at Howrah, as well as a large number of screw presses for cotton, jute, and fibres; also flour mills and iron foundries. In the town of Hooghly there are three native steam mills for pounding bricks into soorkee. There is a jute mill at Serampore, and a yarn manufactory at Rishra. There is a large factory at Fort Gloucester, fifteen miles down the Hooghly. Another jute mill is being built at Pulta Ghât. There is a brisk manufacture of paper for native use carried on at the Bally Paper Mills in the Hooghly district.

Burdwan.

Presidency.

Indigo and date sugar are the staple manufactures of the Presidency division. Among other manufactures the fine cloths prepared by the weavers of Santipore in the Nuddea district deserve notice. A superior description of cotton cloth is also manufactured in the Satkeerah sub-division of the 24-Pergunnahs. In the Jessore and the 24-Pergunnahs there is a manufacture of shell-lime collected on the banks of the rivers and khals in the Soonderbuns. Nuddea is famous for its brass utensils, which are exported to various parts of Bengal. There are large jute mills and factories at Baranagore, and at Gowripore in the 24-Pergunnahs, as well as lesser factories.

Silk and indigo are the principal manufactures of Rajshahye. Moorshedabad specially produces silk Rajshah ye. cloth, articles of ivory, gold and silver filagree work, brass utensils and gunny bags; Dinagepore, coarse cloth

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and gunny bags; Pubna, gunny bags; Rajshahye and Bograh, silk cloth; and Maldah, silk cloth and brass utensils.

Dacca.

There is no manufacture on a wholesale scale in the Dacca division except tea and indigo. There is a considerable quantity of coarse cloth for use by the lower orders made in all the districts; it is considered more durable than Manchester cloths. Date sugar is made in Furreedpore in sufficient quantities to be exported from the district. In the island of Dukinshabazpore and the south of Backergunge cocoanut-oil is made and exported to Chittagong and Calcutta. There is also a considerable trade in iron and brass implements and vessels of local manufacture. There is also some lac-dye manufactured here, and soap, known in the market as Dacca soap. The manufacture of finer cloths and muslin and kasheeda (cotton cloth embroidered) of the most delicate workmanship have made the city of Dacca celebrated in the past. The cheese known as Dacca cheese is the production of a village in the Kishoregunge sub-division of Mymensingh. A considerable quantitiy of gold and silver ornaments is exported to Calcutta. Country paper is manufactured at Atteah in Mymensingh.

In the town of Chittagong and its environs the principal industries are carpentry, ship and boat-building, Chittagong. blacksmith's, brazier's, and gold and silversmith's work. Sea-going vessels of two, and even three, masts are built and launched here for the coasting trade and for voyages to Ceylon, the Laccadives, Cochin, and other Indian ports. The shipwrights are nearly all Mahomedans. The braziers make the usual domestic utensils of brass and copper, and the gold and silversmiths can execute plain or ornamental work to pattern, but do not seem to have any original designs like the Cuttack or Dacca men.

In Cox's Bazaar the Mughs make both silk and cotton cloth. The daos manufactured by the Mughs have a long blade fitted straight into the handle and widening towards the end, which is square; they are much heavier and more powerful instruments than the ordinary Bengali dao. Japanned boxes and other Burmese work are also to be had at Cox's bazaar. In carpentry and joiners' work, especially as applied to house-building, the Mughs are much more expert than their Bengali neighbours. Their wooden kiangs, or rest-houses, are well and solidly built, and some of the houses of well-to-do residents at Cox's Bazaar are not only substantial, but very picturesque and neatly ornamented. They are built entirely of timber raised on piles after the Burmese fashion. The roof is shingled, and with its surrounding verandahs and decorated gable-ends the whole presents an appearance not unlike that of a Swiss cottage.

In the district of Noakhally country cloth is manufactured on a very small scale. Something is done in the manufacture of molasses from date-juice. Coarse cloth is the only article produced in Tipperah, and that in no large quantity.

In the Patna division the manufacture of indigo and opium are of paramount importance, and have already been alluded to. An account of the saltpetre manufacture has also been given above. Sugar is made

Patna.

into molasses and sugar-candy in enormous quantities. Of minor manufactures, an inferior tusser silk is produced in Patna. Towels and bath linen are a famous product of the Barh sub-division, and skull caps of Behar. Tobacco manufactured, prepared for the hookah with spices, is a specialité of Patna. In Gya there is a small manufacture of tusser silk and carpets, and a specialité of ornamented carving in black stones Paper, blankets, and brass utensils, are manufactured in Shahabad. The local paper manufactory is in the sub-division of Sasseram on the banks of the Soane. In Sarun there is a local manufacture of coarse cloth, and the outturn of the ornamental brass work and pottery of the Sewan sub-division has acquired some celebrity.

The principal manufacture of Bhaugulpore is indigo. Firearms and hardware of inferior quality Bhangulpore. are manufactured at Monghyr. The cabinet-makers of Monghyr are worth mentioning; considerable amount of skill is evinced by them in making inlaid writing desks and other fancy cabinet-wares, rosaries, necklaces, and bracelets. Monghyr is also famous for its baskets and other things made of bamboo. Tusser silk is a special manufacture of the district of Bhaugulpore.

Orissa.

In Orissa there is little to notice; brass vessels and brass ornaments and coarse cloth are the chief articles made. Cuttack is celebrated for its silver ornaments. Salt manufacture has kept increasing in Balasore and Pooree, but has declined in Cuttack. There are difficulties also of transport from the Cuttack coast, which add to the charges and decrease the profits of Cuttack-made salt.

Salt manufacture is the staple of Orissa, and is susceptible of unlimited development.

There are two lac factories at Jhalda in Chota Nagpore, and one large concern at Ranchee. Tusser silk Chota Nagpore. is woven, and there are an immense number of weavers in this division. The bulk of the people are still content with country cloths, but among the upper classes the taste for English-made goods has spread as it has elsewhere. In parts of Singbhoom and Manbhoom there are masses of soap-stone, which the people in the vicinity have for ages worked into vessels of different kinds.

Assam.

In Assam there is not much in the way of manufactures. There are the usual potters in each district, but this work is of a poor description. There are also a few workers in brass and iron, but the articles manufactured are merely for local use. The manufacture of silk still continues, but it is not in a flourishing state. In the Khasi Hills there is a good deal of iron work, but less, it is said, than formerly.

MINES AND QUARRIES:

MINERALS.

Of the mineral resources of Bengal, coal only has been largely developed. Iron, however, is at least as abundant as coal in many places, and in these days of dear iron the fact is of unlimited quantities of the richest ironstone are found in the closest conjunction with coal in large tracts where

Coal and iron.

no slight importance that

lime is also plentiful; and it may be said that if anywhere in India iron can be manufactured on a large scale in the European method, it must be in these provinces.

The largest and best coal mines of Bengal are in the Raneegunge sub-division of the Burdwan district, Raneegunge. and in the division of Chota Nagpore. There are now altogether 44 coal mines at work, of which 19 mines turn out more than 10,000 tons of coal a-piece per annum. In the larger and better mines coal is raised by steam from pits and galleries. In the smaller mines or workings coal is raised by hand-labour from open quarries. In the Raneegunge coal-field alone 61 steam engines, with an aggregate of 867 horse-power, are at work. Only one seam (or set of seams) of a less thickness than 8 feet is worked, and the average thickness of the seams at the Raneegunge mines is about 15 or 16 feet. The pits are mostly shallow; very few are more than 150 feet deep. The Bengal Coal Company, with its mines at Raneegunge and westwards, is able to raise more than six millions maunds of coal annually. The gross valuation of coal mines in the Burdwan district has been registered under the Road Cess Act at Rs. 2,88,361. The coal-fields of the lower Damoodah and Chota Nagpore. Burrakur are occupied for the most part by private companies; the coal-fields in Palamow belong to Government. The Rajhara coal mine in Palamow supplies coal for the Dehri irrigation works, and to some extent for the East Indian Railway Company. These mines comprise an area of twenty-five to thirty square miles, the seams being of an average thickness of from eight to ten feet, and the coal is said to be of fair quality. The East Indian Railway Company now generally burn in their engines coal from their own mines at Kurhurbari, which produce a coal of first-rate quality. There are great stores of coal for future ages in the Chota Nagpore division. The Eastern Bengal Railway and the River Steam Companies are at present the chief customers of the coal owners.

The use of coal in the Public Works Department of Government has much increased of late years On the Soane Canal works, and at all public works near the great rivers, bricks and lime are now generally burnt with coal instead of wood or farm refuse. Coal has, however, not yet become the domestic fuel of the countrymen in the coal districts. In Raneegunge alone it is said that the people are taking to coal for cooking purposes. In the Hazareebaugh and Palamow districts, where coal can be delivered at Rs. 2-8 or Rs. 3 per ton, ironsmelters and village blacksmiths still use charcoal for their furnaces, and the ordinary country people use wood for all domestic purposes.

Arrangements have been under consideration for smelting iron in coal furnaces after the English method at Hazareebaugh and elsewhere. At present iron is smelted from ores of different kinds after the rude native methods in many parts of the coal districts, but there are no manufactories on the European method, and it is very desirable, in the face of the great rise in the price of British iron, and the large and increasing demand for Railway iron of all kinds, to develope the production of the Indian iron works.

Assam.

The districts of Assam are amply endowed with mineral resources. The Khasi and Jynteah Hills especially excel perhaps any part of India in respect of minerals If there were only some addition to the population so enterprising and energetic, we might expect to have not only cattle and cinchona, cotton and fruit trees, but it is probable that the combination of the best coal, iron, and lime in one place, together with an iron-working population, might make these hills the best manufacturing district in India. The newly annexed tract of the Garo Hills may possibly much extend the field for such industries. The chief mineral products of the hills are iron, lime-stone, and coal. The iron ore excavated in 1872-73 is estimated at 5,000 maunds, the limestone quarried to be 1,550,000 maunds, the coal quarried to be 1,000 maunds. Smelted iron used formerly to be prepared for export more largely than at present. Of the sixteen known out-crops in the hills, Lakadong is the only field where coal is at present both plentiful and accessible. In the Lukhimpore district there are coal mines in the neighbourhood of Jeypore, and at the foot and along the slopes of the lower Naga Hills. They are really quarries, not mines; the coal lying in seams near the surface, and requiring no mining operations. In Seebsaugor there is a coal mine worked by the Assam Tea Company in the Naga Hills, for the privileges of working which an annual present is made to the Nagas. There is also coal of good quality in the Golaghaut sub-division. Surface lime was discovered at the foot of the Bhootan hills some two years ago. It is of a superior description, and it is believed that the quarry, though it does not extend over a wide area, might be profitably worked on a small scale.

Patna.

Mines scarcely exist in the Patna division. There is a talc mine near Rujowlie in the Gya district, which is seldom worked now, though there seems to have been a certain amount of enterprise expended on these talc mines many years ago. Of other minerals there are stone quarries at Burakur on the Gya hills, at Behar, and near Sasseram at Dhodund, and elsewhere on the Rhotas range; and there is a most valuable supply of limestone to be had, as soon as ever water-carriage is available, from quarries near Rhotas.

Except in the Sonthal Pergunnahs, there are no mines in the Bhaugulpore division, but various Bhaugulpore. minerals are found in small quantities on the hills in the south of Monghyr and Bhaugulpore. In Bhaugulpore lead, silver, and copper, exist, and the lead has been pronounced a valuable mineral with a large portion of silver in it. There are several coal mines in the Damin in the Sonthal Pergunnahs, but only one is now worked. A few thousand maunds of coal are transported now and then to the district of Bhaugulpore for purposes of burning bricks, &c. The coal is of a poor description. When the East Indian Railway loop line was under construction, several lakhs of maunds of coal used to be taken for burning timber and lime, but there is little or no demand for it now. There are stone quarries in the district of Monghyr.

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