10 TRAXSACTIOKS OF THE 



There are 65 castes reported of 100,000 or more each, and 265 

 lesser castes or tribes. Hindooism gradually absorbs the aboriginal 

 tribes, and occupations mark castes something like guilds in west- 

 e/rn countries, so that caste mingles questions of religion, race, and 

 occupation. 



About twenty languages are spoken. Over half the people speak 

 Bengali as their mother tongue, over one-third speak Hindoostani, 

 and only about 36,000 speak English as their mother tongue. 



Education is low. The Hindoos are best educated of the great 

 classes. In Calcutta the education of boys compares favorably with 

 that in some western cities. The education of girls is scarcely 

 secured at all, except among the Christians. 



Admirable maps and diagrams aid the presentation of the facts 

 in the census. 



The digest of the census of Bombay has also been received here 

 without the fullness of discussion or the maps of the Bengal report. 

 The general relations of population and of customs are much the 

 same as in Bengal. A new series of languages occurs, however, 

 and 830 castes are reported, some of which are essentially identical 

 with some of the Bengal castes, but many castes are intensely local 

 in India. 



The reports do not follow a uniform spelling in anglicizing even 

 so common words as Hindustani, Mahomedan, and Brahman. 



DISCUSSION. 



Major Powell said : I have been much interested in the paper 

 read by our fellow-member, Mr. Blodgett, as a simple and lucid 

 presentation of the more important facts presented in the Bengal 

 census. One line of facts is of especial interest to me — namely, 

 that relating to the census of the castes of Bengal. 



Two great plans for the organization of mankind into states, as 

 tribes and nations, are known : Tribal states are organized on the 

 basis of kinship; national states, on the basis of property, which in its 

 last form appears as territorial organization. Yet from time to time 

 there spring up incipient methods of organization of another class. 

 Men are interrelated in respect to their wants, and ultimately or- 

 ganized thereby through the organization of industries or callings — 

 that is, organized on an operative basis through the division of labor. 

 This method of organization appears in many ways, and in one form 



