INDIA 



2945 



INDIA 



tion, for while the British have established 

 schools, both elementary and secondary, the 

 caste system and the superstition, which largely 

 take the place of religion, have prevented all 

 but a comparatively few children from receiving 

 any advantage from them. Somewhat better 

 success has been attained by the missionary 

 schools, which are aided by the government and 

 which draw to them the children from the 

 Christianized families. The "universities" of 

 Calcutta, Bombay, Madras, Allahabad and the 

 Punjab are but examining bodies which pass 

 upon the work of the various colleges scattered 

 throughout the country. 



Religion. "Ye men of Athens," said Paul 

 as he stood on Mars Hill, "I perceive that ye 

 are in all things very religious;" and the same 

 thing might be said to the people of India, who 

 are indeed "very religious." The number of 

 the faiths professed is legion, for the Oriental 

 mind seems peculiarly fitted to the fashioning 

 of beliefs; but one religion is clearly dominant, 

 Hinduism or Brahmanism. It is this faith, 

 embraced by more than 217,000,000, which has 

 hud upon the country the curse of the caste 



system, has given to the people their numerous 

 gods and has declared the cow a sacred animal. 

 Second in the number of adherents is Moham- 

 medanism, with 66,000,000; and all the other 

 faiths are a long way behind these two in num- 

 bers. There are over 10,000,000 Buddhists; 

 10,000,000 animists, or spirit-worshipers; 3,000,- 

 000 adherents of the Sikh religion; and over 

 3,000,000 Christians, of whom about one-half 

 are found in Madras Presidency. It is among 

 the lower classes, those regarded by the Brah- 

 man as degraded, that Christianity has spread 

 most rapidly. 



The Cities. The population of India, even 

 in the thickly-settled parts, lives largely under 

 rural conditions, about nine-tenths of the in- 

 habitants, it is estimated, living outside of the 

 cities, most of them in villages organized by a 

 definite system. There are comparatively few 

 large cities, only four, Calcutta, Bombay, Mad- 

 ras and Hyderabad, having more than half a 

 million inhabitants. Other cities of importance 

 are Delhi, the capital ; Benares, Lucknow, Ran- 

 goon and Lahore, each of which is described in 

 these volumes under its title. 



The Land 



Coasts. The coast line of the Indian penin- 

 sula is about 3,000 miles, and much of it is very 

 regular, except when the mouths of the great 

 rivers widen into great deltas. On the west 

 there are two prominent indentations, the Gulf 

 of Cutch and the Gulf of Bombay, but on the 

 east the breaks in the coast line are more gen- 

 tle. To the southeast of the southern extremity 

 is the large island of Ceylon, separated from 

 the mainland by Palk Strait and the Gulf of 

 Manar. A chain of small islands between the 

 two is called Adams' Bridge. 



Surface Features. India, excepting Burma, 

 which is treated in a separate article, is divided 

 into three well-defined tracts. In the north is 

 the Himalaya Mountain region, which contains 

 the loftiest passes and peaks in the world, 

 Mount Everest reaching a height of 29,002 

 feet. India would be a very different country 

 were it not for this vast wall which shuts off 

 the cold winds from the bleak region to the 

 north. 



Next is the great plain of the Indus, Ganges 

 and Brahmaputra rivers, a broad, low valley 

 region with its frequent floods. As Egypt is 

 the "gift of the Nile," so is this most fertile 

 region of India the gift of these three great 

 rivers. This is the most densely-populated part 

 185 



of the empire, and one of the most densely- 

 populated regions in the world. 



On the south this plain slopes gradually up- 

 ward to meet the table-land of the Deccan, 

 which with its bordering lowlands extends to 

 the end of the peninsula. This region has an 

 altitude of from 1,600 to 3,000 feet above sea 

 level; and its surface is broken by numerous 

 conical peaks, the craters of old volcanoes; for 

 practically the whole Deccan table-land is but 

 a heap of lava poured out in bygone days. 

 To-day, however, it is covered in most places 

 with a fertile soil. 



Rivers. The chief rivers of the country, 

 besides the Irrawaddy, which is in Burma, are 

 the Ganges, the most famous as well as the 

 most valuable commercially of all the rivers 

 of India; the Brahmaputra, which joins the 

 Ganges near its mouth; and the Indus, which 

 pours its waters, with those of the tributary 

 Sutlej and Chenab, into the Arabian Sea. 

 Farther south there are some streams of con- 

 siderable size but of no value for navigation, 

 the Godavari, the Nerbudda and the Krishna. 



Climate. India is a land of widely- varying 

 . climate, not only because of its great extent, 

 but because of differing elevations. The south- 

 ern portion and the lowland regions every- 



