472 CENSUS OF THE POPULATION 



During the operations of the Committee of Improvement, founded by- 

 Governor General Adam in 1823, a more constant intercourse with the 

 Natives soon convinced me that there could be no difficulty whatever in 

 obtaining the desired information, provided the real motives were declared, 

 and any incipient alarms at once quieted by unreserved explanations. 

 The classification of the mehalas and streets for the assessment of the 

 JBehri, a small mehala tax levied for the purpose of cleaning and 

 repairing the street drains, afforded a convenient pretext for the com 

 mencement of the Register, as the more direct prosecution of the object 

 was interdicted, but all precautions of this nature were, in fact, unnecessa 

 ry, and only tended to impede the progress and injure the arrangement 

 of the matter, which it thus occupied two years to bring to completion. 

 On other grounds, the City of Benares prevented facilities for the prose- 

 cution of statistical enquiries, from its division into numerous mehalas or 

 wards, under the protection of a police on the phdtekbandi system, so 

 called from the phalelcs or gates of each mehala, which were, in former 

 days, regularly closed at night. The watchmen are well acquainted 

 with every house within their beat, and can generally tell the names 

 and circumstances of their various inmates : with the assistance of these 

 men, who also pointed out the limits of the mehala, my enquiries were 

 continued from house to house, either addressed to the householders 

 themselves, or to servants and neighbours. The chumars of the mehala 

 having daily admittance to each house to remove dust and rubbish, 

 were found to be useful auxiliaries in checking the estimates of population 

 derived from other sources. 



In some mehalas, chiefly where the richer classes resided, more dif- 

 ficulty was experienced in obtaining accurate returns than in others ; but 

 in general the results are worthy of confidence. I have frequently ques- 

 tioned native visitors as to the number of inmates in their houses, and 

 have been surprised at its close accordance with the Register. To 



