political and military headquarters of the Government of India. It has been outstripped in population by the Western capital, Bombay; and it is being run hard by that great harbour in the race for commercial pre-eminence. The port of arrival and embarkation for the British troops has long since been transferred from Calcutta to Bombay.
But in spite of these changes, and of the rapid development of its Western and other rivals, Calcutta still goes on growing with the majestic growth of a vigorous maturity. Its unrivalled position at the mouth of the combined river-systems of Northern and North-eastern India, gives it a great advantage in regard to the older and bulkier staples of Bengal, rice, jute, and oil-seeds — although even these have, to a very large extent, deserted the slower water-routes for the railways. The enterprise of its merchants and capitalists has called into existence new industries on a vast scale, tea-planting, coal-mining, engineering foundries, and steam factories of many sorts. The new railway to the West will bring to it an increasing share of the wheat-trade; and it only awaits the better adaptation of the European smelting processes to the Indian coals and ores, to become the financial centre of a great iron industry in Bengal. Meanwhile Calcutta sits calm and strong on its ancient river-bank, and watches the produce of the richest provinces of the world float down to it by many waters, or pour
