Historical Documents of Eastern India (8 Vols.)

by Robert Montgomery Martin

In pursuance of the Orders from the Court of Directors of East India Company, issued in the year 1807, the Governor General in Council commissioned Dr. Francis Buchanan to conduct a survey of the life and conditions of the people of British India. Montgomery Martin, undertook the project of presenting the survey to the people in the form of a book. "Two facts are peculiarly striking", comments Martin, "Firstly the richness of the country surveyed and secondly, the poverty of its inhabitants." There is a peculiar thing about Montgomery Marting also, in that he is critical about the British Empire. Thus, the present volume objectively defines the surveys conducted in Bihar and Patna, Shahabad, Bhagalpur, Gorakhpur, Dinajpur, Puraniya, and Assam.