IIUGLI or Hooey, a town in Bengal, in lat. 22° 54' 44" N., long. 88° 26' 28" E. It has the town of Chinsurah adjoining it on its south, and their joint population in 1872 was 34,761. A fort is said to have been built here by the Portuguese in 1537, and a population gathered around it. About the year 1629 it was taken by storm, under the order of the emperor Shah Jahan ; but in 1640 the English East India Com pany, under a finnan granted to Dr. Boughton, opened a factory here, and two years afterwards another at Balasor. Between 1685 and 1688, disputes arose between the Nawab of Bengal and the Company's servants ; but peace was restored, Ind in the treaty permission was given to build a actory at Sutanati, the present site of Calcutta. lloogly is the head station of a British revenue listrict, with an area of 1467 square miles, and a population in 1872 of 1,488,556 souls, the most minerous Hindu castes being the Bagdi, Kai bartta, ' t Rajputs; and Mahomedans, 299,025. Viten Hoogly fort was taken by the troops of Shah ahan by:assault, after a siege of 3} months, more Fan 1000 Portuguese were slaughtered, and 4400 nen, women, and children were made prisoners of var. The best-looking young persons were sent to i and circumcisedand made Mahomedans. The iris were distributed among the hamms of the 'mperor and his nobility. In Hoogly the first wits set in India in 1778, by Messrs. lalhed and Wilkins, on the occasion of the publica tion of a Bengali grammar by Halhed. The Bandel church is the oldest Christian church in Bengal, built, according to the inscribed date, in 1599. Prior to Hoogly, the royal port of Bengal was Satgaon. The Ganges formerly flowed by this place, and came out near Andool, and the remains of wrecked vessels have been turned out beneath the earth, which has overlaid the bed of the deserted channel. Satgaon is of great anti quity, having been known to the Romans under the name of Ganges Regia.
The Hoogly river is formed by the junction of the Ilhagirathi and Jelinghi, two branches of the Ganges. It runs into the sea at Saugor roadstead, by an estuary 15 miles wide. Its length is 160 miles by winding of stream. It receives the Damodali, 350 miles ; Dalkissore, 170 miles ; Cossy, ,240 milesMor, 130 miles ; and about 49,000 square miles are drained. The river has on its banks Calcutta. Serampur, Chandernuggur, Hoogly, and Murshidabad. The rivers forming it are offsets from the western branch of the Ganges delta. The eastern or Saugor channel is the principal entrance. From Middleton Point light to Fort William at Calcutta is 83i miles in length, following the windings of the river. It is the most westerly, and, for commercial purposes, the most important channel by which the Ganges enters the Bay of Bengal. Proceeding south and a little east from Santipur, the Hoogly river divides Murshidabad from Hoogly district, until it touches the district of the Twenty - four Parganas in lat. 22° 57' 30" N., and long. 27' 15" E., close to the village of Bagherkhal. It
then proceeds almost due south to Calcutta, next inclines to the south-west, and finally turns south, entering the Bay of Bengal in lat. 21° 41' N., and long. 88° E.
The Saraswati, now a muddy channel, enters the Hoogly at Satgaon, about 30 miles above Calcutta, and the Adi Gangs, now little more than a series of pools, which diverges south-east from it just below Calcutta, are both rivers of great sanctity. They are supposed to represent the original Ganges, Holy Mother Gangs, who takes her divine source in the Himalayas, and pours her waters into the Bay of Bengal at Sager (Saugor) island. In August 1856, neap tide rose 151 feet above the datum sill of the Kidderpore dock ' • and upon the 18th August 1856, spring tide rose to 22i feet above the same datum, the greatest rise of the salt lakes being 12 feet. This is on the western side of the delta. On the eastern side the tides rise from 40 to 80 feet. The silt held in solution, earthy matter, carbonate of lime, magnesia, sulphates of lime and iron, at 3 feet of depth, varies at Calcutta and in the Gasper Channel from 7.34 to 18.92.
The Hoogly is difficult to navigate. The tides run rapidly. The James and Mary Sands, 30 miles below Calcutta, used to be reckoned so perilous, that until well into the nineteenth century East Indiamen lay at Diamond harbour, just below their dangerous currents. A minute super vision of the channels, with steady dredging and a constant readjustment of the buoys, now renders the Hoogly a safe waterway to Calcutta for ships of the largest modern tonnage, drawing up to 26 feet, These sands are shallows formed at the entrance into the Hooglyy, from its western bank, of the Damodar and Rupnarayan rivers, which bring down the drainage of South-Western Bengal,' These rivers discharge at sharp angles into the Hoogly, at a distance of only a few miles apart, nearly opposite Falta, which lies 27 miles by water from Calcutta. Their waters check the flow of the Hoogly, and lead to the deposit of vast quantities of the silt with which the Hoogly, Damodar, and Rupnarayan are loaded. If a ship touch the bottom of the sands, she is immedi ately pushed over by the current ; and cases are known in which only the yards of a great three masted ship have remained above water within half-an-hour after the accident ; vessels become covered over with the sand if not promptly blown up. The sands extend upwards from Hoogly Point, 331 miles from Calcutta, opposite the mouth of the Rupnarayan, to about Falta, 27 miles from Calcutta, opposite the mouth of the Damodar.
Fishermen, who have sea-going boats, inhabit villages near the entrance of the Hoogly.
A bore is caused by the head-wave of the advan cing tide becoming hemmed in where the estuary narrows suddenly into the river, and often exceeds 7 feet in height. It is felt as high up as Calcutta, and frequently sinks small boats or dashes them to pieces on the bank. The tide itself runs as high up as Hoogly town.— Tr. of Hind. i. pp. 13, 15.