COMMERCOLLY, n.p. A small but well-known town of Lower Bengal in the Nadiya District; properly Kumār-khālī ['Prince's Creek']. The name is familiar in connection with the feather trade (see [ADJUTANT]).
COMMISSIONER, s. In the Bengal and Bombay Presidencies this is a grade in the ordinary administrative hierarchy; it does not exist in Madras, but is found in the Punjab, Central Provinces, &c. The Commissioner is over a Division embracing several Districts or Zillahs, and stands between the Collectors and Magistrates of these Districts on the one side, and the Revenue Board (if there is one) and the Local Government on the other. In the Regulation Provinces he is always a member of the Covenanted Civil Service; in Non-Regulation Provinces he may be a military officer; and in these the District officers immediately under him are termed 'Deputy Commissioners.'
COMMISSIONER, CHIEF. A high official, governing a Province inferior to a Lieutenant-Governorship, in direct subordination to the Governor-General in Council. Thus the Punjab till 1859 was under a Chief Commissioner, as was Oudh till 1877 (and indeed, though the offices are united, the Lieut.-Governor of the N.W. Provinces holds also the title of Chief Commissioner of Oudh). The Central Provinces, Assam, and Burma are other examples of Provinces under Chief Commissioners.
COMORIN, CAPE, n.p. The extreme southern point of the Peninsula of India; a name of great antiquity. No doubt Wilson's explanation is perfectly correct; and the quotation from the Periplus corroborates it. He says: "Kumārī, ... a young girl, a princess; a name of the goddess Durgā, to whom a temple dedicated at the extremity of the Peninsula has long given to the adjacent cape and coast the name of Kumārī, corrupted to Comorin...." The Tamil pronunciation is Kumări.
c. 80-90.—"Another place follows called Κομὰρ, at which place is (* * *) and a port;[[81]] and here those who wish to consecrate the remainder of their life come and bathe, and there remain in celibacy. The same do women likewise. For it is related that the goddess there tarried a while and bathed."—Periplus, in Müller's Geog. Gr. Min. i. 300.
c. 150.—"Κομαρία ἄκρον καὶ πόλις."—Ptol. [viii. 1 § 9].
1298.—"Comari is a country belonging to India, and there you may see something of the North Star, which we had not been able to see from the Lesser Java thus far."—Marco Polo, Bk. III. ch. 23.
c. 1330.—"The country called Ma'bar is said to commence at the Cape Kumhari, a name applied both to a town and a mountain."—Abulfeda, in Gildemeister, 185.
[1514.—"Comedis." See quotation under [MALABAR].]
1572.—