The Ganges River is a great river of the plains of northern India. The Ganges River stretches 1,560 miles and its basin serves as a lifeline for hundreds of millions of people. Hindu followers believe that bathing in the Ganga can help wash all sins away and that a mere touch of the river can help attain salvation; they believe the Ganga is a sacred place.
In her poem "Eighteen Hundred and Eleven," Barbauld compares the movement of civilization to the stream of the Ganges River, insinuating that civilization is benefiting from Britain's exports while Britain itself is in decline.
And arts that make it life to live are thine.
If westward streams the light that leaves the shores,
Still from thy lamp the streaming radiance pours.
Wide spreads thy race from Ganges to the pole (78-81)
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