forty passengers every voyage; and
besides the fleet of large ships, the river presents steamers,
pleasure-boats, and native craft of all sorts and sizes, from the gay
_budgerow_, to the wretched and more than half rotten _dhingy_. The
scene has, however, its drawbacks. The stranger is shocked and disgusted
at the sight of some half-dozen dead bodies floating down the river, in
all stages of decomposition, some with a vulture perched on them,
gorging himself as he floats down the stream on his hideous raft.
Government has placed people above the town, for the express purpose of
sinking dead bodies and similar nuisances; but they have not succeeded
in effecting their object The last time I went up the river, four human
corpses passed my boat between Kradd's Dock and Colvin's Grant, a
distance of two miles.

Nothing strikes the stranger, on landing for the first time in Calcutta,
so much as the extraordinary aggregation of palaces and mansions,
ordinary dwelling-houses, warehouses, shops, bazaars, stables, huts, and
hovels, all mingled together in glorious confusion, a few streets
forming the only exception. This is a great eye-sore even to the old
resident. I know no part of the world where society is divided into so
many ranks and classes as it is here, nor where pride and pomp hold
their heads higher. To hear some of the great ones of this city talk,
you would think they had sprung from a long line of princely, or, at
least, of noble ancestors. It is often observed, however, that they
seldom or never mention their immediate progenitors, nor the whereabouts
of their birth-place, which, in nine cases out of ten, would be found to
be some humble cottage on the bank of a modest brook in England, or burn
in Scotland. The more obscure or lowly their origin, the more difficult
of access they are generally found. The real gentleman is easily
discovered by his superior breeding and genuine urbanity.

In former days, a young man arriving at Calcutta as a writer, had no
difficulty in raising money by borrowing from some wealthy _circar_; and
many of those very young men are still hampered with debts they can
never pay: though high in office, and enjoying large salaries, they are
tied to the country by their creditors, to whom they are obliged to give
a large portion of their earnings. Times have now changed, and the
native has learned from dear-bought experience, that the European is not
always so worthy of confidence as he at