ade has been great. Much watchfulness, however, is still very
necessary; for, on an exciting night a few years ago, part of the
extended harbour-wall was washed away by a storm.

Yes, Madras is an important seaport; yet it is a fact that, except to
men whose business is with the sea, Madras is much less like a seaside
town than it was in its earlier years, and many of the people who live
there seldom see the briny ocean--even though they may sometimes be
reminded of its nearness when in the stillness of the night they hear

'The league-long breakers thundering on the shore.'

For one thing, the greater part of Madras is not so near the sea as it
was in former times; for the southern wall of the harbour has acted as
a breakwater, causing the sea to recede a very long way from the
original shore; and houses in the thoroughfare that is still called
'Beach Road' are now a very long way from the beach, and it is only
from upper stories that the sea in the distance is visible. Southward,
moreover, the magnificent road that is still called the 'Marina' is
fast losing its right to the name; for it is only across a broad
stretch of ever-extending dry sand that the dark blue ribbon of
tropical sea is beheld therefrom.

In earlier days Madras was verily a city of the sea. Both White Town
and Black Town lay directly along the sea-beach, and the coming and
going of the Company's ships were momentous events. Surf-boats used to
land on the beach outside the 'Sea-Gate' of the wave-splashed Fort,
laden with cargo from the Company's ships lying out in the roads; and
the bales were carried through the gateway into the Company's
warehouses within the Fort-walls. The Sea-Gate is still to be seen,
and it still looks towards the sea; but the sea is far away, and the
Sea-Gate is now one of the least used of the entrances to the Fort.

[Illustration: THE SEA GATE.

The sea has now receded afar.]

In former times the Company had a considerable fleet of first-class
sailing-ships, and, owing to the frequency of wars with either the
French or the Dutch, the Company obtained royal permission to equip
their ships as men-of-war armed with serviceable guns, which could be
turned against an enemy if occasion required. The voyage from England
to India was by way of the Cape of Good Hope, and it lasted at least
three or four months, and often very much more. For example, when
Robert Clive came out to India for the first time, the vessel was so