their white "cub" or pupil. There is one shoal in particular, known as
the "James and Mary," on which a ship, touching ever so lightly, is as
good as lost. Calcutta, since I first knew it, has become a great
manufacturing centre. Lines of factories stand for over twenty miles
thick on the left bank of the river; the great pall of black smoke
hanging over the city is visible for miles, and the atmosphere is
beginning to rival that of Manchester. Long use has accustomed us to
the smoke-blackened elms and limes of London, but there is something
peculiarly pathetic in the sight of a grimy, sooty palm tree.

The outward aspect of the stately Government House at Calcutta is
familiar to most people. It is a huge and imposing edifice, but when I
first knew it, its interior was very plain, and rather bare. Lady Minto
changed all this during her husband's Vice-royalty, and, with her
wonderful taste, transformed it into a sort of Italian palace at a very
small cost. She bought in Europe a few fine specimens of old Italian
gilt furniture, and had them copied in Calcutta by native workmen. In
the East, the Oriental point of view must be studied, and Easterns
attach immense importance to external splendour. The throne-room at
Calcutta, under Lady Minto's skilful treatment, became gorgeous enough
for the most exacting Asiatic, with its black marble floor, its
rose-coloured silk walls where great silver sconces alternated with
full-length portraits of British sovereigns, its white "chunam" columns
and its gilt Italian furniture. "Chunam" has been used in India from
time immemorial for decorative purposes. It is as white as snow and
harder than any stone, and is, I believe, made from calcined shells.
Let us suppose a Durbar held in this renovated throne-room for the
official reception of a native Indian Prince. The particular occasion I
have in mind was long after Lord Lansdowne's time, when a certain
Rajah, notoriously ill-disposed towards the British Raj, had been given
the strongest of hints that unless he mended his ways, he might find
another ruler placed on the throne of his State. He was also
recommended to come to Calcutta and to pay his respects to the Viceroy
there, when, of course, he would be received with the number of guns to
which he was entitled. The Indian Princes attach the utmost importance
to the number of guns they are given as a salute, a number which varies
from twenty-one in the case of the Nizam of Hyderabad, who