Page:Bulandshahr- Or, Sketches of an Indian District- Social, Historical and Architectural.djvu/116

 colonnaded building in the Cucherry compound, called the Lowe Memorial, which is used as a place of shelter for people attending the courts. They, no doubt, find it a convenience, and the design is for the most part too simple to criticise, except for the low square clock-tower, which is obtrusively ugly and ill-proportioned. The diminutive battlements, with which it is crowned, were doubtless intended to give it a Gothic character, but only emphasize its want of any architectural character whatever. The cost was Rs. 6,936. As usual, there was no access to the roof, except by a break-neck ladder, till 1878, when I added a corner stair-turret. The Church is rather a pretty little building, and as a far-away imitation of Gothic, is more successful on the whole than Indian churches frequently are. It is crushed by a low vaulted roof of very un-Gothic type, and in order to resist its thrust, the buttresses, which are very short, have such a wide straddle as to give the whole composition a touch of the grotesque. The Lodge, added in 1883, is a reproduction of the mother-building on the most diminutive scale, and is more like a doll's house than a structure intended for human habitation. It has a very high-pitched roof, with miniature buttresses and pointed arches to the doors and windows, and is divided into two rooms, corresponding to a nave and chancel, the internal dimensions of which are respectively nine and six feet square! As a fanciful addition to the Church grounds it may have its merits; but it is quite certain that the Chaukidar, for whose comfort it was built, will never consent to immure himself in such a cramped and stifling prison. As regards the other engineer-works: the Jail, first built in 1835, but enlarged in 1845 and again in 1883, is a straggling range of barracks, which the most ordinary village mason could have constructed; the Law Courts are not only of the meanest appearance, but are also altogether inadequate in accommodation: the rooms provided for the Sessions Judge may be specially mentioned as in the hot weather absolutely uninhabitable. The same is the case with the Assistant Surgeon's house. In the schools, dispensary and post-office, the workmanship, which is good, was non-professional; the designs were supplied by the department and are certainly, open to exception. Such are the facts, and the conclusion to which they point is surely this, that the district would have been a direct gainer, both as regards the possession of more sightly public buildings and in the greater encouragement of local industry and talent, if it had been allowed to provide for its own wants in its own way, without any inter-meddling at all on the part of the Government bureau.