Page:Calcutta, Past and Present.djvu/188

 new presidency church could be built within the new Fort. The worthy Directors of the East India Company were very particular as to the due attendance of their covenanted and military officers at church, and had standing orders on the subject, besides giving the Calcutta Board occasional reminders that their servants "be required to give due obedience thereto." This ensured a regular congregation, and all Calcutta society met regularly at church on Sunday mornings, for there was no evening service: where also young ladies, on their first arrival in the settlement, made their public début. The lively writer of " Hartly House, Calcutta," a collection of letters published in 1789, gave an account of a quaint custom permitted on such occasions:—

"I have been at church, my dear girl," she wrote, "in my new palanquin (the model of genteel conveyance), where all ladies are approached, by sanction of ancient custom, by all gentlemen indiscriminately, known or unknown, with offers of their hand to conduct them to their seat. Accordingly those gentlemen who wish to change their condition (which, between ourselves, are chiefly old fellows), on hearing of a ship's arrival make a point of repairing to this holy dome, and eagerly tender their services to the fair strangers, who, if this stolen view happens to captivate,