Page:Calcutta, Past and Present.djvu/192

 from England; and the tonjon, a chair with movable hood, became popular at one time, and was used by Lady William Bentinck during her stay in India, when her husband was Governor-General, from 1828 to 1835.

Before the sack of Calcutta there were but few carriages in the settlement, but as the town began to spread, and roads were made, the number of conveyances increased. M. Grandpré, writing in 1790, said that Calcutta, exclusive of palanquins,—

"abounds with all sorts of carriages, chariots, whiskies, and phaetons, which occasion in the evening as great a bustle as in one of the principal towns of Europe, There are also a great number of saddle horses, some of the Persian breed of exquisite beauty, but not Arabians, except a small sort called pooni, which are very much in vogue for phaetons."

It is supposed that the word "whiskies," used in the above account as the name of a carriage, is a mistake, and should be "britzska," a term which is now as obsolete as, and conveys even less meaning to the modern ear than "whiskies," which at least suggests being whisked along at a rapid rate! Besides the britzska, which was at one time a very fashionable conveyance, and