Page:Calcutta, Past and Present.djvu/27

 by the rain and whirling flood into semblance of some living monster, stretching octopus-like arms. Once and again would sweep by a human form, charred from the funeral pyre, borne on the rushing waters of the sacred stream to meet its final dissolution, devoured by the alligators, vultures, crows, and jackals who haunted the river waves and shores in watchful eagerness for their prey.

Moving carefully and slowly up stream with the rising tide, came a varied fleet of merchant vessels, and small "country boats," which had ridden together at the last safe anchorage, and now toilsomely accomplished another stage of their journey on the dangerous waterway. Sailing with the others came a little "country ship," commanded by an English seaman, Captain Brooke, and bearing a small company of Englishmen, servants of the Honourable Company of East India merchants. Their destination was the village of Chuttanutty, where they had traded at various intervals for several years past. Steering for "the great tree" which was the "sea mark," the worthy captain brought his vessel to a safe anchorage in the deep water below the high bank on which the village stood; and this is how the record of the arrival stands in the old books of the company:—