Page:Imperial India — An Artist's Journals.djvu/68

 CHAPTER IV.

AGRA. YOU reach Agra by a bridge across the Jumna. Some few minutes before you get there, out of the left window of the carriage you see in the distance the celebrated Taj. The sun was rising when we first saw it, and the white domes told in faint lilac against the golden sky. The outline of the Taj, I frankly admit, I do not like : other domes or cupolas rise from a square or hexagonal base, but the dome of the Taj rises from a circle, and swells straight away. The view from the railway prepared me for disappointment on a closer inspection. Crossing the river, the railway takes you close to the fort. Like the Delhi fort, the fort at Agra is built of red sandstone, and the Red Sandstone Gate, close to which you find yourself upon leaving the station, is very imposing. We had little time, however, to inspect, for breakfast has great charms for the traveller who has sped all night long by rail, and our lodgings had to be secured. Off we went to the club, of which, owing to the foresight of my brother, we had previously been made honorary members. We drove past many comfortable-looking bungalows, whose inhabitants were many of them starting for their morning ride. Unfortunately the club bungalow was full, and we had to content ourselves with two rooms in an indifferent hotel called the "Agra Cantonment Hotel." There we breakfast, and by eleven o'clock are ready to start sight-seeing.

First we go to the fort. It is not so big as the Delhi fort, but more irregular in shape. As at Delhi, towards the river are the royal buildings, and, as at Delhi, the hand of the Englishman has done its best to destroy. At the summit of the rising