Page:Life in India or Madras, the Neilgherries, and Calcutta.djvu/565

497 resting. These things are as new to the resident of Madras as are the scenes of Italy to the Englishman. The people of Bengal differ from those of Southern India in language, dress, and looks, as well as in other respects. In frame, they are more slightly built, and less manly; indeed, they have the reputation of being the most effeminate of the Hindu races.

About a hundred miles above the island of Sagor, a bend in the river, now but a mile wide, opens to your view Garden Reach, a suburb of the great city. As you glide gently up with a favouring breeze and silent but powerful tide, you pass house after house, elegantly built, plastered with chunam, and surrounded by a beautiful shady compound, with a green lawn running to the water's edge. These are the country residences of the English gentry. You recall (if a reader of Sunday-school books) the story of Ermina, and almost wonder through which of these gardens the thoughtless Minny and her gentle Anna walked to the home of the rich merchant. But the scene has become too exciting for meditation; you are passing the fort and city. Steamers, ships, awkward craft from the Laccadives or Maldives, China, and Malacca, boats of various kinds and shapes, are Rh