Page:Life in India or Madras, the Neilgherries, and Calcutta.djvu/75

Rh upon which to build a fort and factories, from the Rajah of Chandgherry, a petty prince of the interior. It was then a small fishing village. But as the power of this company of English merchants increased, and its influence widened, it acquired more territory. The little village, with its fort for the protection of traders, grew into a walled town, the centre of extended possessions. As the work of acquisition went on, its importance rapidly increased, until now it is a city of seven hundred thousand inhabitants, the great and growing metropolis of the possessions of the East India Company in Southern India. The native princes who then held courts and ruled in these lands are forgotten; and their descendants, sunk into insignificance, live upon pensions granted them by the English rulers of the realms of their ancestors.

Madras lies upon the Coromandel or eastern coast of Hindustan, thirteen degrees north of the equator. It stretches for several miles along the shore of the Bay of Bengal, upon a flat sandy plain, raised but a few feet above the level of the sea. The old walled city is known as Black Town, from its being densely populated by Hindus. On its southern side, the Rh