Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 6.djvu/58

 NOTES AND QUERIES. [ii s. vi. Juw 20. wia

to the group. It defaces the fabric of the Abbey, and its removal might well be con- sidered. This memorial, erected by the East India Company at a cost of 1,OOOZ. to the sculptor and 511. 10s. to the Dean and Chapter, was unveiled 18 June, 1763. There is also in St. John's a memorial to Lieut. -Col. J. A. Kirkpatrick (" Husherrat Jung"), husband of the Begum Khair-un-Nissa of Hyderabad, and father of Kitty Kirkpatrick, the " Blu- mine " of Carlyle's ' Sartor Resartus.' Neither is mention made of tablets affixed to buildings commemorating former resi- dents of note, nor yet of the monuments in the great cemeteries where lie many of the illustrious dead of the earlier days of the settlement. (At the Alipore Military Ceme- tery is the grave of Lieut. Walter Landor Dickens, who died in 1863. Its stone bears an inscription from the pen of his father, Charles Dickens the novelist.) With the exception of the Heber statue, the same remark applies to St. Paul's Cathedral and other places of worship.

The following statues are in course of pre- paration : Lord Clive (John Tweed), similar to another destined for King Charles Street, Westminster, which at the time of writing is on the point of being temporarily placed in the garden of Gwydyr House, Whitehall ; Lord Curzon (F. Pomeroy), at the time of writing in the exhibition of the Royal Academy ; Lord Curzon again (for the Victoria Memorial Hall); the King Emperor, Edward VII. (Sir T. Brock) ; Lord Kitchener (Sydney March) ; Lord Minto (Sir Gos- combe John).

A fountain to the memory of the late Lady Curzon has also been projected, though it is now doubtful if its erection will follow.

. Lord Auckland. George Eden, Earl of Auckland (1784-1849), Governor- General of India 1836-42. Pedestrian. Bronze. By H. Weekes. On a maidan island site north of Eden Gardens, with its back to the High Court. It was first placed (in 1848) within the gardens (which Calcutta owes to the generosity and taste of the Misses Eden, his lordship's sisters). They were at one time known as Auckland Gardens, and cover a portion of the site of the long-lost Respon- dentia Walk.

Another statue occupies a niche on the principal facade of the India Office.

Sir S. G. Bayley. Sir Steuart Colvin Bayley (born 1836), Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal 1889-90. White marble. By W. Hamo Thorny croft, R.A. Near the north-east corner of Dalhousie Square Park. It stood

until 1905 on an island grass-plot to the west of Government House Gardens, with its back to the Treasury Buildings.

Lord W. Cavendish Bentinck. Lord Wil- liam Cavendish Bentinck (1774-l'839), last Governor-General of Fort William in Bengal (1828-34), and first Governor-General of India 1834-5. Pedestrian. Bronze. By Sir R. Westmacott, R.A. Erected in 1835 on the maidan, facing the south entrance of. the Town Hall. A vigorous bas-relief below of a suttee (also by Westmacott) commemo- rates the abolition of suttee during his period of office. The inscription at the back of the pedestal by T. B. (afterwards Lord) Macaulay, Law Member of the Supreme- Council in 1834-8, is as follows :

"To William Cavendish Bentinck, who during seven years ruled India with eminent prudence, integrity, and benevolence ; who, placed at the heat! of a great empire, never laid aside the simplicity and moderation of a private citizen ; who infusecl into Oriental Despotism the Spirit of British Free* dom ; who never forgot that the end of Government is the welfare of the governed ; who abolished cruel rites ; who effaced humiliating distinctions ; who allowed liberty to the expression of public opinion ; whose constant study it was to elevate the moral and intellectual character of the nation committed to his charge."

Another statue occupies a niche on the principal facade of the India Office.

The Black Hole. The position of the chamber, " a cube of 18 feet," with but little ventilation, known to history as the Black Hole of Calcutta (in which,, on the night of 20 June, 1756, there were confined 146 British inhabitants in the course of the siege of Old Fort William by the Nawab Suraj-ud-Dowla, of whom only 23 came out alive), was indicated during' Lord Curzon's Viceroyalty by a black marble pavement, with iron railing and skirting-wall on three sides, and on the- fourth, against the Collectorate adjoining,, a marble tablet with inscription. In 1884 a^ tablet had been placed on the inner side of an archway (since demolished) to the north of the General Post Office in Charnock Place ; it recorded the wrongly conjectured! site of the Black Hole, but was removed* after further excavations in 1891 had satis- factorily uncovered the remains of the actual chamber. White marble tablets and brass guide-lines now indicate other ascer- tained positions of historical interest in and about the site of the Old Fort. It is believed that a short range of archways fitted up as " godowns " for use by the Post Office is all that is now left above ground of the first Fort William.