Indiamen are lying at anchor, ships are arriving or preparing for
departure, the native craft incessantly ply to and fro, and a Babel of
voices of different nationalities rises on the air.

Here is a picture of the Maidan, drawn by another lady-traveller, Mrs.
Murray Mitchell:--

[The Maidan, Calcutta: page95.jpg]

It is, she says, a noble expanse, which, about a hundred years ago, was a
wild swampy jungle, famous only for snipe-shooting. Strange to say, it
is not, like most Indian plains, burned up and brown, but, from its
vicinity to the river, and the frequent showers that visit it, as fresh
and green as an English park. It has a few fine tanks, and is sprinkled
with some leafy trees; these, however, not so numerous as they were
before the cyclones of 1864 and 1867, which swept away its chief natural
beauties. Several broad well-kept drives intersect it, and it is
ornamented by some graceful gardens and a few handsome columns and
statues. Indeed, the Maidan is the centre of all that is grand and
imposing; the shabby and the unsightly is kept behind, out of view.
Facing it, along its eastern marge, stand the noble pillared palaces of
Chowringhee. At one end stands the handsome new Court House; also the
Town Hall, and other buildings of less pretence; and, further on, the
noble pile of Government House, with four handsome entrance gates, and
surrounded by shrubberies and gardens. In front spread the Eden Gardens,
a delightful addition to the beauties both of Government House and the
Esplanade. From this point the business part of Calcutta extends in a
northerly direction, including Dalhousie Square, with its many buildings,
among which conspicuous stands the domed Post Office--the vista closing
gracefully with the shapely spire of St. Andrew's Church. At the further