ORIENTAL COMMERCE. 



[Madras. 



There are many large and handsome houses within the fort, but the 

 Company's servants and merchants generally reside in the country ; they 

 repair to the fort in the morning for the transaction of business, and return 

 home in the afternoon. Madras has been greatly improved within a few 

 years past; it now contains three churches, besides several chapels. 



The Black Town is to the N. of the fort, separated by a spacious 

 esplanade ; it is near four miles in circumference, and surrounded with forti- 

 fications sufficiently strong to resist the attempts of cavalry to surprise and 

 plunder it. This town is the residence of the Gentoo, Moorish, Armenian, 

 and Portuguese merchants, and of those Europeans who do not hold 

 situations under the Government. The custom-house, and the houses of 

 some of the merchants at Clack Town, are large and elegant buildings ; 

 these, with the pagodas and temples, have a grand appearance from the sea. 



To the S. of the fort stands the country residence of the Governor ; and 

 a short distance to the S. of that is Chepauk, the palace of the Nabob of 

 Arcot. The surrounding country is called the Choultry Plain, and is covered 

 with the houses and gardens of the Europeans, most of them large and beau- 

 tiful ; and from the superior quality of the chunam, or mortar, used in their 

 erection, have an appearance of being biiHt with marble. 



The Choultry Plain commences about a mile and a quarter S. W. of 

 Fort St. George, from which it is separated by two rivers. The one, called 

 the River of Triplicane, winding from the W., gains the sea about 1000 

 yards to the S. of the glacis; the other, coming from the N. W., passes the 

 W. side of the Black Town, the extremity of which is high ground, which 

 the river rounds, and continues to the E., until within 100 yards of the sea, 

 where it washes the foot of the glacis, and then turning to the S., continues 

 parallel with the beach, until it joins the mouth and bar of the River of 

 Triplicane. From the turning of the river at the high ground, a canal 

 striking to tlieS. communicates with the River of Triplicane. The low ground, 

 included by the channels of the two rivers and canal, is called the Island, 

 which is near two miles in circumference. About 1200 yards from the strand 

 of the sea is a -long bridge, leading from the island over the Triplicane 

 River, to a road which continues S. to the town of St Thome. Another 

 bridge over the canal leads to the W., and amongst others, to a village called 

 Egmore; from which this bridge takes its name. Coming from the S. or W., 

 these two bridges afford the only convenient access to the Fort or White 

 Town, excepting another along the strand of the sea, when the bar of the 

 Triplicane River is choked with sand. All the ground between the St. 

 Thome Road and the sea is filled with villages and enclosures ; and so 

 is that on the left, for half a mile towards the Choultry Plain, from 



