PONDICHERRY. 
313 
I forwarded by express to Madras, the letters of introduction 
with which I had been honoured by the Marquis Wellesley for 
Lord WilHam Bentinck, and also letters to Mr. Petrie, a Member 
of Council, requesting him to lay the bearers for me for the last 
thirty miles. 
Pondicherry, once the most splendid city in the East, and the 
capital of the French when they held the larger part of the Garnatic, 
has never recovered its destruction in 1761. The French admini- 
stration, confiding in the great force sent out under Monsieur Lally, 
wantonly ordered that all the British forts, which might fall into 
his hands, should be dismantled ; and this was executed at Fort St. 
David's. The fate of war "made Pondicherry liable to retaliation ; 
the fortifications were completely destroyed, and the ditch w^as 
filled up by the removal of the glacis into it. This, however, did 
not satisfy the Council of Madras ; a remembrance of the great 
power of the French seems to have haunted them ; and to make a 
return of it still more difficult, they determined to extend their 
devastations to the buildings, public as well as private. The 
Jesuits' College, and some of the public buildings, still remain me- 
morials of their resentment. The private houses have been com- 
pletely repaired, and Pondicherry is still the handsomest town, 
except Calcutta, that I have seen in India. 
In the middle of the square are lying the pillars and other orna- 
ments of a pagoda of a black stone, richly ornamented with carving. 
These had been removed from a sacred building by Monsieur 
Dupleix, when he assumed the rank of Soubah, and lived in all 
the pomp of an eastern prince, and were probably intended for a 
durbar. They now remain strewed on the ground, no unfit emblem 
