rajemah’l. 
93 
immediately attempted by the lighter boats that 
were then upon the river. They could not, however, 
make head against the force of the stream. Mean- 
while the poor girl who had been seized, her legs 
hanging on one side of the monster’s jaws, and her 
head and shoulders on the other, was seen to raise her 
hand as if supplicating that assistance which no one 
had the power of rendering her. The alligator rushed 
with his burden up the most rapid part of the cur- 
rent, as if determined at once to baffle all attempts at 
a rescue ; and, having then turned into the calm deep 
water, sank with his prey, and was seen no more. 
Alligators have been frequently caught in the Hoogly, 
and opened, when several pounds weight of armlets 
and ankle rings, with other ornaments worn by women 
and children, have been found in their stomachs. 
As we proceeded up the river, the current ran so 
strongly against us, and the wind was so generally un- 
favorable, that it was nearly a month before we entered 
the Ganges at Sooty. In our progress, we landed 
and made a short stay at Rajemah’l. Here the country 
begins to change its appearance considerably ; a con- 
tinued chain of hills rises above the town for a long 
distance up the southern bank of the stream, which 
adds a most agreeable diversity to the scene. Ra- 
jemah’l was originally a place of great consequence, 
of which there are even now many remains, though 
at this time it is a place of little consideration, 
presenting the appearance of a large, meanly built 
village. There are still to be seen, in a very dila- 
pidated state of course, several rooms of what was 
originally a spacious palace. Some of these apart- 
ments, as the remains show, were of marble, and 
