TRIMAL NAIG’S CHOULTRY. 
51 
Siva and Vishnu, and some progress was made during 
his life towards completing these splendid edifices. 
Most of them are now expunged altogether from the 
mighty chronicle of human events, or are only to be 
faintly traced : of some " the place thereof knoweth 
them no more while of the rest it can only he said, 
that they remain grand, indeed, but melancholy evi- 
dences of the fallacy of human expectations. 
Besides these fabrics and the choultry already men- 
tioned, Trimalla Nayaca, commonly called Trimal 
Naig, erected a splendid palace within the fort of Ma- 
dura, The choultry, which is always associated with 
the name of this Prince, is certainly the most remark- 
able structure of its kind in Hindostan. Intended, as 
it was, to chronicle, in a material more durable than 
marble, the deeds of his ancestors and of himself, the 
founder of this magnificent monument of Hindoo art 
spared no expense to render it such a structure as 
should secure the admiration of posterity. Knowing 
what a powerful agent superstition is to give perma- 
nency to, and obtain veneration for, a name, Trimal 
Naig has so blended the history of his family with the 
popular mythology, that, until the one shall be ex- 
ploded, the names of his ancestors and himself will 
be recorded in the popular annals of his country, and 
embalmed in the memories of every generation. His 
munificence is even to this day the theme of many a 
romance and of many a song ; and amid the wrecks of 
former magnificence at Madura, which seem to point, 
as with an air of solemn mockery, at the misery of 
her now poor and scanty population, the proud record 
of her bygone glory is occasionally heard, like the 
