Corporation Street, showing Hindustan Buildings--Proprietors, Hindustan Co-operative Insurance Society, Ld.
Old site of the present Continental Hotel, Chowringhee
Park House, Park Street, William Heath's Premises
The "Haunted" House, corner of Sudder Street, Chowringhee
G.F. Kellner & Co.'s premises in Chowringhee.
Chowringhee Mansions, built on the site of Old United Service Club
Hall & Anderson's premises, at the corner of Park Street
[Illustration: _Photo. by Calcutta Phototype Co_ Old view of Government House, North aspect]
[Illustration: Old view of Government House, South aspect _Photo by Johnston & Hoffmann_]
When I first came to Calcutta things were entirely different to the present day. There was, of course, a very much smaller European population, and every one was consequently pretty well known to every one else, but at the same time the cleavage between the different sections of society was much more marked than it is now. Members of the Civil Service were very exclusive, holding themselves much more aloof than the "heaven-born" do to-day; the military formed another distinct set; while the mercantile people, lawyers, barristers, and others not in any government service, had their own particular circle. This marked cleavage did not, however, prevent the different "sets" from having quite a good time, and as I have said, even if they did not mix together very closely and intimately, we all in a way knew each other.
Forty or fifty years ago, Calcutta was not so lively as it is to-day, especially in the cold weather, but there was one thing in those days which we do not see now. I refer to the regal pomp and circumstance which characterised Government House, and all the functions held there. The annual State Ball was an event which was always looked forward to, and it was a ball at which one could comfortably dance, instead of the crush it had become in the decade prior to 1911.
Looking back, one of the first things that strikes me is the change between then and now in the matter of locomotion. In my early days there were no taxi-cabs, trams, nor even _fitton-gharries,_ the only conveyances for those who had not private carriages being _palkis_ and _bund-gharries._ It would seem strange to-day to see Europeans being carried about the streets in _palkis_, but half a century or more ago they were by no means despised, especially by the newly-out _chokras_, whose salary was not at all too high. They had to choose between a _palki_ and a _ticca-gharry,_ which were very much alike in shape, the difference between them being that the one was carried on the shoulders of coolies, and the other drawn by a horse.