Bombay has a population only a little smaller than that of Calcutta, and, like Calcutta and Madras, it is a new city, as time goes in the Immemorial East. The island on which it stands was presented to King Charles II. as part of the dower of his Portuguese Queen, and in order to enable the British the better to co-operate with the Portuguese in resisting the aggressions and encroachments of the Dutch. When handed over by the Portuguese, there was but a small settlement on the island. In 1668, however, Bombay was ceded to the East India Company, and the Company transferred thither the centre of its trade on the west coast of India, which had up to that time been at Surat, a hundred miles north of Bombay. Gradually the commerce of the port increased, although for a long time it was far outdistanced by Calcutta, whose great riverway extends, as we have seen, through densely peopled plains for a thousand miles inland. Eastward of Bombay, on the other hand, is the mountain face of the Western Ghats, barring easy access to the interior. The greatness of Bombay came only with the opening of the Suez Canal and of the railway lines up the Bhor and Thal Ghats, northeastward and southeastward into India.
[Sidenote: 23. Exterior of Caves of Elephanta.] [Sidenote: 24. Caves of Elephanta.] [Sidenote: 25. The Same, showing the Trimurti.] [Sidenote: 26. Villagers of Elephanta.] In Bombay Harbour there is a small island, about six miles from the city, which is called Elephanta. It contains carved rock temples whose antiquity contrasts strangely with the modern city close by. We have here the entry to these temple caves, and here a view within. This is another picture, showing a three-faced image. The carving is some twenty feet high, and represents Brahma the Creator, Siva the Destroyer, and Vishnu the Preserver. The nature of these gods was described in the first of these lectures. Here we have a little group of the villagers of Elephanta. The village has some seven hundred inhabitants. It is known as Elephanta because there was formerly conspicuous among the rock carvings of the temple a great elephant, which, however, decayed and fell some fifty years ago. The native name of the island means “the town of excavations.”