hands at rapidly increasing prices, and it was no uncommon occurrence for shares to advance in the course of a day hundreds of rupees until they eventually reached Rs. 9,000 to Rs. 10,000, the par value being Rs. 1,000.  I had one share given to me which I sold for Rs. 6,000.  Of course the inevitable happened—­Port Canning proved a dead failure and the slump was most disastrous, the shares rapidly declining from thousands to hundreds and even less.

FORTNIGHTLY MAILS.

Of course there were no telephones in the days I am writing about, and the telegraph was very rarely used.  Business had not to be done in such a rush then, and in the ordinary way the post was quick enough.  Telegraph charges were high, and it was only in matters of the utmost urgency that the wires were used by business people.  Then there were only two mails a month.  One fortnight the mails were sent direct from Calcutta by the P. & O. steamer from Garden Reach, and the next fortnight went across country to Bombay.  The railway line did not extend right across the country then, and in places the mails had to be taken from one railway terminus to the beginning of the next part of the line by dak runners.  I remember when I went home in 1869, I went by train as far as Nagpur, and from there had to go by dak gharry to join the railway again at another point about 150 miles away.  This was, of course, before the Suez canal was opened, and after the round-the-Cape route had ceased to be the way to India.  Mails and passengers went by steamer to Suez, and then by train to Alexandria, where they joined another steamer.  Similarly the incoming mail came in alternate fortnights to Bombay and Calcutta, and the arrival of the mail at Garden Reach, particularly in the cold weather when all the young ladies came out to be married, was always a great occasion.  All Calcutta used to gather at the jetty at Garden Reach to see and welcome the new-comers.  Practically, the only steamers then were owned by the P. & O., Apcar & Co., and Jardine Skinner & Co., the two latter trading to China; Mackinnon & Mackenzie had one or two small steamers, but the trade of the port was carried on chiefly by sailing vessels.  These used to lie three and four abreast in the river from the “Pepper Box” up to where the Eden Gardens now are, and they added considerably to the attraction and adornment of this particular section of the Strand.  There were no docks or jetties, and all loading and unloading had to be done over the side into lighters and country boats.

Travelling in the mofussil in those days, as may be imagined, was not a pleasant and easy business.  The Eastern Bengal Railway was only built as far as Kooshteah, and beyond that the traveller had to go by boat, bullock cart and palkigharry.  Assam was quite cut off, and a journey up there was a serious undertaking.  There were no railways or steamers, and the traveller had to go in a budgerow, a sort of house-boat, and the journey took at least a month each way.  Tea was then, of course, quite in its infancy.