EARLY YEARS
warehouses, and workshops, were all in the Fort; and closely packed they must have been, for the entire length was only 710 feet, and the breadth at the northern end 340 feet, widening to 485 feet at the south.
Though the Governor's official residence, which Hamilton described as the best and most regular piece of architecture he had seen in India, stood within the Fort, he had his private dwelling-house outside the walls, for the advantage, no doubt, of wider garden space and purer air than could be obtained in the hot and overcrowded area within. This house appears to have stood about where Bankshall Street now runs, and its grounds extended across Bankshall Street to "the Park," Dalhousie Square. Round this locality gather many memories of the early days of Calcutta. It has been conjectured that the walls of the Fort were at one time coloured red, and that their ruddy reflection in the waters of the tank obtained for it its native name, "Lal Diggee," the Red Tank. However this may be, the "Great Tank" was highly valued by the settlers, for, being fed by springs, it furnished a supply of pure drinking water, very desirable when the river was polluted by every form of contamination and was the receptacle for all carrion. The tank was accordingly guarded
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