CALCUTTA: PAST AND PRESENT
goods, so that he could not see it. When the Fort was demolished, in 1818, the site was built over and all remains obliterated.
In 1883, excavations which were made for the foundations of the East India Railway Company's Office in Fairlie Place uncovered portions of the masonry of old Fort William, and roused an interest in the identification of its exact position. Since that date additional information has been gained from time to time as old buildings have been removed and new ones erected on portions of the site, and by this means a plan of the old Fort has been constructed with reference to the position of modern buildings. These have been marked with memorial tablets to indicate the principal spots of interest, and so to keep in memory those who laid the foundations of the British Empire in India.
The oft-quoted rhyme, "Ghora pur howda Hathi pur ghin," which has so often been said to have had reference to Warren Hastings' hurried retreat from Benares to Chunar, appears to have had a much earlier origin in connection with the fall of Calcutta, and to have run—
"Hathi pur howda, Ghora pur ghin
Killa moorcha pur dhunka
Calcutta lia chin."
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