is bordered with some fine banyans. The branches interlace overhead and form a long aisle of wood and foliage. It is beautiful in all its aspects : in the early morning, when the mist is rising and the blue smoke of the wood-fires hangs like a curtain of delicate gauze over the still vegetation in the broad rays of the noonday sun, when every leaf glistens with reflected light ; at sunset, when horizontal shafts of gold pierce the western side of the road and touch the grey stems of the trees; and even at night, when the full moon throws a lacework of patterns upon the roadway. The road ends abruptly at the entrance to the grounds of the Adyar Club, losing itself in the crossway called Chamier's Road.
The compound of the Adyar Club slopes down to the Adyar River one of those smooth, still backwaters, like the Cooum, that begins as a watercourse, and spreads out into broad reaches. It is a natural boundary to the suburbs of Madras on the south, and is unpolluted by drainage. It has always been the favourite resort of the lovers of boating. The club-house has a history that is interesting. It belongs to the Portuguese Roman Catholic Mission at the Luz, to which it was bequeathed by De Monte more than a century ago. Petrus Uscan, the son of an illustrious Armenian of Julfa, came to Madras early in the eighteenth century and settled there. He built up a flourishing trade with Manilla in the Philippine Islands and accumulated a fortune. His name is connected with the Marmelong Bridge and with the steps to the church on St. Thomas's Mount. When he died (1754) his commercial mantle fell upon the shoulders of a merchant named De Monte, the descendant of one of the proud old Portuguese dons who settled at Mylapore. Business prospered with De Monte as it had done with Uscan, and a fine fortune was made. He had an only son whom he sent to England to be educated. During
