Recollections of Calcutta for over Half a CenturyMassey, Montague
History
Recollections of Calcutta for over Half a Century
Massey, Montague
Calcutta (India) -- Description and travel; Massey, Montague -- Travel -- India -- Calcutta
This of course made a most wonderful and striking change in the
economy of life in more ways than one, and amongst others it brought
about at once and for ever the abdication of the tyrannical sway and
cessation of the depredations of the aforesaid Gungadeen who had no
use for kerosine as a substitute for his beloved coconut oil wherewith
to anoint his body and for the other various uses to which he could
apply it.
ELECTRIC LIGHTS.
Although this did not come into general vogue until the late nineties,
it had been introduced in a very practical way as far back as the
year 1881 in the Howrah Jute Mills Co., but after a few years it was
discontinued, to be generally re-adopted in 1895 by all the jute
mills. The introduction of the light into private dwellings, places of
amusement, and other buildings, of course worked a marvellous change
in our social life and all its conditions, but it appealed most of all
to those who like myself had for so many years sat in a species of
outer darkness and made it almost seem as if the past had been but a
dream.
PUNKAHS AND ELECTRIC FANS.
The old, swinging punkah, with which most of us are so familiar, held
on its silent way in spite of occasional attempts from time to time to
oust it from its well and firmly established position. The different
inventions that made their appearance always lacked the one essential
point of giving expression to the kick or jerk of the hand-pulled
punkah, and consequently they proved unsuccessful. I doubt much
whether it would ever have been possible to create an artificial
substitute for this most essential and necessary adjunct. But the
advent of the electric fan also in the latter end of the nineties of
course did away with the necessity for any further essays in this
direction. And so at last after innumerable years of abuse but useful
and indispensable work, the old punkah went the way of all things
mundane.
THE HOWRAH BRIDGE
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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