"The ships lie against the bank of the river for two or three miles, and in some places they are three or four deep, so that at a distance their masts resemble a forest of trees stripped of their foliage. Twice in recent times Calcutta has been visited by hurricanes or typhoons--in 1842 and 1864--and on both these occasions nearly all the ships in the harbor were driven from their moorings, and many sunk. A gentleman who was here during the last of these storms says the ships were actually piled one above another, and that the loss of property was very great. This was the storm that flooded Saugur Island and all the lower part of the Hoogly, and caused an enormous loss of life. The centre of the typhoon of 1842 passed directly over Calcutta, and that of 1864 within a few miles of it. "Going up the bank of the river from the Maidan we pass a long line of great warehouses that front on the water, and come to the bridge over the Hoogly. Doctor Bronson says this is the largest bridge of the kind in the world, as it is neither on piles nor suspended, but is supported by pontoons. He advises us to describe it, as it will be interesting to all boys whose fathers are engineers, and to a good many others besides; so we'll try. "Owing to the treacherous sands of the river, and the great depth necessary for piers for a fixed bridge, it was determined to build a floating one, so that it could be economically constructed, and easily repaired in case of accident. The bridge is more than 1500 feet long from one abutment to the other, has a roadway forty-eight feet wide, and footways seven feet broad on each side, and is said to have cost at the rate of ten dollars for every square foot of platform. The platform is of wood, resting on iron girders, which are supported twenty-four feet above the water by timber trusses resting on iron pontoons. There are twenty-eight of these pontoons, each 160 feet long and ten feet broad; they are each divided into eleven water-tight compartments, and moored both up and down stream by means of iron cables. Viewed from the lower part of the harbor as one approaches from the sea, the bridge appears like a massive fixed structure, and we could hardly believe the captain of the steamer when he told us that it was only a floating affair, resting on pontoons. "There, we've described the bridge the best way we can, and the Doctor says it is very well done for inexperienced boys like ourselves. We'll stop now and rest awhile." CHAPTER XXVII. CALCUTTA, CONTINUED.--DEPARTURE FOR BENARES. The letter about Calcutta continued as follows: "From the Hoogly bridge we went to see the famous Burning Ghaut, where the Hindoos dispose of their dead. Ghaut means 'steps,' and the Burning Ghaut is nothing more nor less than a series of steps on the bank of the river, with a wide platform at the top. [Illustration: THE BURNING GHAUT AT CALCUTTA.]