Page:Calcutta, Past and Present.djvu/110

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PUBLIC BUILDINGS

with the new Theatre adjoining it on the west, "Theatre Street" running between the two. The Theatre stood on the site of the present new China Bazar, which makes the position of the house correspond with the corner of the road from the Bazar into Lyons Range, and it is safe to conjecture that this was the house described in 1776, in the deeds relating to the lease of the land on which Writers' Buildings was built, as "the house in the occupation of James Huggins, merchant." Clive most likely occupied "Mr. Eyre's house," if such it was, during the three years of his first administration of Bengal, from January, 1757, to February, 1760, when he sailed for England, and lived in the larger and probably new house during his second administration.

The Governor's residence within the Fort was in ruins after the siege, and his private house outside the walls was too much injured for immediate occupation. It had been used as an outpost, but was abandoned on the second day of the siege. The house is said by Long to have been reoccupied as Government House, and to have been in so decayed and ruinous a condition in 1767, when it was surveyed by the Civil Architect, as to require immediate and thorough repair. It appears doubtful, to say the least, if the house referred to in the architect's

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