VII. ] BENGAL! LANGUAGE & LITERATURE. 885 college was considered one of the most important departments of the State, and the Senior members of the Government were required in virtue of their office, to take a share in its management. Lord Wellesley proposed to erect a spacious and magni- ficent edifice for the institution in the immediate neighbourhood of Calcutta at Garden Reach, suit- able for the accommodation of all professors and 500 students with a public hall, library, chapel and other requisite apartments.” ‘Such was the grand institution which, Lord Wellesley projected to qualify the public function- aries for their official duties. It was the noblest and most comprehensive plan of usefulness which had been devised since the Factory had grown into an Empire.” ‘“ The incitements to exertion in the College of Fort William were of the highest and most effective nature and its moral, economical and religious discipline such as was admirably calculated to promote all that was virtuous and useful in civil society.* “Several of those who attained the highest posts in the empire, and many, who, if they did not reach such a proud eminence yet departed with the esteem of the high, and confidence of the lowly, laid the foundation of future success within the precincts of the College. The well-known names of Macnaghton, Bayley, Jenkins, Haughton, Prinsep and others, are sufficient to prove the justness of this observation.’’t
- Memoirs of Dr. Buchanan Vol. I, Page 208.
+ Calcutta Review, Vol. V.
