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CAREER IN INDIA
47

he served more than once, and from whose reforming mind he doubtless drew inspiration. He would not see much of the immediate successor, Lord Auckland, with whose pre-occupations in Afghánistán he felt little concern. As will be presently shown, he was intimately acquainted with Lord Ellenborough. He was greatly pleased with Lord Hardinge, from whom, during the scanty leisure afforded by warlike events, he obtained sanction for some of his most important projects. With the last of the six, the Marquess of Dalhousie, he also cultivated friendship, and died under his régime.

As he stepped from the East Indiaman to the strand of the Húghlí, he was young and extremely tall, with abundant brown hair, fair complexion, grey-blue eyes and regular features; the general type being Anglo-Saxon. He had a modest demeanour and winning manners, with an aspect which the Natives would ascribe to high caste. When to this were added a thoroughly sound education, intellectual endowments, and a paternal name most favourably and honourably known in Calcutta — discerning persons could foresee that he would rise rapidly in life, and that many a powerful hand would be stretched forth to help him in mounting the steps of the ladder.

Thus he landed at Calcutta on September 19th, 1822, as a Covenanted Civil Servant on the Bengal establishment. He found his family in Calcutta; his father being at the post of sacred duty, and his