36 MURSHIDABAD CITY. peculiarity of this mosque was its liberality of worship. On one side prayers were conducted according to the Hanafi rite of the Sunni sect, while on the other side were being observed the religious ceremonies of the Shias, the Court sect. The General Aspect of the City is thus described by the Revenue Surveyor (1860):— Numerous brick buildings stand all along the banks of the river, north and south of the palace, which belong to, and are chiefly occupied by, the relatives and adherents of the Nawab. Many others, some with pretty gardens, are scattered about in the tangled maze of jungle, hovels, holes, and tanks which lie to the eastward. Standing on the top of the palace dome, the loftiest place in the District, and looking over the city and its suburbs, little meets the eye but a dense forest of bamboos and trees of all kinds. Hardly a clear spot is to be seen. It is only when one turns to the west that the river and the high land in the north-west of the District present open tracts. A stranger, as he stood and gazed, would never imagine that below was a dense mass of human beings of all classes, crowded together in every description of house and hut. There are no defined limits to Murshidabad as a city, nor is any part known especially by this name. It is given indiscriminately to a collection of temples, mosques, handsome brick houses, gardens, walled enclosures, hovels, huts, and tangled jungle, containing the ruins of edifices that have sprung up and decayed around the many palaces of the former and present Nawabs of Murshidábád.' Motijhil, or the Pearl Lake (a name also applied to a lake in Kashmir and another in Lahore), is about 2 miles south of Murshidabad. Dr. B. Hamilton states that it has been one of the former windings of the river; but others are of opinion that it was formed by the excavations made to procure bricks for building the houses, which were at time surrounded by the lake in the form of a horse-shoe. It continues to be a beautiful spot, but hardly a relic remains of its ancient magnificence. It seems to have been first chosen as a residence by Nyázish Muhammad, the nephew of Ali Vardi Khan. It is more celebrated, however, for the palace built by Siraj-ud-daulá at an enormous expense. The materials were partly brought from the ruins of Gaur; and a few arches are still left, constructed of the black marble (or rather hornblende) which once covered the tombs of the old Pathán kings of Bengal. The following story is told of its completion, to explain the name of Mansúrganj, by which it is commonly known : • As the building was nearly finished, Siráj-ud-daulá invited Ali Vardí to see it. When he came, Siráj-ud-daulá locked him up in a room, and refused to release him unless the zamindars there paid a fine for their land. This request the Nawáb was compelled to grant, and also to allow to his petulant grandson the privilege of erecting a granary.
