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218
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY
[ DECEMBER, 1927
there is the image of a face, all red, but its features are not distinguishable. The Indians say that it is the pagoda1c of Madeo, and the Hindus are much devoted to it.
A reservoir near the Daman Gate, where the finest walk of the district begins, is much esteemed. This gate is covered and surrounded by the branches of a fine War-tree17 which the Portuguese call a root-tree, and which affords the most pleasant shelter to all who come to this tank. This large water reservoir has sixteen angles ; each of its sides is one hundred paces in length, and the whole structure is as long as a musket-shot in diameter. The bottom of it is paved with largo, smooth stones, and there are steps almost all round it after the manner of an amphitheatre, reaching from the top of the tank down to the bottom : each step is half a foot in height, and they are made of fine free-stone brought from the neighbourhood of Cambay; that portion inside the tank which is not in steps, is in talus; and three slopes have been made as watering places.
In the middle of this reservoir there is a stone edifice about four toises (1 toise=1.39459 feet) in height, length and width, which one mounts by two little staircases. It is a place where people can enjoy themselves and take the air ; but they must reach it by boat. The great tank is filled by rain-water during the rainy season ; after flowing through the country. side, where it forms a large canal, which has had to be bridged, the water runs into a large area enclosed by walls, whence it passes into the tank by three holes which have been cut circular, having a diameter of over four feet; and near by, there is a kind of Muhammadan chapel.
This tank was constructed at the expense of a rich Bania named Gopi,18 who had it built for the public benefit ; and in former times no other water was drunk in Surat but the water of this tank, for the five wells which supply the entire city nowadays, were not discovered until a long time after the tank was constructed. It was begun at the same time as the castle, and people say that the one cost as much to construct as the other. It is most certainly a piece of work worthy of a king, and may well be compared to the finest ever built by the Romans for the public benefit. However, as the Levantines allow everything to perish for want of proper upkeep, it was already obstructed by six feet of earth when I saw it, and it is in great danger of being completely filled up with earth some day, unless some charitable Bania has it cleaned out.
Having inspected this fine tank, we went to a place a quarter of a league away, to see the Princess's Garden there, so-called because it belongs to the sister of the Great Mogul. It has a large area, planted with trees of various kinds, such as mangoes, palms, mirabolams, wars, maisa trees, and several others planted in avenues. Among the shrubs I saw the querzehere of aacla, with which I have dealt fully in my second volume, and also the Egyptian acacia. There are several very straight, fine avenues, and especially the four which traverse the garden cross-wise, with a small channel in their midst, the water of which is drawn from a well by bullocks. In the middle of the garden there is a building with four fronts, each having its divan, and in each corner a small room, and in front of each of these divans, there is a square tank full of water, whence issue the streams which flow along the main avenues. However, though this park is well laid out, it has nothing of the elegance of our gardens. One does not see our bowers, our beautiful flower-beds or the accuracy of their divisions, and still less the various fountains which we have.
At one hundred or a hundred and fifty paces from this garden, we saw the War tree in its entire fulness. This tree is also called Ber, and Banyan-tree, and Root-tree, owing to the facility with which its branches, which bear large filaments, take root, thus reproducing fresh branches : thus a single tree can fill & very large area, and this particular one is very extensive and very tall, and casts a very large extent of shade. Its trunk is round, with a diameter of eighty paces, which makes more than thirty toises. The branches which had 16 A Hindu temple.
17 Wad, Ficus indica. 18 This is the famous Gopi Talao, now drained,
