A Well in the Fort at Monghyr, Bihar

Monghyr was an important Mughal town and fort which served as a regional headquarters during the reign of Akbar. More recently it had been used by Mir Kasim during the period of his unstable relations with the British (see lot 14); but by the time the Daniells visited it (in 1788 and again in 1790) it was in the possession of the British. One still surviving mark of this occupation is the small European cemetery outside the fort's northern gate, the Lal Darwaza. The Daniells were anticipated here as in other places, by William Hodges, who drew part of the fort in the spring of 1781 and published an aquatint of it in September 1787 (Select Views, no.30). In the Daniells' attempts to outdo Hodges they gained some unexpected support: Hodges' aquatint of Monghyr was criticized by the aristocratic traveller Lord Valentia for having 'no resemblance to it' (Valentia, 1809, vol.I, p.89). The Daniells were not beyond some strange perceptions themselves, however: William told his mother that 'Monghir is esteemed the Montpelier of Hindoostan' (Cotton, 1923, p.13).