It has a fine park.
"The kings of Oude were ambitious to outshine the glories of Delhi, and, to
a considerable extent, they succeeded; but the architecture is fantastic
rather than grand and beautiful, and experts are inclined to laugh at it.
But our friend Professor Giroud has something to say, and I subside to make
room for him.
"I wish to tell the story of a Frenchman, which I think will interest the
party," said the professor. "Claude Martine was a Breton soldier who went
with his regiment to Pondicherry, the principal French settlement in India,
which has been tossed back and forth between the English, Dutch, and French
like a shuttlecock, but has been in possession of my country since 1816. He
attained the grade of corporal; but this elevated rank did not satisfy him,
and he left for the interior.
"Finally, after a thousand adventures, which he never wrote out, he arrived
at the court of Oude, where, by some means, he obtained a captaincy in the
royal army, and, what was better, the favor of the king. In 1780 he was
commander-in-chief of the native army. But his enterprise did not end here;
for he was the king's trusted favorite, and of course he became a
millionaire, even though there were no railroad shares in being at that
period.
"He brought with him some crude notions of architecture, and he set about
reforming that of India.
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