পাতা:ইংরেজের জয় বা আরকট অবরোধ ও পলাশী.pdf/৩৪৩

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O\) o ३दू (ख्दू डी श । Hole, yet were either killed at an earlier stage of the Seige, or having come out of the Black Hole alive, afterwards succumbed to its effects. These persons seem to me equally to deserve commemoration with those who were smothered to death in the prison, and accordingly I have entered their names on the remaining panels of this monument. We therefore have inscribed On this memorial the names of some So persons who took part in those historic events which established the British dominion in Bengal nearly a century and a half ago. They were the pioneers of a great movement, the authors of a wonderfel chapter in the history of mankind : and I an proud that it has fallen to my lot to preserve their simple and humble names from oblivio, and to restore them to the greatful remembrance of their countrymen. In carrying out this scheme I have been pursuing one branch of a policy to which I have deliberately set myself is India, namely, that of preserving, in a breathless and often thoughtless age, the relics and memorials of the past. To me the past is sacred. It is often a chronicle of errors and blunders and crimes, but it also abounds in the records of virtue and heroism and valour. Anyhow, for good or evil, it is finished and written and has become part of the history of the race, part of that which makes us what we are. Though human life is blown out as easily as the flame of a