BRIEF MEMOIRS
OF THE LATE RIGHT REVEREND
JOHN THOMAS JAMES, D.D
LORD BISHOP OF CALCUTTA;
PARTICULARLY
DURING HIS RESIDENCE IN INDIA
GATHERED FROM HIS LETTERS AND PAPERS,
EDWARD JAMES, M.A.
PREBENDARY OF WINCHESTER, AND EXAMINING CHAPLAIN
TO THE LORD BISHOP OF THE DIOCESE.
LONDON :
J. HATCHARD AND SON, 187, PICCADILLY.
1830.
WNY MOHgf STEPHENS
:'::. 'II. .'::'
LONDON :
JBOTSON AND PALMER, PRINTERS, SAVOY STREET, STRAND.
TO
SIR THOMAS DYKE ACL AND, BART. M.P.
FOR THE COUNTY OF DEVON,
AND
SIR ROBERT HARRY INGLIS, BART. M.P.
FOR THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD,
THE EAIILY AND LONG-TRIED FRIENDS
OF THE
LATE BISHOP OF CALCUTTA,
THIS VOLUME
IS, WITH MUCH ESTEEM,
INSCRIBED.
PREFACE.
IN offering these short Memoirs to the pub-
lic, I have to express my thanks to the
Friends of my late Brother, who have
kindly contributed the letters they re-
ceived from him after he sailed for India.
From such sources, and from his own
papers and memorandums, the narrative is
chiefly drawn. An introductory Memoir
has been prefixed for the sake of giving- a
slight sketch of the previous incidents and
pursuits of his life. I feel assured, that to
his friends this will be acceptable on its
VI PREFACE.
own account ; and I trust, that even to
strangers it may not be uninteresting to
trace the growth and formation of a cha-
racter destined for so high and important
duties duties, alas ! which, in the climate
of India, were too much for his strength,
and to the incessant discharge of which he
fell an early victim.
East Sheen, April 6, 1830.
INTRODUCTORY MEMOIR,
JOHN THOMAS JAMES, D.D. late Bishop of
Calcutta, was born on the 23d of January,
1786, at Rugby in Warwickshire. His
father, Thomas James, D.D. was well known
as a scholar, and held, for many years,
the laborious office of Head Master of
Rugby School, to which he was elected in
1778, having previously been Fellow and
Tutor of King's College, Cambridge. Dr.
James's health being impaired by his unre-
mitting exertions in the school, he re-
signed the mastership in 1794, and on
the application of the Trustees of the
foundation at Rugby to Mr. Pitt, then
Vlll INTRODUCTORY
prime minister, he was shortly afterwards
preferred to a prebendal stall, in the Ca-
thedral Church of Worcester ; in the en-
joyment of which situation he continued
to be among the foremost in every work of
charity in that city, and equally zealous in
the discharge of his duties as a parish priest
at his rectory of Harvington in the vale of
Evesham, till the day of his death in Sep-
tember 1804. An elegant piece of sculp-
ture by Chantrey, representing his full
length figure has been erected by his
scholars in the newly-built chapel at
Rugby School ; but his proudest monu-
ment, in the present age, is seen in the
grateful recollection with which his me-
mory is cherished by those, the improve-
ment of whose early years was the object
of his care.
In mentioning the name of this excel-
lent man, it may, perhaps, be permitted to
filial affection, to record here one anecdote
MEMOIR. IX
of his life, especially as it is one, which
is not more characteristic of the benevo-
lence of the father, than of the same
turn of mind and taste for the fine arts
which were strikingly displayed in him
who is the immediate subject of this me-
moir. It happened, while he was an un-
dergraduate scholar of King's, (to which
place he removed from Eton in 1767,)
that the clerk of the college chapel was
reduced to extreme distress by cases of
protracted illness in his numerous family :
his wife became deranged ; his debts in-
creased ; and, despairing of being able to
extricate himself from his difficulties, he
made known his circumstances to Mr.
James. A subscription was immediately
raised ; and Mr. James, finding that his
means did not enable him to contribute so
largely as he could wish in pecuniary re-
lief, turned his mind to another mode of
administering it, and for this purpose wrote
an historical account of that chef d' oeuvre
X INTRODUCTORY
of Gothic architecture, the chapel of his
college, of which he was a great admirer,
and he added a short history of the founda-
tion of the two colleges of King Henry VI.
This little production was embellished
with two etchings by the masterly hand of
his friend, Mr. Thomas Orde, afterwards
Lord Bol ton, at that time a Fellow of
King's College ; and was first published
by subscription in 1769, under the name
of Henry Maiden, chapel clerk ; it went
through several editions, and the ready sale
it met with among visitors to Cambridge,
exceeded even the sanguine hopes of its
real author in the regular supply it af-
forded for the relief of the suffering fa-
mily.
John Thomas was the eldest of eight
children Dr. James had by his second mar-
riage with Arabella, daughter of William
Caldecott, Esq. whose family were long
resident at Catthorpe, in Leicestershire.
MEMOIR. XI
He received the rudiments of his education
at Rugby School, under the immediate eye
of his father ; till at the age of twelve, he
was placed on the foundation at the Char-
terhouse, by the late Earl of Dartmouth,
one of the Governors. Here he soon won
the good opinion of the Head Master, Dr.
Matthew Raine, and the regard and esteem
of his school-fellows, among whom were
the present learned master of the school,
Dr. Russell, and Robert W. Hay, Esq. now
one of the under-secretaries of state, whose
friendship he highly valued throughout his
life. Besides distinguishing himself in the
usual studies of the school, he here began
to show considerable talent for drawing,
and in 1803, the first prize medal was
awarded to him by the Society for the En-
couragement of Arts and Sciences, for a
drawing of Worcester Cathedral.
The following sketch of his boyish cha-
racter is from the pen of his school-fellow
Xii INTRODUCTORY
at the Charterhouse, the Rev. C. R. Prit-
chett, now reader and librarian on that
foundation: " The leading feature in
James's character, at school, was excellent
feeling ; he always felt kindly, and few, that
I have known, seemed to feel more cor-
rectly. I should say, that the singleness
united with kindness of heart, which so
strongly marked his father's course through
life, was no less conspicuous in the son.
His disposition was particularly amiable,
and he was universally beloved. But
while he possessed a calmness which en-
titled him to be called dispassionate, no
one was more warm than he, no one showed
greater animation under circumstances
which so fell in with his turn of mind, as
to rouse him from his usual quiet and
thoughtful retirement. He was always con-
siderate of the feelings of others ; of this
I remember a particular trait. His father
used to allow him, during the winter, a
fire in a private room, hired for him, with
MEMOIR. xiii
Dr. Raine's permission, at the gardener's
house ; but James would often deny him-
self this indulgence rather than appear to
enjoy what other boys could not have.
With this thoughtfulness he was always
cheerful, and had much original humour.
In his studies he was diligent and fond of
private reading. Retired and sedentary in
his habits, he seldom took an active part in
the games common at schools . Drawing, in
which he greatly excelled, constituted his
chief amusement. But still he was always
ready to engage in 'any exploit that em-
braced objects of more than ordinary en-
terprise and hardihood."
His own inclination, at this time, was to go
to sea, and he showed great fondness for every
pursuit connected with naval tactics ; but
at the earnest wish of his mother he forbore
to indulge this inclination, and soon began
to turn his mind to that profession in which
he afterwards attained so high a rank.
XIV INTRODUCTORY
After he had been selected to deliver the
annual oration at the Charterhouse, in
May 1804, he was removed to Christ
Church, Oxford, where he entered as a
commoner ; but had scarcely begun to re-
side, when the death of his father deprived
him, at once, of his best instructor, and
his ablest guide. He soon, however, recom-
mended himself to the notice of that ready
patron of merit, Dr. Cyril Jackson, then
Dean, who, according to his yearly cus-
tom of rewarding some one of those who
had best acquitted themselves at the col-
lections or terminal examinations in the
college, nominated him the dean's student,
having the year before conferred the same
honour on an eminent scholar, Mr. Lloyd,
the late Bishop of Oxford. It is re-
markable, that in after life, the two friends,
thus united in distinction at College, were
raised to the same high station in the
church in consecutive years, and in con-
secutive years, also, were cut off from the
MEMOIR. XV
hopes of their respective dioceses, their
families, and their friends !
Having been examined for his B.A. de-
gree, Mr. James continued to reside at
Christ Church ; and, while he was engaged
in taking pupils as a bachelor, he was
suddenly deprived of his books and draw-
ings, and, indeed, of all that he possessed,
by an alarming fire, which broke out in
the south-western corner of the great quad-
rangle, and was not checked in its pro-
gress, till it had consumed his rooms, to-
gether with several other sets adjoining.
The beautiful hall was, at one time, appre-
hended to be in danger, but the stre-
nuous exertions of the firemen, aided by
the members of the University and others,
succeeded in saving it. It may easily be
believed, that a fire at midnight, in such a
place as Oxford, and at such a college as
Christ Church, would present many pic-
turesque effects to any one who could col-
XVI INTRODUCTORY
lectedly contemplate it ; and it may be
worth mentioning as characteristic of Mr.
James, that, bereft by it, as he was, of all
his little property, as soon as he found that
his services were no longer required in
helping to extinguish the flames, he calmly
selected his spot, and having procured
drawing materials at a friend's rooms, sat
down, and made a sketch of the fire, from
which he afterwards finished a large draw-
ing.
It would be wrong to mention Mr.
James's loss, without mentioning also, that
he was more than compensated for it ; the
liberality of the Dean and Chapter replaced
his furniture, and his numerous friends
took that opportunity of testifying their
esteem and affection for him, by useful
and splendid presents, which made him, as
he often said, "richer than he was before."
After proceeding to the degree of M.A.
MEMOIR. XVII
in 1810, he remained as one of the tutors
at Christ Church, till an opportunity oc-
curred of indulging his wish to see foreign
countries. The events of the war having
now begun to open the continent to Eng-
lishmen, he went abroad in 1813, with his
college friend, Sir James M. Riddell, Bart,
and landing at Gottenburg, he visited
with him the courts of Berlin, Stockholm,
and Petersburg, having entered the Rus-
sian empire by crossing the Gulf of Fin-
land, from Grisleham to Abo in sledges du-
ring winter. From Petersburg, Mr. James
proceeded with William Macmichael, Esq.
M. D. (who was then travelling as RadclifFe
fellow from the University of Oxford) to
Moscow at the interesting moment just
after the burning of that city ; thence they
followed the line of the French retreat to
Borodino and Smolensk, and afterwards
pursuing the course of the Dnieper as far
as Kiev, they visited the cities of Lemberg
and Cracow in Poland, and so crossed to
b
XVl'il INTRODUCTORY
Vienna. On returning to England, Mr.
James published his travels in one volume,
4to. and had the satisfaction to find that
two editions in 8vo. also were soon called
for in succession.
At the wish of many of his friends he
published, the year before he went to India,
a series of views, taken during this tour ;
which he engraved upon stone with his own
hand, and coloured in a manner that gives
the effect of the original drawings.
In 1 8 1 6 he visited Italy with another Christ
Church friend, the late George Hartopp,
Esq. with whom he spent some time most
agreeably, both at Rome and Naples, and
enjoyed the opportunity of cultivating that
taste for painting, which afforded the chief
recreation of his mind amidst the graver
studies to which it had been at all times
habitually directed. Soon after his return
from Italy, he was admitted to holy orders,
MEMOIR. XIX
and resigned his studentship at Christ
Church on being presented by the Dean
and Chapter to the small vicarage of Flitton,
with Silsoe, in Bedfordshire. Here, in the
leisure hours which his parochial duties af-
forded, he followed up those literary pur-
suits, to which he had early become attached,
and embodied the observations he had made
on his favourite art during his tour in Italy,
in a work called "The Italian Schools of
Painting ;" the success of which led him af-
terwards to publish, in 1 822, " The Flemish,
Dutch, and German Schools," which he
enriched with many interesting anecdotes
of the painters. He had it in contempla-
tion to proceed to the painters of the
English school, and also those of France
and Spain, but his attention was now en-
grossed by a more serious subject.
He could not be a silent spectator of the
attempts which were made to bring re-
vealed religion into disrepute ; and the
XX INTRODUCTORY
attacks upon Christianity, which had re-
cently issued from the English press, in-
duced him, as he had seen much of the
evils of infidelity on the continent, to give
to the world his own reflections on the
most important of all subjects in a volume,
which he entitled " The Semi-sceptic ; or
the Common Sense of Religion considered."
He was long employed in arranging his
materials for this work, which is one of
close reasoning, and in the course of which
he examined in detail, and ably confuted,
those infidel arguments which had paved
the way in France for the overthrow of the
altar of religion ; and he pointed out the
superior clearness with which the Christian
philosopher arrives at his conclusions.
In 1823, he married Marianne Jane,
fourth daughter of Frederick Eeeves, Esq.
of East Sheen, Surrey, and formerly of
Mangalore, in the presidency of Bombay,
MEMOIR. XXI
to whom alone, during his illness in India,
he was indebted for all the earthly com-
fort that smoothed his bed of suffering
in the last hours of his life.
Towards the close of the summer of
1 826, when the intelligence reached Eng-
land, that the see of Calcutta had become
a second time vacant by the lamented
death of Bishop Heber, it seemed no easy
matter to find a fit successor to such a man ;
and the invitation transmitted to Mr. James
to fill that highly responsible station could
not be considered otherwise than as a token
of great esteem for his character and quali-
fications . Upon receiving the offer, his first
feeling was to decline it, and he made an-
swer to that effect ; but being afterwards
strongly advised to reconsider the objec-
tions he felt, he determined to consult the
best medical advice as to the fitness of his
constitution to endure the climate of India.
Dr. Johnson's long residence in Bengal,
XX11 INTRODUCTORY
and the study which his then recent pub-
lications shewed him to have bestowed on
the effects of its climate on Europeans,
pointed him out as eminently qualified to
give an opinion on the subject ; him, there-
fore, he consulted, and also his intimate
and valued friend, Dr. Macmichael, who
had long known his constitution, and had
been the companion of his travels in Rus-
sia, Poland, and Germany.
Finding that both these able physicians
coincided in opinion, that there was no-
thing in the state of his health which
should deter him from going to India, he
felt that he could no longer answer it to his
own conscience, if he continued to shrink
from the offered post on account of its dan-
ger. After due deliberation, he made up his
mind to accept it ; and from that moment he
thought of nothing but the object to which
he had devoted himself, and felt it his duty,
as his expression was, " not to look back."
MEMOIR. XX111
Early in April, on the Sunday before
he was to leave Flitton, a day which will
not be forgotten in that village, he preached
on St. Matthew x. 29, " Are not two
sparrows sold for a farthing ? and one of
them shall not fall on the ground without
your Father" and in the course of his
sermon, he took leave of his parishioners
in the following manner :
u I have purposely chosen this passage
of Scripture for this day's discourse, as
conveying a doctrine with which my mind,
you may be assured, is deeply impressed,
and without which, in embarking for a far
distant land, there could be no consolation
for me and mine. I do not know that at
any moment before the present, I have
ever made mention of myself from this
pulpit, or ever used a phrase, even person-
ally referring, unless while speaking of
those common duties which equally belong
to you, to me, to all. I cannot, however,
XXIV INTRODUCTORY
quit you, among whom I have lived so
long and so happily, without some more
particular and especial notice on this day ;
nor can I think of my separation from
you, as if the tie that exists between a
clergyman and his parishioners were one
of an ordinary and common nature.
" I have now entered upon the tenth
year of my ministry among you; may
Heaven grant that I may pass the next
ten years (if God spare me so long) in as
much harmony and quiet, in as much
peace and happiness with those around
me ! Well do I remember the grateful
forwardness that met my exertions in form-
ing a Sunday school when I first settled
here, the gratifying and eager good sense
of the parents in sending their children,
the willingness of the children themselves,
of whom many are now matured in life,
and already exemplifying to another gene-
ration rising about them, the blessing of
MEMOIR. XXV
being able to read the Bible. Nothing of
this has been forgotten by me, and, believe
me, never shall be. In other little esta-
blishments, which I was desirous to form
amongst you, what anxiety did I find to
aid and assist my views ! how many judi-
cious hints have I received among your-
selves ! and when the yearly time of ga-
thering has arrived, with what cheerful
generosity have the wealthier part of rny
parishioners contributed to place in my
hands the means of promoting good among
you ! With what alacrity have they, on
every occasion, met my wishes ! Let me
hope that these institutions, now so well es-
tablished, may not be suffered to fall to the
ground ; and that, when the time of year
comes round again, though far away, I
may yet think, that this union of charity
and industry is still flourishing as it used
to do ; let me hope that the new year will
still be ushered in with as much pleasure
as heretofore, and that those who have it
XXVI INTRODUCTORY
in their power to give, will still remember,
that he that giveth unto the poor, lendeth unto
the Lord !
"Among those whom I have attended
on the sick bed, how many have I heard
express with their dying lips, their Chris-
tian reliance in the promise of a better
world, and declare their stedfast faith in
the merits of the Redeemer. Some, too,
I have surely seen, who, having recovered
from sickness, have taken the wholesome
chastisement, as a warning to lead the
rest of their lives in the fear of God, and
I trust will continue to go on their way
rejoicing. Let me hope that these feel-
ings may yet be improved among you,
and that my last words may be remem-
bered as bidding you to feel in heart that
trust in the Lord, which every one pro-
fesses with his lips ; let it be felt as well as
uttered ; let it guide your actions ; and the
sense of the presence of an unseen Saviour
MEMOIR. XXVii
will not fail to support you under your sor-
rows, and confirm your hopes. Lastly,
neglect not family prayer : be assured, again
and again, the Lord will ever mercifully
hear the voice that crieth unto him daily.
66 In going from hence to other duties,
in a distant land, in God is my hope
and my trust. There is One that keepeth
Israel there is He that shall neither slum-
ber nor sleep, and he will be our defence
upon our right hand, so that the sun shall
not burn us by day, neither the moon by
night."
On the following day, he left with much
regret the place, which, however small the
income it afforded him, had been the scene
of his happiest years ; where the vicarage
grounds still show the taste of him that
laid them out, and many a cottage family
around tells how much he did among
them, and how dearly he was beloved.
XXV1U INTRODUCTORY
From the time of his reaching London,
he was constantly engaged in preparing
for his new duties, and in attending to
matters of business connected with his
approaching departure for India, The
University of Oxford paid him the com-
pliment of conferring on him the degree of
D.D. by diploma; and on Whitsunday,
June 3rd, he was consecrated in the chapel
at Lambeth Palace, by the Archbishop of
Canterbury, assisted by the Bishops of
London, Durham, and St. David's. The
consecration sermon was preached by his
brother, the Rev. William James, Fellow
of Oriel College, and Vicar of Cobham,
Surrey, and was printed by command of
his Grace the Archbishop.
Every day was now fully occupied :
amidst other cares he was actively making
inquiry into the Indian relations of the va-
rious institutions in London, which have for
their object the extension of the knowledge
MEMOIR. XXIX
of Christianity, and particularly those two
venerable Societies which have become, as
it were, the handmaids of the Church of
England. As the concerns of these two
societies form a prominent feature in the
following memoir, it may not be improper
to introduce here an account of his taking
leave of each. A meeting of the Society
for the Propagation of the Gospel in
Foreign Parts was held at the Freemason's
Hall, May 25th, when the Archbishop of
Canterbury took the chair, and amongst
other resolutions . it was moved by the
Bishop of Gloucester,
"That this meeting, while they cannot suf-
ficiently lament the loss of Bishop Heber, re-
pose great confidence in his successor, whose
known desire it is to follow the steps of Bishops
Heber and Middleton."
This resolution being seconded by Dr.
Barnes, late Archdeacon of Bombay, the
Bishop of Calcutta spoke thus :
"I am deeply indebted to the Right Rev.
XXX INTRODUCTORY
Prelate, who moved the resolution, for the kind
manner in which he introduced my name ; and
well indeed does the suggestion, contained in
that resolution, come to me, when seconded by
one who has himself so ably discharged the du-
ties of the ministry in India, and was regarded
with love and veneration by every class of so-
ciety there. And yet this suggestion which has
been made is one, which, considering the high
and deserved reputation of my predecessors, I
can never regard without diffidence and awe. If
ever there was a man well calculated to lay the
corner-stone of the church establishment in a
foreign land ever one whose correctness and
precision of judgment, whose uncompromising
firmness of mind, whose piety and learning
fitted him for such a purpose, it was Bishop Mid-
dleton one who never swerved from that path
which his Christianly- formed conscience told him
was the true one, one who, if ever man did,
< digged deep and laid his foundation on the rock.'
" Nor were those peculiarities less striking
in themselves, however different in their nature,
which belonged to that generous and highly-
gifted individual, whose loss we more recently
have mourned : his it was to conciliate, to
soothe, to subdue : it was his to win over by his
openness and frankness of manner, all that had
MEMOIR. XXXI
else beset bis path, and to unite all those vary-
ing discordant humours that too often arise to
perplex and confound the zealous advocate of
the Christian cause ; while, by the splendour of
his talents, he kindled a new flame, and all
around him felt proud in being able to show a
sympathy with a mind like that of Heber.
ce
For myself, my path is clear and open : an
humbler task, and yet one which, if Heaven spares
me a term of years, may not pass without fruit : be
it mine to aim at producing a closer union of the
Christian body in general, and to endeavour to
present a less broken phalanx than heretofore to
the enemies of the Cross. It is for this purpose
that honour, wealth, and dignity, are given to
the station to which it has pleased his Majesty's
government to appoint me : it is for this pur-
pose, to produce Christian harmony and union,
that every true church establishment is formed ;
not by a system of terror, not by inquisitorial
means, but by that mild and genial influence
which such institutions shed on those around :
by adopting in those institutions such principles
as long experience has taught us are sound and
secure, by forming ourselves on those ideas
which the habits and practice of the world have
shown us are absolutely necessary to the safety
of our moral constitution.
XXX11 INTRODUCTORY
cc For those kind feelings which the Right Rev.
Prelate has expressed, with regard to the continu-
ance of my health and life, I am sincerely obliged.
These are points 011 which it does not become us
to enter too far : God's will be done ; but I speak
sincerely when I say I go in hope, not in fear.
And if ever it should happen that I should revisit
this country, if ever I should be happy enough
again to appear before the face of this Society,
may Heaven grant that I may then be able to feel
that I have done my duty !"
On the 13th of June a meeting was held
of the Society for Promoting Christian
Knowledge, for the purpose of making a
valedictory address to the Bishop, prior to
his departure for India. An eloquent
address was delivered in the name of the
Society by the Bishop of Gloucester, to
which the Bishop of Calcutta made the fol-
lowing reply :
" If I rise under feelings somewhat over-
whelmed by the kind and flattering expressions
with which the eloquence of my Right Rev.
Friend has honoured me; if I confess myself
MEMOIR. xxxiii
unable to thank this numerous assembly for
the manner in which they have received those
sentiments in which I am so deeply and so per-
sonally concerned ; I must crave your indulgence
for a species of incapacity of which your own
generous feelings towards me are the cause.
Indeed, I feel as if it were but an act of justice
to confess, that some of those encomiastic
phrases which have fallen from his lordship on
this occasion, appear to me to have been sug-
gested and formed rather from his own high and
honourable sense of duty, than from any desert
of mine. Still I thank him warmly and sincerely :
there may be those, on the other side, who will
view these matters in a far different way than he
has done ; who will suppose that certain allure-
ments and temptations pave the way, and prompt
the acceptance of every official situation ; and that
enough of what the world prize so highly was here
displayed to excite a not unworthy ambition.
" I would not make any pretensions to a
false humility, nor would I in any degree affect
to disregard or undervalue the honours and dig-
nities of the profession to which I belong ; but
slender were the inducements to journey to a
distant land (as I have undertaken to do) if that
were all. The fancies indeed of a youthful ima-
gination may paint such matters with a showy
XXXIV INTRODUCTORY
and gaudy colouring, but it is under a very dif-
ferent aspect that they appear when lapse of
time has matured the judgment, and experience
and practice of the world has enabled us to view
them in all their sober, sad reality. How un-
substantial then seems all the pomp and parade
that even in the highest rank attends upon the
rich and lofty ones of the earth ! how coldly do
such trivialities repay the absence of those do-
mestic feelings that form the comfort and the so-
lace of the life of man ! What is precedence in
the room what is the sound of title to the ear
what is the value of a few more of the super-
fluities of life, when compared with the happi-
ness one derives from the presence of a mother,
a brother, a long-loved friend, or one's own
child ? these are ties, and these are securities.
" And yet I would not that any one should
think harshly of my conduct, or blame me too
much, if on these or any other grounds I may
seem amenable to the charge of reluctance or
delay. If I have not courted this important
office, so neither have I shrunk from it when
once I thought it my duty to obey : and I trust
it will yet be in my power to prove that it is one
thing to show zeal to obtain an office, and ano-
ther to show zeal in its discharge. Having
put my hand to the plough, I turn not back : I
MEMOIR. XXXV
look forward, not indeed to higher duties, (for
none can be higher than those arising out of the
relation of a parochial minister to his flock,) but
to a wider and more extended field of usefulness,
and hope to claim a larger share of confidence
from my mother Church than that with which I
have been hitherto entrusted.
" A clergyman, and the son of a clergyman, I
feel a firm affection, a deep and pious veneration
for that Church, that visible and apostolic Church
of which the Lord Bishop of Gloucester has just
now so feelingly spoken, and I look to its wel-
fare with the utmost interest and attention. But
that Church has higher and better claims upon
our regard, than those which are occasioned
merely by the habitual feelings of its ministers.
It adopts that interpretation of Holy Writ
which is best established by the researches of the
most learned amidst a thinking and inquiring
nation : it follows that which is handed down to
us embalmed in the prayers and praises of many
a preceding age, and proves the purity and per-
fection of its doctrines (as far as, humanly speak-
ing, the phrase may be used) by showing itself
the only one which is able to defeat all the in-
genuity of the libertine, or the malice and so-
phistry of the infidel. On these points I speak
not as if I feared to be mistaken ; I feel my sin-
XXXVI INTRODUCTORY
cerity, and trust it will be appreciated by others.
But while I regard with the warmest love that
branch of our establishment which has been
committed to ray charge, I must not lose sight
of that which our admirable Liturgy styles the
Catholic, the universal church of Christ mili-
tant here on earth : and while I uphold, as far
as I can, that which my manifest duty in a more
especial manner requires me to do ; none that
cometh in the name of Christ shall ever be con-
sidered as a stranger by me.
" On other points to which my Right Reve-
rend Friend has alluded, I will not dare to en-
large at the present moment. I will not venture
upon subjects in which I am still unpractised, or
trespass on a field where my footsteps have not
yet been seen. Time and diligence will, I
hope, give me a clearer view in these matters,
and experience may ripen those thoughts, which
if now brought forward, might seem rather the
offspring of anxiety than of knowledge. And,
if ever it should please a kind and indulgent
Providence to restore me to this land, with what
pleasure shall I look forward to the day to the
hour when I may again be received within these
walls : when I may devote myself, with all the
fruits of my experience, as one lately returned
from Bombay has done, with so much zeal and
MEMOIR. XXXvli
ability, to the noble and exalted objects of this
Society.
Tin this very room, in the midst of our com-
mon pursuits, how many new friendships have I
formed, how many old acquaintances have I
renewed and improved ! and how many are
there of those now assembled here, to whom,
though I may have been hitherto personally
unknown, yet, if I may judge by my own feel-
ings, I need not scruple to call my friends ; who
will watch hereafter with unceasing interest and
anxiety over all that regards myself and my
fellow-labourers in the vineyards of the East ;
and support us with that fostering and liberal
spirit at home, which alone can, under God's
blessing, enable us to be successful abroad.
" Of these, of all, I must now take a long fare-
well ', there is a solemnity in the word ; there
is somewhat of awfulness in the occasion, and
in a ceremony which, it so happens, on this very
day, four years ago, was performed to one
whom I am not less proud to say I mourn as a
friend, than this Society is to lament as an
agent lost to her present need. Yet I speak of
this singularity only as that which ought to
afford matter for serious reflection at the passing
moment, rather than as suggesting any thought
XXXV111 INTRODUCTORY
of fear or weakness. Every feeling that I have,
is cheered, when I contemplate but for a mo-
ment, the liberal and munificent conduct I have
every where experienced, when I regard the
generous confidence placed in me by this So-
ciety, the large sums entrusted to my disposal
for the furtherance of our great cause, both at
the Cape of Good Hope and in India; and
when 1 look forward to the pleasurable duties
you have enjoined me to fulfil, as almoner of
your bounty. Still more are those feelings en-
hanced when I observe the general interest now
beginning to be felt by all ranks of people here
in that college at Calcutta, which is at once so
noble a monument of the sagacity and piety of
Bishop Middleton, and whose welfare it shall be
my care so to promote as may best appear fitted
to realize all the bright prospects of its wise and
learned projector.
" For the means thus afforded to me of aiding
the Christian cause, and of furthering these
blessings to that which is henceforth to be my
adopted country, accept from me a feeble ex-
pression of that gratitude which will one day be
repaid you by the voice of millions ; accept the
assurance of my best wishes, of my warmest
endeavours, and of those prayers which I
trust will be pure, as they will ever be in
MEMOIR. XXXIX
union and accordance with those of this So-
ciety."
The Bishop having had the honour to
be presented to his Majesty at court, left
London, with Mrs. James., as soon as
his business permitted, to pass the short
time that remained in the retirement of
their own family at East Sheen; till on
Monday, July 9th, the painful hour of se-
paration arrived, and leaving their two
elder children under the care of Mr. and
Mrs. Reeves, they set out for Portsmouth,
expecting to sail the next day.
VOYAGE TO CALCUTTA.
THE Bishop and his family, consisting of Mrs.
J. T. James, and her youngest boy, five months
old, her cousin, Miss Ommanney, and Mr. S.
Hartopp Knapp, the bishop's chaplain, embarked
at Portsmouth, on Saturday, July 14th, 1827, on
board the ship Mary Anne, free trader, Captain
Boucart, and sailed for India the next day. The
passage down the Channel was slow and tedious :
it was not till the 20th that they were off Ushant,
when a summer gale came on so severe as to
split three sails ; there were two more such gales
in crossing the Bay of Biscay.
The ship was principally manned by Lascars,
who came, on the first sight of the new moon,
July 26th, to make their salaam to the captain and
passengers, previous to the commencement of
2 FUNCHAL.
their customary songs amd dances in honour of
the Hegira, which continued for ten days : the
songs consisted of lamentations for Hassan, these
Indian Mahometans being Shiites. On the fol-
lowing Sunday, 29th, when Divine service was
over on the quarter-deck, on application being
made by the Captain, the Bishop desired that
the Lascars might by no means be prevented
from their usual ceremonies, which appeared to
constitute almost their only idea of religion :
they thankfully recommenced their devotional
observances, and thus the day was in some sort
hallowed by all.
On the morning of the 2nd of August, the
party found themselves in sight of the sunny
rocks of Madeira, and the glittering white town
of Funchal, with its high hills rising nobly at the
back. They reached the shore at three o'clock,
and were hospitably received at the house of
Messrs. Keir and Company.
The following are extracts from letters the
Bishop wrote from Madeira to his mother, the
late Mrs. James, who was then living at Wor-
cester; to Sir R. H. Tnglis, Bart., M. P. ; to
MADEIRA.
Thomas Caldecott, Esq., of Dartford, and others
of his family.
" Funchal, Madeira, Aug. 5th and 6th, 1827.
" We arrived here on the 2nd, and expect to
sail again on Monday, as soon as our Captain has
shipped his cargo of wine. The voyage has been
tedious, chiefly on account of the very calm
weather we have experienced, though we had
some severe summer gales, as they call them.
The rolling and pitching of the ship at such times
is, as you may suppose, disagreeable enough ;
but, I thank God, Marianne and I have suffered
very little, either on these occasions or any other :
we have indeed both of us escaped the usual
horrors of sea sickness, and this from attention
to regimen, and the excellent advice we received
from Mr. Scott, * as we beg he may be told, with
our best thanks. We had the grampus sporting
and diving close to the ship, and sharks, and the
beautiful pearl-coloured dolphins, to amuse us
on our way, as soon as we got clear of the
Channel.
* John Scott, Esq., now M.D., of Barnes, Surrey.
B 2
4 MADEIRA.
" You may well imagine how much we enjoy
this delicious spot, after even so short a confine-
ment on shipboard ; though, indeed, the Island of
Madeira needs no accessories to enhance its
beauty. I have never seen, even in La bella
Italia, such exquisitely picturesque scenery as I
have here. It is the grandeur and prodigality
of leaf, of blossom, of form, of variety, that
constitutes the great charm of this luxuriant
region, and the novelty of finding oneself among
palms, and fusias, guavas, orange-trees, &c.
I must add, that it is no small gratification to be
welcomed with the hospitality which proverbially
belongs to the English factory here. It is the
custom with all the merchants to receive the pas-
sengers by the East India ships, and entertain
them during their stay on the island, depending,
of course, on thus increasing their own connex-
ions. I have already commenced my orders for
my cellars at Calcutta. You may imagine their
reception of strangers is in a princely style, when
I tell you, that we are now sitting at the house of
Messrs. Kier and Co., in a room about forty feet
long, twenty high, and thirty broad, which is one
of the noble suite allotted to us. The garden
belonging to the house is among the most perfect
MADEIRA. 5
things of the sort I ever saw; long walks, covered
with trelliage and vines, with fountains, &c.
amidst all the luxuriant produce of this almost
tropical climate, bananas, papas, pines, cactus,
aloes, canes, &c. : add to all this the magni-
ficent rock scenery which surrounds three sides of
the horizon, with white houses and green vine-
yards occupying every level spot that presents
itself, and in the distance a sea-view of twenty
or thirty miles, and you may have some idea of
this enchanting spot.
" It is quite new to me to find myself in
a country where so great a degree of liberality is
manifested by the Roman Catholics towards Pro-
testants, and where the ancient rancour seems so
much on the wane. Not only the laity, but
the priests also, appear very reasonable people.
How much better is this gradual change than a
revulsion in the nature of things ! But in truth
it surprises me. Some of the Roman Catholic
clergy are occasionally seen in attendance at our
English church ; it may be, perhaps, from curio-
sity, but they observe all our forms, and be-
have with great decency and attention ; not in
the way that, I am sorry to say, many English
MADEIRA.
people do in their churches. One of them was
present at the service at our chapel when I
preached this morning. It would seem, therefore,
not to be now, as it formerly was, a crime subject
to penance to have been present at such a place
of worship. An apology was made to me by the
Portuguese governor, Senhor Valdez, for the
Roman Catholic Bishop not being able to call
upon me during my stay in the island. We
were politely received on our visit at the nunnery
of St. Clara, and also at the Franciscan con-
vent.
" I have had pleasure in distributing several
copies of a selection of the Homilies, from the
Prayer-book and Homily Society in London.
One I gave to a Scotchman ; the rest were soon
applied for, and there were more applications
than I was able to satisfy. The generality of
the English here are presbyterians ; but, as at
Antwerp, and other foreign factories, they attend
the church, if the minister is only temperate and
discreet. They moreover raised the building at
an expense of fifteen thousand pounds. The
English government pays half the chaplain's
salary, and the factory subscribes the rest."
MADEIRA.
Finding from Mr. Deacon, the chaplain, that
there was difficulty in obtaining the permission
of the Consul to have evening as well as morning
service in the chapel on Sundays, the Bishop
could only regret that he had no authority to
interfere by giving any order on the subject, nor
any means of prevailing with the Consul, who was
then in London, to give the wished-for consent ;
but he promised to use his best exertions to
secure to the English residents all the benefits of
the religious services of their church ; a promise
which he immediately performed.
An application of a more singular nature was
made by a friar, who expressed himself desirous
to leave his convent, and embrace the reformed
religion, if his Lordship would allow him to follow
in his suite to Calcutta ; but as the proposal was
made just as the Bishop was going on ship- board
to leave the island, when there could be no op-
portunity of making any enquiry into the pre-
vious character of the man, or the probable
motives which led to this step ; and, moreover,
as the Bishop had no power to land any indivi-
dual at Calcutta, without the express permission
8 MADEIRA.
of the Company being first obtained; he had no
choice but to decline receiving him, though it
was impossible not to feel compassion for the
man, under such circumstances.
On Monday, Aug. 7th, they left Madeira.
Mrs. James writes at this date " It was quite
dismal making for the ship again, after enjoying
ourselves so much in this paradise, for such it
appeared to us ; and I felt as if stepping into a
prison, as I went up the side of the ship ! How
natural is the feeling of liberty to us all ! and
still our amusements on board are many. We
have a good supply of books, and a piano > besides
occasionally finishing drawings, and writing let-
ters, when the ship is sufficiently steady, and
then our work, and the guitar ; and yet I have
not mentioned my little Freddy, our chief amuse-
ment, and sometimes the plaything of the whole
ship. I thank God, he has hitherto been par-
ticularly well, and, if possible, thrives better on
board than on shore. This I feel as a great
blessing : had he been sickly, how much should
I have blamed myself for having brought him.
It would have been hard indeed to have left all.
MADEIRA. 9
May I never feel that I ought, even in this par-
ticular, to have still further set aside all selfish
feeling for the sake of my children ! * * *
" The costume of the Madeira peasant is
pretty ; a full white shirt and trousers, apparently
all in one, fastened below the knee, a sash round
the waist, a dark blue cloth cap, and boots of
yellow tanned leather to meet the trousers. In
our little excursions into the country we rode on
small horses and mules, which were very sure
footed, and went nearly at full speed up some
tremendous hills : almost every horse has a man
to attend him ; and, when ascending steep places,
these men lay hold of the horses' tails, and hang
on till they reach the top : they gain their liveli-
hood by attending different parties as guides,
and run sometimes the whole day ; neither they
nor the horses appearing to feel the heat, which
was intense during our stay in the island. At
Funchal a rude sledge is used for carrying goods
about the town, drawn by two bullocks ; and, to
prevent its taking fire from the friction of the
pavement, the bottom of it is wetted from time
to time with a cloth, dipped in the stream which
runs through the streets."
10 AT SEA.
The following observations, in the Bishop's
memorandum book, appear to have been written
about this part of the voyage.
" The punishment of seamen on board Eng-
lish merchant-vessels is not regulated by law.
They are as apprentices, and hence black eye
and fisty-cuff command prevails ; the Americans
have a law for this purpose.
" Much phosphoric light at sea betokens
southerly wind in all latitudes. Seamen observe
that sunset, under a bank of dark cloud, denotes
westerly wind ; under light clouds, easterly.
" Porpoises also are well known as signs of
wind; and they are observed to swim in the
direction of that quarter whence it is about to
come. The blue of the sky is paler in the tro-
pical regions, especially towards the line.
" * Deep and dark blue ocean ;' why ? for
the same reason that our imperfect black and
white colours, when mixed, make a grey; so
the gradual darkness in the depth of the sea,
combined with the light from above, forms a blue ;
AT SEA. 11
for the same reason,, again,, an unclouded sky is
blue.
" One may almost hold converse with < the
deep and dark blue ocean ;' and yet, after all,
it is a melancholy suggester of thoughts. How
hard is it to be so far away from one's children ;
how hard, that others, and not myself, should
hear all they say, and see all they do! of all
troubles, this is the only one that I have not
found harder to bear in reality, than it was
to regard it in prospect : and well it may be so,
for no powers of the imagination can add to the
severity of such a feeling : and yet, no doubt,
mine is not the hardest part : no man can know
half a woman's feeling towards her child. May
the day come that we may both have pleasure
to think of this, if such be the will of God !
Sept. 3. Crossed the line, long. 22 W.
Sept. 23. Our tenth Sunday. Better atten-
tion in our congregation than heretofore; not,
indeed in the ship's crew : for all orderly bodies,
have so much of mental discipline within them,
12 AT SEA.
as to make them to all appearance regular. T
speak of the passengers.
" Oct. 4. Recross the meridian of London.
It is no small pleasure to reflect on hours that
are now the same with those observed by them
we have left at home. Whales seen. Birds in
great abundance, pindarries, or cape pigeons,
albatrosses/' &c.
The following letter to the Rev. William
James, Cobham Vicarage, Surrey, bears date
from the ship Mary Anne, 32 lat. S. 11 30',
long. K Oct. 8, 1827.
" My dear William ;
% % * * From Madeira we have had
such constant fine weather, as to have very
little ground of complaint of any sort, though
we begin to think it long before we arrive at
the end of our second stage. A voyage to
India is explained in few words. The trade
winds north-east above the equator, south-east
below, (the only constant winds known,) form
the greatest part of it ; there being, as far as
AT SEA. 13
this part of the voyage is concerned, only three
variable spaces ; namely, first, from England to
about 30 N., and then again, from about 10 N.
of the equator to about 2 ; then again, in stretch-
ing across the Southern Atlantic, almost from the
coast of America, whither ships are carried by
the S. E. trade, to the coast of Africa; the
two first, in our case, occupied a fortnight each,
the last about four weeks, and is not yet over :
our wind to-day is contrary, and we may beat
about for some time. As for gales, we have
experienced nothing like what I formerly did in
the Cattegat ; and we thought a slow passage,
without those gales, a fair compensation, and the
common one, at this time of the year, for a
quicker and more stormy one. * * * *
" The ship crossed the line about 22 W. long,
on Sept. 3. We had received a letter from
the seamen of the forecastle, announcing the
preparations for the usual ceremonies ; and
Neptune's postman came on board the even-
ing before, to congratulate the captain and his
crew, and was sent off as usual in a tar-barrel
set on fire, which blazed in our wake for many
a mile. The procession of Neptune and Am-
14 AT SEA.
phitrite was very amusing, and so you may
suppose was the shaving and ducking of the
neophytes ; all which, by the arrangements of
the captain, we saw from the windows of the
cuddy. I had written an answer to the seamen
of the forecastle, stating the polite manner in
which Neptune received all bishops on their
coming upon the line, and understanding it was
his practice to admit them to their freedom
without any ceremony whatever, I subjoined cer-
tain fees for such honorary degree.
" We have seen abundance of flying fish, (they
look just like a flight of swallows skimming the
surface of the water,) and we are now sur-
rounded with birds of various sorts, that keep
eddying round astern, sometimes within four or
five yards of the cabin window where I am
writing. A whale now and then shows itself;
but this is all our visiting company, for we are
now out of the usual track of ships, and have
not spoken one for six weeks : of those we saw
three out of four were English.
" I fear you will have some difficulty in decy-
phering this epistle ; but though the weather is
AT SEA. 15
fine, the ship is not so steady as to allow of any
great perfection of penmanship, and I thought
it best to secure a few minutes for my private
correspondents now, as I may have difficulties
in the way of some of my business ashore which
may occupy my whole time.
" Half-past four. A whale has just been an-
nounced in sight ; but though we all ran on deck,
he did not make his appearance again : but, no
matter, we shall see more as we approach the
Cape, at least, if there should be any wind.
We are now in the first month of spring, and
find it very cold, 55 of Fahrenheit, which, after
our hot weather between the tropics, is to us
very severe. It was amusing enough to watch,
on a fine night, the gradual development of the
southern hemisphere, which is very brilliant ;
there are many more stars of the first magnitude
than in the northern ; the difference, indeed, as
I had often heard, is very striking. Magellan's
cloud I have not yet seen ; but we have an
astronomer, Mr. Fallows, at Cape Town, and if
we have time to see the lions, I shall hope to
hear more of these matters. It was a great
16 AT SEA.
pleasure to watch the north polar star down to
the horizon, and the
Arctos
Oceani metuentes aequore tingi.
I have been endeavouring to lay out my time
for the next five years with reference to the
prevailing winds and seasons in India, and ac-
cording to the time when previous visitations
have taken place in each part of the diocese.
Our captain is an admirable seaman, and, as he
has long been employed in the country service,
can afford me better information than I may,
perhaps, at another time, have within my reach.
I shall, probably, next year, go up the Ganges,
and visit the different stations up to Agra, and
Delhi, &c. and return to Calcutta. July 1829 to
September 1830, Madras, Tanjore, Trichino-
poly, Madura, Tinnevelly, and the Syrian Chris-
tians ; then to Ceylon ; then to Bombay before
April, and thence by the Kistnah to Masulipatam
and Calcutta. July 1831 to Penang, Sinca-
pore, and so to New Holland and Van Die-
man's Land, returning to Calcutta in May or
June, 1832.
AT SEA. 17
" If I can accomplish this in the five first years,
(for I hardly expect a coadjutor before the re-
newal of the charter) I shall be well content.
Pray learn for me from * * * * whether
there would be any objection, ecclesiastically,
to my appointing six chaplains. I could wish,
as my real patronage is so scanty, to have the
power of paying a compliment of this sort to
some one, who may seem most deserving, in each
of the governments I visit. I should be sorry
to trouble * * * * * to write on such
a matter, and therefore have taken this mode
of referring to him, that you may send me an
answer. I am getting on pretty well with the
Hindostanee. I hope, however, you may never
have to begin a new alphabet at forty-one. If
I had not such an overplus of time on board
ship, as to have a sort of greediness of employ-
ment, it would be tiresome indeed. Half of
Gilchrist's words meant for vulgar use are Per-
sian, which is, as it were, the French of Asia,
not homebred Hindostanee.
" Oct. 10th. The ship rolls terribly ; fair wind
right aft. I cannot write.
18 THE CAPE.
" Oct. llth. A dead calm. I have nothing
to write. Besides, I fancy I am rather out of
humour. I have just calculated that before we
get to the Cape, we shall have made a course
of more than ten thousand miles from Ports-
mouth.
Oct. 12. Wind S.E. that is, right in our
teeth ; however, we make way, and that is some-
thing. Two o'clock, land in sight to our great
joy. We are just off Saldanha bay. But the
wind is contrary, and we shall hardly get in to-
morrow ; at least, so they say.
" Oct. 13. A dead calm. For employment we
tried the old experiment of the bottle. A line
of fifty fathoms was procured, and an empty
bottle well corked was sunk. It came up full
of water, and the cork was reversed. Q.E.D.
" Oct. 14. A fine breeze springs up. The
range of mountains at the Cape, and the en-
trance of the bay are magnificent beyond de-
scription. What a new source of pleasure is
the sight of long wished-for land ! Six o'clock,
came to anchor.
THE CAPE. 19
" Oct. 15. We are now comfortably settled
at the Governor's. I am sitting in a room to
receive visitors. The window opens upon a
garden full of close avenues, and a fountain
plays just before it. All the luxuriant flowers
of this delicious climate are sparkling around
me. We are all well. Love from all, even
Freddy.
" Believe me,
" Your affectionate brother,
" J. T. CALCUTTA."
As soon as they reached Table Bay, General
Bourke, the lieutenant-governor, sent his aid-
de-camp, Mr. Rundell, on board, at five o'clock,
with the offer of accommodations at the go-
vernor's house; and the Bishop and his party
were most kindly received on their arrival there.
Cape Town is beautifully situated between
the beach and the magnificent mountains which
rise behind it ; it is itself prettily built, with
wide streets running across each other, and in
many parts planted on each side with Scotch
fir, which mixed with a pleasing simplicity of
architecture, gives the town a lively appearance,
c 2
20 THE CAFE.
the interest of which is much increased by
catching here and there a sight of the bay
studded with shipping, at the end of a street.
They build usually with twisted chimneys,
because they say that smoke when uncon-
fined is seen to ascend in a spiral form, and
hence they assume this to be the best figure for
chimneys*
The colony of the Cape of Good Hope is not
included as part of the widely-extended diocese
placed under the charge of the Bishops of Cal-
cutta ; but as the church arising there had
never hitherto enjoyed the benefit of any epis-
copal visitation, which was felt to be much
wanted, the Right Honourable the Secretary for
the Colonies thought it advisable that Bishop
James should be charged with a special com-
mission from the Crown to commence his epis-
copal functions at that place.
Accordingly, after receiving the visits of the
chief officers of the government, his first and
most anxious wish was to take measures for
calling a public meeting of the inhabitants, with
a view to raising subscriptions for building an
THE CAPE. 21
English church ; next, to make arrangements
for holding a confirmation, of which he had pre-
viously given notice by a letter from England
to Mr. Hough, the colonial chaplain ; then, to
visit the free schools, the hospital, and other
establishments ; and to make inquiry into the
means adopted for extending the benefits of re-
ligious instruction in the colony, and into some
special matters, which had long wanted inquiry,
and were now committed to his charge.
Oct. 18. In presiding at a meeting of the
District Committee of the Society for Promoting
Christian Knowledge, which was fully attended,
the Bishop opened the business of the day in
the following manner :
" I have not risen with the intention of de-
taining you by a long harangue, or expatiating
on the merits of this Society and its claims to
support, as they are familiarly known to you all ;
and of your practical views with regard to
them, your presence, on this occasion, affords
the best and most satisfactory proof. But it
would argue something of coldness of heart, if
one did not indulge in the expression of some
22 THE CAPE.
feelings of congratulation on an occasion like
this, when one sees in a distant and remote
quarter of the globe the same Christian feeling
and the same Christian zeal animating the So-
ciety here, and appearing, too, to be directed
by the same ability and prudence, as we have,
perhaps, many of us witnessed in the conduct
of the Parent Society at home. Though I had
heard, by report, of the establishment of the
Branch Society here ; yet, it is a matter of
gratification to witness, with one's own eyes, the
bright and cheering prospect this day affords of
its success, and to see the best wishes of our
friends at home thus visibly and substantially
realized.
" As far as the British name extends, as far
as our arms have been heard, or our institutions
known, the knowledge of Christianity is by such
means as these promulgated amongst men ; and
that, not by any act emanating from the power
of government, but by the voluntary and zeal-
ous care of individuals, by those means which
give to every subscriber a share in promoting
the great work ; so that while we look forward
to the time when the church of Christ shall be
THE CAPE. 23
one fold under one Shepherd, we may claim
the distinction of having been, under the bless-
ing of God, voluntary, but humble instruments
of his great design; and advancing, as far as
in us lies, the extension of the saving know-
ledge of the best and greatest gift ever offered
to the world."
On the 21st, the Bishop preached to the
English residents at the Dutch Reformed Church ;
and again obtained the use of the same church
the next day, and, in the presence of a large
congregation, administered the rite of Confir-
mation to near five hundred persons: after
which he delivered an impressive charge to
those whom he had confirmed.
Three o'clock, the same day, was the hour
fixed for the public meeting at the Commercial
Hall, for the purpose of taking into considera-
tion the means to be adopted for building an
English church, an object the Bishop was most
desirous to promote, and the arrangement for
which, with the necessary provisions for se-
curing the permanence of the grant of land for
consecration, had unceasingly occupied his at-
THE CAPE.
tention from the moment of his landing. All
difficulties seemed now to be removed; the grant
was made ; every disposition was shown by the
wealthier classes to come forward on the occa-
sion ; and on taking the chair he made the fol-
lowing address.
"This public meeting has been convened,
under the sanction of the Governor of this colony,
for the purpose of taking into consideration the
best mode of fulfilling that eager desire, which
has been so long felt by the British inhabitants
of Cape Town, of erecting for themselves a
place of public worship according to the forms of
the Church of England.
" In opening the business of the day, allow
me to express my congratulation on seeing so
numerous and honourable an assembly around
me, who have now by their presence here an-
swered the general call, and afforded a con-
vincing proof of their public spirit and their
Christian zeal. It is, indeed, an honest and
a proud feeling that prompts our countrymen to
wish to exhibit here some visible and tangible
proof of adherence to their own apostolical
THE CAPE. 25
form of faith ; and to show some testimony of
their admiration for that Established Church,
for which Cranmer, and Hooper, and Latimer
died, and which has come down to us pure and
unstained, save by the holy blood of its mar-
tyrs ; that church, too, which has at all subse-
quent periods excelled in theological learning ;
and has been enabled so successfully to combat
the cunning of worldly wisdom in the sceptic,
and to silence the sophistry of the infidel.
For these reasons we love, we venerate our
church establishment, and the forms of our an-
cestors. While, however, we express our pride
in these sentiments, I am sure I am borne out in
saying, that we do so without any intention of
dispraising or undervaluing the zeal and sin-
cerity of those who dissent from our forms,
though not from our faith ; and who on any
conscientious ground are scrupulous of joining
our communion, the language of which is free-
dom, while our liturgy itself instructs us to
pray, not for ourselves alone, but e for the whole
state of Christ's church militant here in earth.'
We are all Christians, and are bound, as a proof
pf the love we bear to our common Master, to
love one another. We indeed have more es-
26 THE CAPE.
pecial reason to make such acknowledgement
in this town, where we have received the
kindest testimony of this Christian feeling from
the Presbytery, ministers, and whole body of
the Dutch Reformed Church, who have ever
been forward to aiford us a place of devotion
by accommodating us within their walls as bro-
thers in Christ ; and who, when we declare our
reluctance to trespass longer upon their kind-
ness, will, I am sure, be among the first to ap-
plaud our designs and regard our proceedings
with a friendly eye. It remains as our duty, that
while we indulge these feelings, and admire in
others this truly Christian liberality of spirit,
we forget not to cherish it in ourselves, but take
care to show that the same flame glows most
purely and brightly within our own bosoms."
" I have come amongst you with no power, no
jurisdiction; I come on a mission of charity and
of peace ; and if in the course of this day I have
spoken of our proceedings if I appear to have
identified myself, more than I was in strict reason
entitled to do, with the concerns of the colony,
you will forgive the expressions, which have
THE CAPE. 27
arisen only from the warmth and sincerity with
which I have felt your cause. Indeed, if ever
there shall be a day of my life that I shall hope
to look back upon with renewed feelings of
pleasure and gratitude, it will be this, on which
I have witnessed so much of British generosity,
and, what is still more, so much of the true spirit
which Britons are every where forward to show
in promoting the sacred cause of Christianity.
I shall quit your shores with regret, and carry a
pleasing remembrance with me whithersoever I
may go."
In the course of the proceedings, the Bishop
had the gratifying task of laying before the meet-
ing, as he had previously done before the chief
inhabitants in private, the liberal offer he was
commissioned to make, on the part of the govern-
ment at home, to give a grant of land, and to
supply half the expense of building the church,
provided the inhabitants would furnish the other
half. This announcement he followed by laying-
down his own private subscription, and had the
satisfaction of seeing the sum amount to two
thousand one hundred and eighty pounds raised
on the spot, before he quitted the chair, besides
THK
in kind from those \vlio had not
money to uive : one month's labour from a r;ir
pmfer. five hundred feet of eedar from a timber-
merehanf.
The resolutions heini? passed, and the arrange-
ments eompfoted, the next day, at three o'eloek,
in the preseuee of the o>ernor. and nearly all
the Kni;lish inhabitants, the Bishop eonsivrated
the pieee of land allotted for the rhnreh. and
another to he used as a burying ground,
was mneh wanted, as the burghers had full
use for theirs.
While he was at the Cape, the Bishop found
opportunity of sending the folKnMii^ pastoral
Inter to the Islanders of Tristan d'Aeunlm.
u My Christian Friends,
t% In passing through tliis quarter of the globe,
on my voyage to India, I could not but feel
anxious to hear something relative to the conduct
and happiness of those of my countrymen who
are so for separated from the rest of the world
as the settlement at Tristan d'Aeunlm. I could
g*ia lure lutle or no intelligence of you that was
THE CAPE.
of a late date ; but I have heard, with sincere
pleasure, that you zealously promote the observ-
ance of the Lord's day among you : and let me
hope that so sacred a zeal may meet with no
relaxation ; let me hope that your children, when
baptized by yourselves, will be brought up, as
you yourselves were brought up, in the nurture
and admonition of the Lord, having a knowledge
of the truths of the Christian religion, and of the
duties it enjoins. So may they be a blessing to
their parents, and live long to inherit the land !
I have been glad to learn that inquiry has already
been made after you by the Society for Promoting
Christian Knowledge established at Cape Town ;
and I am happy to tell you, that on your making
application to them, any assistance you may
want, in the way of religious books, will be
cheerfully granted.
" Receive the assurance of my prayers for
your welfare both here and hereafter, from
" Your sincere friend,
" J. T. CALCUTTA."
An interesting reference, made to the Bishop
by some Mahometan priests, is related in the
"
30 THE CAPE.
next two letters, which contain also an account
of his departure from the Cape.
TO MRS. JAMES, COLLEGE-GREEN, WORCESTER.
" Government-house, Cape Town, Oct. 24, 1827.
" My dear Mother,
I have scarcely had one moment to myself
since I landed, and have not been able to go out
to see any thing, except that once, on a public
meeting being put off, we went in the go-
vernor's carriage to visit Constantia Farm :
however, all people seem in good humour,
and that is amends enough for any trouble.
* * * * j have now finished my official
letters, and take up my pen for you. Marianne
is gone to see the laying of the foundation-
stone of the Scotch Presbyterian Church. I
heartily wish it was ours. Had the English
church, for which we have now set on foot a
subscription, been begun one year ago, no
Scotch church would have been thought of; they
would have been well content to have joined us.
However, one cannot but feel that they did
right.
THE CAPE. 31
" At four o'clock 1 go to meet the Imaun, or
head Mahometan priest of this place, who defers
to my authority as e a man of God/ as he says,
to compose the differences between himself and
some of his followers ; curious enough. I hope
to establish a friendly feeling with them now, and
trust, by the blessing of God, I may be able to
draw something better from the occasion by-
and-by; at any rate it is a very singular oc-
currence. Almost all the slaves here are Ma-
hometans. * * * *
" Believe me always,
" My dear Mother,
" Your affectionate Son,
J. T. CALCUTTA."
" TO REV. EDWARD JAMES, EAST SHEEN, SURREY,
E. Long. 87. S. Lot. 6. 27.
December 8, 1827.
" My dear Edward,
" I sent you a short note from the Cape, and
in truth it was all I had time to write. We
stayed there eleven days, but that was barely
enough for all that lay upon my hands, at least
32
THE CAPE.
to inquire into things in the way I like ; and as
we were too late to pick up passengers for our
ship, I really felt that every day, not actually
employed in necessary business, was so much
of pecuniary loss to our excellent and kind-
hearted captain. It was a great satisfaction,
however, to find that we left all the people in
good humour. They presented me on the morn-
ing of our departure, October 19th, with a letter
of thanks, signed by fifty-six of the chief mer-
chants and residents of the place, some of whom
were not Englishmen ; and they met me at the
Government-house, together with the English
clergy, and accompanied me in a body to the
beach, where Marianne and Elizabeth and the
baby joined us in the governor's carriage, and
from whence we got on board the custom-house
boat, and made for the ship.
" I mentioned, I think, in a letter to my
mother, a singular circumstance which occurred
while we were at the Cape. One of the Malay
priests (they are all Mahometans, and generally
of the lower and poorer classes) told Mr. Fallows,
of the observatory, that he had a dispute with
the Imaun, and wished it to be referred to me,
THE CAPE. 33
as ' a man of God ;' these were his words. I
was surprised,, but could not help indulging a
hope that some good might result. I appointed
a meeting with the Imaun at four the same even-
ing ; and he came, attended by ten of his priests,
one of whom spoke English ; and, by his assist-
ance, together with that of Mr. Skirrow, the
architect, we were enabled to confer. The
Imaun laboured hard to get rid of the appear-
ance of reference to me ; professing that he
wished to pay his respects to me, but no more.
By degrees, however, I drew out the story from
him, and thus the reference in fact was made.
It turned out to be a dispute on a point of dis-
cipline, and not, as I had hoped, on a point of
doctrine. I had no hesitation therefore in saying
that the Imaun had the authority in his own
hands, and should be obeyed by those who are
placed under him. I then touched on the points
in which the Koran agreed with our faith, (not
omitting the testimony borne to the preaching
of the Apostles,) and lamented that the agree-
ment went no further. We then parted very
good friends ; it was indeed my object to leave
a good and kind understanding with them all,
hoping to improve upon any further occasion
D
34 THE CAPE.
that might offer : and this I trust was done, for
the Imaun afterwards sent me word, by one of
his priests, that public prayers would be offered
in the mosque, on Friday, the day we sailed,
for the safe voyage of myself and my family to
India. It may be, and probably is the fact, that
the real point in dispute was concealed from me,
and it might be that it was something more than
the interpretation of a text of the Koran relative
to discipline ; I have therefore promised to send
some books from Calcutta to Mr. Fallows, which
he may lend or give to this seceding priest, who
has, it appears, about three hundred followers,
and we must try what we can.
' ' I also wrote a sort of admonitory letter to the se-
cluded islanders at Tristan d' Acunha, and was glad
to be able at least to point out the means of their
beingsuppliedwith books of religious instruction.*
* The inhabitants of Tristan d'Acunha are now (1829)
about thirty in number, including women and children. Glass,
who is at the head of the little community, was a corporal in the
company of artillery which was stationed there under Captain
Clouts, during the residence of Napoleon Buonaparte at St.
Helena. When the company was withdrawn, Glass, at his
own request, was allowed to remain with the few settlers on the
island, and take charge of the stores ; and being a well-dis-
posed man, he has been attentive to religion in his little society,
THE CAPE. 35
" The chief hope of introducing Christianity
and civilization into the parts about the Cape,
must be by means of the new system of licensing
natives to be admitted as workmen. This has
been till now forbidden, and is yet under con-
siderable restraint. The consequence is, that
beyond the frontiers we see the bushmen with-
out employment, and actually starving, while
labour within the frontiers is at such a price as
to check all advances towards improvement !
"By all I can learn it appears that the mis-
sionaries are much better conducted and better
educated men than heretofore ; they preach
often, and are heard greedily. Translations of
parts of the Scriptures into C afire are advancing
under those of the London Society ; Mr. Wright
is now employed on the Book of Genesis ; but
no translation of the New Testament has yet
been made. The Hottentot language prevails
on the western, and the Caffre on the eastern
side.
while he has had such success in the management of their land
and their cattle, that they are now able to afford supplies of pro-
visions to any ships that may touch on their shore.
36 AT SEA.
" As for the voyage from the Cape to Calcutta,,
it is accomplished usually at this time of the year
in about ten weeks, the only constant winds
being the S. E. trade, which we fell in with in
S. lat. 20 and lost in 7, and the N.E. monsoon,
which will carry us, we hope, from 1 or 2 N.
lat. to Calcutta. The rest of the voyage de-
pends on the westerly winds, which generally
prevail from 38 S. lat. to 41% and which carried
us as far as St. Paul and Amsterdam islands.
We have now almost constant rain, and the
hatches down close work; but we have a
little wind, and consider Calcutta as nearly in
sight.
" Dec. 12. A dreadfully hot day ; thermom.
87. We have now reached 2 S. lat. 89 E.
long. This day last year I preached at the
Charter-house ; little did I then think where the
next Founder's day would be passed by me.
Thank God, however, we are all well. I now
read the Persian character tolerably, and begin
to see my way in Hindostanee. * * * *
" Your affectionate brother,
"J. T. CALCUTTA."
ON THE WINDS. 37
The Bishop's memorandum book contains the
following observations on the winds, written
soon after leaving the Cape.
" There is no doubt but that the winds blow
according to certain fixed laws, and if these
were known, we might ascertain when the wind
would be favourable, and when not: perhaps
one day this may be known.
" It appears that even a heavy gale or storm
seldom covers a space of more than from three to
five degrees at once ; and that a ship sailing one
hundred miles distant from another, unless in the
Trade winds or the Monsoons, seldom has the
same wind, either as to strength, or as to the
exact point of the compass. Now if from the
returns at Lloyd's an account were furnished of
all the winds encountered by a*ll the ships, wher-
ever they were, on one day, or a succession of
days, we might be able to learn something of
this matter ; for it is certain they act on a system
of compensation as to one another; and that
whenever a westerly gale has prevailed long in
a certain space, it must have occasioned a gale
or gales to the east, or at least easterly in ano-
38 THE CAPE.
ther space ; and doubtless this must all be ac-
cording to some fixed law."
" When a compact cloud (not one having
arisen from the horizon, but collected afterwards)
reaches the zenith, or is over the mast-head,
then comes a squall of wind ; and it is usual to
prepare for such by taking in sail, as soon as it
is seen approaching the mast-head. The sea-
man's expression is, that ' the gale comes out of
the cloud.'"
FROM MRS. J. T. JAMES TO FREDERICK REEVES, ESQ.
EAST SHEEN, SURREY.
" On board the Mary Anne,
" Nov. 17, 1827.
" Dearest Papa and Mamma;
" This is only the second quiet day we have
had since we left the Cape. The day I enjoyed
the most, while we were there, was that on
which we made our excursion to Constantia
farm, when a public meeting being accidentally
put off, the Bishop was able to make one of
the party. We had a pleasant drive of twelve
miles, and passed through the pretty village of
Wynberg, with its white cottages and thatched
THE CAPE. 39
roofs ; they are the cottages, however, of the
wealthier families. The vineyard at Constantia
is small, but it is the only one from which the
celebrated wine is made. In all parts of the
road, the surrounding mountains are highly pic-
turesque, and the wild flowers so beautiful, that
it is quite like driving through a conservatory ;
geraniums of every variety, and of the largest
size, are seen growing in bushes around you ;
aloes in profusion, and arums in all the ditches ;
to say nothing of the silver witteboom which
they gather for fuel : we saw several waggons
laden with it, drawn by eighteen or some-
times twenty oxen. On the morning of our
leaving the Cape, a large body of the principal
inhabitants escorted the Bishop to the beach,
expressing their thanks for the interest he had
taken in the spiritual affairs of the colony ; they
also signed a very gratifying letter to the same
effect. After we got on board, the whole of
the afternoon was employed in heaving the
anchor, which was found to have sunk so deep,
that sailing out of the bay was given up for
that night. The Serang was much hurt by the
sudden breaking of the rope to which the cable
was fastened : the captain told us, that he once
40 AT SEA.
saw four men break their legs, one after another,
in trying to get up an anchor when it had sunk
very deep in the sand. We got out of Table
Bay on Friday, October 26, and almost imme-
diately met with a fair wind, which took us safe
out to sea. We made the first two thousand
miles in twelve days, and escaped the heavy
seas and gales, which I so much dreaded, off the
Cape ; however, we have since had a smart
gale in 28 S. lat. It blew very hard, beginning
November the 10th, at six in the evening, with
thunder and lightning, and continued the whole
night, and the next day, blowing tremendously,
during which time the stern cabins were in
utter darkness. Alarmed as I was, I felt the
comfort of a truly pious-minded husband ; and
certainly I never before entered so fully into the
beauty of the 107th Psalm, or so warmly expe-
rienced the truth of that sublime passage, which
declares, that it is only HE that can make the
storm to cease, so that the waves thereof are
still. I think you will give me some credit for
going up on the poop to see the beauty of the
sea when it was so violently agitated; though
T was, indeed, most thankful when the sea went
down, and we were again restored to light and
AT SEA. 41
quiet. Several accidents happened during the
storm : the steward had one of his legs broken
by a spar ; the first mate received a violent cut
on his eye by a fall on deck ; three men were
hurt at the wheel, and the poor cooks sadly
scalded ; but we were thankful that no lives
were lost, and the gale, though severe, did not
last very long. At its commencement a ball of
fire was seen for a long time on the yards of the
mast-head, and the sea was beautifully illumi-
nated to a considerable distance, apparently by
an electric fluid. However, we have since had
fine weather, and are all in high spirits again,
and still hope to eat our Christmas dinner in
Calcutta. We talk of nothing but the delight
of finding ourselves on shore, and having space
to walk half a mile without turning round five
hundred times.
" Sunday, Nov. 18. There is something pecu-
liar in the enjoyment of a fine calm S unday on board.
The day is very well kept in this ship, and the cap-
tain is fond of foretelling a fine day for Sunday.
We have only missed having service on deck
two Sundays during the whole voyage. The
4V \i
ship's en-w are (ailed over about ton o'clock in
the iiiorniii!';; and, as the seamen are principally
Lascars, all tastefully dressed in their best, the.
muster has a slrikiui;lv picliires<|iie effect. The
Bishop always performs part of the service, and
IMr. Knapp the rest ; and if is most gratifying'
to sec the increased attention paid h\ llie whole
of the congregation since the first Sunday.
Many of the Portn^uese blacks, who an* llo-
man Catholics, attend regularly, and seem to be
de\outl\ eii!--a!;-ed. It iiHiMt. be* o\\ ned that the
Church Service is particularly impressive on
the quarter deck of a ship; the sii;ht of so
many i their decent Sunday dresses, assembled
for worship under the canopy of heaven, all
imploring the protection of the same i;reaf (lod,
and perhaps each feeling that his protection is,
if possible, more necessan when we are sin-
rounded by that fathomless ocean, and those
mighty \\;ncs which an- only under his control.
There is something pleasing, also, in the re-
flection that, we are employed in the same manner,
and, though atsoj;reat a distance, still olVcrin^ the
same prayers with those lear friends whom wo
have left in I'ln^land. If we*, on the ocean, are
AT SEA. 43
praying for blessings on them, they are, HI tin-
fine manner, praying that equal blessings and
protection may he showered on //s.
" Wednesday. This evening the sun-set has
been extremely beautiful, and reminded me of
Danby's picture of the sun-set, which I was
struck with at Sir Thomas Lawrence's. The
colours were most extraordinary, such as ru
seerri quite unnatural to those who have not
seen the effect of a sun-set between the tropics:
a bright fjrw.n among the golden streaks, small
purple floating clouds, a red homon, arid
bright blue sky.
" Some of the officers going a-head to-
to bathe, brought rne a shell-fish of the
Kchinus tribe; the seamen call it, a Portuguese
man-of-war; it floats on the water; the lower
part is soft, and of a beautiful blue colour; the
upper part stands upright, in shape sometli.
like a turban, and is transparent like glass.
" We have seen the boatswain, a snow-white
bird, with a single feather of great length, in
44 AT SEA.
the tail. We have also seen immense num-
bers of little fly ing- fish, which appear in shoals,
rise with the waves, and sometimes fly a consi-
derable distance before their fins are dry, when
they immediately drop into the water. It is a
striking sight to watch the larger fish chasing
them, and darting out of the water in order to
catch them.
" Thursday. Three sharks were caught in
the course of this morning, immediately under
our cabin. We could watch the little pilot-fish
(two of which attended each shark) first disco-
ver the bait, and then gradually bring the shark
towards it until he was hooked. The poor little
things continued to swim under him, one might
fancy, in real distress, that they had been the
cause of his agony, as he writhed on the hook
and dashed the sea with his tail ; nor did they
leave him till he was towed forward, and
hauled up.
" Nov. 27. Our wedding-day. It makes
me think a great deal of our dear Georgy and
Acland, and all whom we love at Sheen ! May
AT SEA. 45
God bless them, and you, my dear papa and
mamma, is the constant prayer of
" Your affectionate daughter,
" MARIANNE J. JAMES."
"P.S. December 1. The S. E. trade-wind
sprung up at three o'clock to-day ; this has given
us all great spirits, and we look with much plea-
sure to being soon comfortably settled at Cal-
cutta/'
FROM THE BISHOP TO ROBERT W. HAY, ESQ., CO-
LONIAL OFFICE, DOWNING STREET.
" S. Lat. 5o. 30'. E. Long, 87.
" December 10, 1827.
" My dear Hay;
"A terribly hot day! sultry, sullen rains;
the hatchways battened down ; and the whole
ship's crew panting for breath. In this plight I
sit down to write to you, so you must not expect
a very pleasant letter. Yet I so much wished
to write to you from the Cape, and so verily
regret that I could not, that I must, in spite
of my very colliquative condition, endeavour to
do something ; for we are now approaching the
route of the homeward-bound ships, and hope to
D7
46 THE CAPE.
have an opportunity of speaking some one, and
sending letters home. We all enjoyed our
eleven days at the Cape extremely ; and the
more, from the very kind attentions of the lieu-
tenant-governor and his family, to whom you
were so good as to furnish me with a letter.
" I shall, I am sure, always feel great interest
in every thing that concerns the welfare of that
place ; and am, indeed, glad to think that a better
system for the natives is likely to be adopted
under certain regulations. It is really very
hard that those wretched native tribes, beyond
the frontier, should be living in a state of actual
starvation, feeding on chance swarms of locusts,
or girding their bodies with string to assuage
the gnawing of hunger, while the agricultural
residents, within the frontier, are suffering from
want of a sufficient number of labourers ; the
two parties being prevented from affording each
other mutual accommodation, on account of the
mistaken fears which are entertained on the
subject of the slave trade; a question with
which, under tolerable regulations, it can never
have any concern. But I am chiefly interested,
THE CAPE. 47
because their being so employed seems the only
chance these poor savages have of being intro-
duced to the blessings of civilization, and ulti-
mately of Christianity. * * * *
" The people were highly delighted with
Lord Goderich's kindness with regard to the
building of the church; the public meeting
held on the occasion, being a novelty, was ex-
tremely well attended, and I have to thank his
lordship for placing me in so agreeable a situ-
ation. They seemed much gratified by the
arrangement made for an episcopal visit, and in
consequence I received a handsome letter of
thanks at my departure, and was accompanied
by the chief inhabitants in a body to the beach,
on the morning of my re-embarkation. I am
sorry to say that the colony is in a most unhappy
condition just now, from the depressed state of
their circulating medium ; and it seems to have
introduced a ruinous timidity into all their mer-
cantile speculations. * * * *
" Dec. 18. A day of melting heat ; perspira-
tion may be a very good word in an European
climate, but you can have no conception how very
48 AT SEA.
inadequate an expression it is in N. lat. 2. We
have now been these three days becalmed, with
a hot glaring sun just over the main-royals ;
but, after all, it is some pleasure to see the sun
under any circumstances; and when I think
that you are at this hour shivering at the sight
of the yet unmelted snow, that whitens the
tops of the houses in Curzon Street, and bid-
ding your servant see whether there is a north-
east wind abroad, I am verily tempted to think
that we liave the best of it here. By the bye,
this same north-easter, here yclept north mon-
soon, is in these latitudes most agreeable
and refreshing; we are eagerly on the look-
out for it every day, as the wind that is to
carry us on our way to Calcutta ; and the cap-
tain's daily toast, is, ' A speedy monsoon, and
soon.'
" Dec. 22. Light wind from the north. We
have been beating up the bay for the last twenty-
four hours, and find that we have lost seven
miles, owing to a strong current to the south.
We have nearly eaten up all our rice a woeful
error ! and are threatened with short allowance
of water. I begin now to think you have the
SAUGOR ROADS. 49
best of it in May Fair, maugre snow and frost.
Let us once make Acheen-head however, and
I trust all will be well. I have laboured pretty
constantly at my Hindostanee, and begin to see
my way a little : but that said Arabic or Persian
character, composed of variable fish-hooks and
harpoons, is really as difficult as it is unseemly :
I am glad I have mastered it : and a new
alphabet at forty-one (I speak of mine age) is,
1 assure you, no trifling occupation.
" Jan. 15, 1828. We have just got our pilot
on board, and are now in Saugor Roads, run-
ning up the channel, between the sands at the
mouth of the Hooghley. Some people are cu-
rious in coincidences, and it is singular enough
that we went on board the Mary -Anne at
Portsmouth, July 14 ; we landed at the Cape
Oct. 14; and reached the Saugor Roads, Jan. 14.
It is now just a month since we re-crossed the
line, and the prospect of getting to the end of
our voyage is very refreshing.
" Four Chinese men have been executed, we
hear, for murder at Calcutta, a measure the
E
50 SAUGOR ROADS.
government had not ventured upon on a similar
occurrence three years ago.
" Our pilot picked up last night a boat with
a hundred and thirty Hindoos, men, women, and
children, who had been driven out to sea in
crossing the river, on their pilgrimage to the
hill of sacrifice in Saugor Island; they had
been out four clays without any food, and were
nearly exhausted : they only asked for water ;
but on the pilot giving them our forbidden
viands, they fell to and eat in a very liberal
manner. By their answers, it would seem that
they were not a little sulky that such a disaster,
as their being thus driven out to sea, should
have happened while they were engaged on such
an errand. But perhaps you do not care much
about them : I have done.
" Let me, my dear Hay, beg one favour of
you, before I close my letter ; namely, that some
day, when you ride down to Sudbrook, you will
be so kind as to call at Mr. Reeves's, at East
Sheen, and see my two pretty little bairns. It
is impossible to express to you how much one's
SAUGOR ROADS. 51
thoughts dwell on them. What would we not
give for such a sight; and how easy and com-
fortable could I feel,, if I could but blot out from
my remembrance the few last hours of our
last morning there! With our united re-
gards,
" Believe me,
" Yours affectionately,
" J. T. CALCUTTA."
TO THE REV. CHARLES ANNESLEY, ALL SOULS
COLLEGE, OXFORD.
" N. Lat. 3. 7'. E. Long. 94.
" December 24, 1827.
" My dear Annesley;
" It is a fine evening, the thermometer ranging
at 89, the sea perfectly glassy and smooth, the
sky lighted with that peculiar delicacy and
brightness, which belong to tropical regions
alone. I am lying on the locker of the cabin,
sometimes penning a line, as this to you, and
sometimes looking into the abyss that shows
itself below the ship's keel, as I put my head
out of the cabin window. Marianne is exerting
E 2
52 OFF SUMATRA.
herself also to hold her pen in her hand, (no
small matter in this climate,) and your little
godson is sprawling on the floor. Overhead
we have, at this instant, Lascars hauling upon
ropes, and officers chiding and rebuking in the
usual marine phraseology. It seems they ex-
pect a breeze ; and as we have been becalmed
for the last week, I cannot express to you half
the joy this word conveys. I must say, how-
ever, that it is something to find oneself here,
within a few miles of the coast of Sumatra, an
island, or rather small continent, hitherto known,
to myself at least, only as lying in the extreme
corner of a map seldom explored. Just on our
beam is Pulo-Nyaz, an island of wretched sa-
vages, who subsist by annually exporting five
or six hundred of their young females to Suma-
tra, whom they rear for sale just as regularly,
and sell just as unconcernedly as we should a crop
of wheat ! Just below, on our quarter, is Engano
island, full of piratical savages, who would per-
haps have a bout with us if we lay a little nearer.
What a pretty part of the world we are come
to ! but I must put by my letter for to-day.
u Christmas-day. 1 trust I have forgotten
OFF SUMATRA. 53
no friend at Oxford, or in England, on this day.
We had service, and I administered the sacra-
ment on the deck ; and I am happy to say that
a very great improvement is observable in the
whole of our congregation from the first up to
this time : we have, indeed, been so fortunate,
that only two Sundays have occurred, when the
services on deck were prevented by stress of
weather.
" Dec. 26. Same hot, dry weather ; not a
breath of air : we luckily find there is a current
which carries us on at about one knot an hour.
It is very unpleasant when the sun makes, in this
way, as one may say, a shot at us sitting; ma
pazienza !
" Dec. 27. A plentiful shower of rain.
What luxury ! one may see it, smell it, touch
it, taste it : all hands are employed on deck in
treasuring up the precious liquid. A light
breeze has come on with it ; the sun is clouded
over, and we have no observation at noon to-
day ; but I trust to-morrow we may find our-
selves off Acheen-head; and then for Cal-
cutta. But I must go and look at the rain again.
54 SAUGOR ROADS.
" Dec. 28. After all our delight, we were
again becalmed yesternight, still in sight of the
golden mountain of Sumatra. This is now the
fourteenth day of continued disappointment, and,
if the expression is not quite contradictory, of
calm. Your merry little godson (who is
Freddy, Freddy, with every one on board,
white or black, captain or cabin-boy) is a
great resource, but he brings most painfully
to mind those we have left at home.
Jan. 15, 1828. We have just taken the
pilot on board, and are running up the channel
to the Saugor-roads with a light wind. You
may imagine the excitement created among all
on board by this event, the long-wished-for
pilot, the long-talked-of roads. In three or four
days we hope to reach Calcutta. It is cheering
to watch the sea growing green again, and to
feel that all the shore delicacies, such as bread,
butter, and fresh vegetables, will soon be within
our reach; and to think, that we shall be in
quiet, that is, tolerable quiet for some months.
CAPE TOWN. 55
" I do not know whether you heard of us at
the Cape. Cape town is the most picturesque
spot I ever saw ; the black slave faces, the carts
drawn by from twelve to eighteen bullocks, the
tents of the market-people, and their thatch-
like straw hats, are, indeed, striking ; but no-
thing can exceed the brilliancy of the flat- topped
white houses against the blue Table Mountain,
and the flat-headed pines avenuing the streets,
with the mountain -streams running between
their rows. I never before knew what it was
to be in such a place, and not dare to sit down
and draw, though, indeed, I had not time, if I
had dared to do so ; my only relaxation was
literally a few hours drive to Constautia, on a
day that a public meeting was postponed. By
the bye, I left a design for an English church,
as Lord Goderich desired. It is very simple,
and if my plan is executed, will afford sittings
for a thousand persons ; and I have pleased my-
self at least, with its proportions. I hope it will
be erected.
" Remember me to the Warden, and to Ash-
hurst, Legge, and Berens, and all my other
56 SAUGOR ROADS.
friends at All Souls, and at Christ Church, and
believe me,
" My dear Annesley,
" Ever affectionately yours,
" J. T. CALCUTTA."
TO MRS. JAMES,* WORCESTER.
" Saugor Roads, Jan. 16, 1828.
" My dear Mother ;
* * * * *
" We are delighted to find ourselves at last
in the mouth of the Hooghley River, after so
long and tedious a voyage as it has been ; but,
I thank Heaven, it has been very quiet, and, for
that sort of thing, pleasant enough. Our cap-
tain, Boucart, is a warm-hearted, amiable, man,
and an admirable seaman, and our ship in good
order; not one death or serious accident on board :
and we are glad to think that, at any rate, now
you will be relieved from all your fears about us.
66 It is a fine brilliant evening, the sunset as
quiet and cloudless as you see generally repre-
* This letter did not reach England till June. The beloved
Parent to whom it was addressed, had closed her pious and
useful life, on the 10th of April.
SAUGOR ISLAND. 57
sented in a picture or print from this country.
Our cable and anchor have this instant been
loosed, and run down with a thundering noise
that shakes the whole ship ; and here we remain
till the tide sets in again, and carries us on our
way up the river. We have been beset the
whole day with boats full of natives, brown
men, naked, except a white linen cloth about
their middle ; and their skins well oiled, in order
to resist the heat : the black and white contrast,
and the strange form of their boats, their pad-
dles, and their odd gestures, give them a very
wild appearance. They are the ' dandies/ or
watermen of the river, and come, some to offer
to tow the ship, others to sell fruit, others to get
employed on any errand that may be wanted on
shore. A little way from us on the right, or, as
we say, on the starboard quarter, is Saugor
Island, where a great fair is being held by the
natives ; many thousands are there assembled,
and we can plainly make out with our glasses,
the boats, and flags, and tents, and all the usual
paraphernalia of assemblies of this nature. It
is, I understand, a sort of religious festival, the
main object being with each individual to stay
a certain number of hours, either in the sea, or
58 KEDGEREE.
else in one of the jungles of the island; and if
they escape death from the sharks in the one, or
the tigers in the other, they imagine that for
this service their sins are forgiven them ! Our
pilot, in coming down to us the day before yes-
terday, fell in with a boat containing a hundred
and thirty of these poor deluded creatures, who
had been driven out to sea in crossing the river
to be present at the festival ; they had been
four days without food, and must have perished
but for his timely assistance."
On Friday, Jan. 17, they had arrived off
Kedgeree, and were riding at anchor, waiting
for the flowing of the tide, when the long-
wished-for steam-vessel was seen making her
way towards the ship ; Mr. Corrie, archdeacon
of Calcutta, Dr. Mill, principal of Bishop's
College, Mr. Eales, senior chaplain, and Mr.
Abbot, registrar and secretary to the Bishop,
(now the only survivor of those who went out
with Bishop Middleton,) were on board to pay
their respects to their new diocesan, as were
also Mr. William Cracroft, Mr. Augustus Prin-
sep, and some other private friends. As it
GARDEN REACH. 59
was late in the evening when the gentlemen
reached the Mary- Anne, and the strong tide did
not suffer the ship to make much way before
dark, it was found necessary to anchor for the
night, and the whole party were obliged to put
up with such accommodation as they could find
till the morning; when, soon after day-break,
they accompanied the Bishop and his family
on board the steam-vessel, amidst the waving
of hats, and the hearty cheers of the whole
ship's crew ; and they proceeded up the Hoogh-
ley, the guns of the Mary-Anne saluting them
on their way.
As they passed the beautiful point of Garden-
reach, and first arrived in sight of Calcutta, the
splendid villas on each bank, with their lawns
sloping down to the water's edge ; the beautiful
Gothic structure of Bishop's College, with the
rich foliage of the Botanic Garden, backed by
extensive woods of teak, on one side of the
river ; with the bold outline of the Fort, and the
lofty minarets and magnificent buildings of the
city, on the other, formed a coup d' ceil that was
exceedingly striking ; and the effect was not a
little heightened by the novelty of the objects
60 CALCUTTA.
that appeared on approaching the shore the
natives in their white dresses the bustle of the
watermen, coolies, palanquin-bearers, &c.
They landed under a salute from Fort Wil-
liam, and the Bishop was immediately conducted
by the aides-de-camp of the Governor-general
to the government-house, where he was most
kindly welcomed by Lord Amherst.
The next day, being Sunday, the whole party
went, with grateful hearts, to the cathedral,
where the Bishop \\ as received by the Arch-
deacon and clergy, and, in the presence of a
large congregation, was enthroned with the
usual ceremonies in that seat, from which both
of his amiable and gifted predecessors had
been so suddenly called away ; and which was
so shortly to be again left vacant by his own
decease !
Early on the following morning, he crossed the
river, anxious to make his first visit to Bishop's
College, where he found, as he had reason to
expect, much to engage his immediate and seri-
ous attention.
CALCUTTA. 61
A succession of hospitable entertainments
greeted the arrival of the new Bishop in this
city of palaces, as Calcutta has been often
called; and the striking effect of an eastern
dinner on strangers newly arrived, is thus de-
scribed by Mrs. James : " We sat down to
dinner at the government- house, a party of
seventy or eighty, in a superb hall with a mar-
ble floor, and marble pillars on each side; and
the brilliant lights, the turbaned servants with
their long beards and their various Asiatic
dresses, the military music, the chowries (fea-
ther-fans) waving gracefully over the heads of
the guests to keep off the insects, all conspired
to give the scene an air of enchantment that was
almost overpowering, especially after our long
habit of the cuddy-table. It seemed quite an
affair of the Arabian Nights."
It was a pleasing circumstance to the Bishop,
that his Oxford friend, Sir Charles Grey,
was Chief Justice at Calcutta ; and at his house
he first met Dr. Wallich, the manager of the
Botanic Garden, and other scientific and literary
men, in whose society he found much grati-
62 BARRACKPOOR.
fication. But the business of the diocese, at all
times too much for the charge of one Bishop,
had accumulated in enormous arrears during the
vacancy of the see ; many important cases had
been awaiting his arrival, and he found them to
embrace matters of no ordinary delicacy and
anxiety. To these, therefore, he immediately di-
rected his whole care and unremitting attention ;
leaving the arrangement of his household, and
all concern about his domestic affairs, to Mrs.
James, who met with the kindest assistance from
several private friends in ordering these matters.
The receiving necessary visits of ceremony,
and attending occasionally to take the chair at
public meetings, were his only relaxations from
the closest attendance to diocesan business for
several weeks, except a visit of a few days to the
Governor-general and the Countess Amherst, at
their delightful park at Barrackpoor. The
party were much pleased with the society of
their amiable host and hostess ; and became ini-
tiated here in Indian customs, sleeping in bun-
galows apart from the house, and riding on
elephants to see the beauties of the scenery,
CALCUTTA . 63
and the curious animals that are kept in the
park.
They returned to Calcutta on the 12th of
February ; and in going to the cathedral on the
following Sunday, they met one of thos living
monuments of the degrading superstitions of
India, called falceers, or religious mendicants.
It appeared, that it had been this man's vow
to hold his arm always perpendicularly erected
from his body, as if pointing to heaven ; and for
so many years had the poor devotee persevered
in holding it in that torturing position, that the
limb had become shrivelled and perfectly im-
movable. These fakeers are highly esteemed
throughout India for their sanctity : it is even
accounted an act of religion to support them ;
and it is their privilege to take what they please
in any shop where they enter, without paying
for it. He had, this day, placed himself near
the ancient bazaar which unites Chowringhee
with Calcutta ; and from the sad spectacle of
this devotee the Bishop and his family passed
on, with feelings of compassion not unmixed
with pain, to the pure and holy worship of the
English church, where the Bishop preached on
64 CALCUTTA.
that morning with much energy, but on leaving
the cathedral was quite overcome with the fa-
tigue of the exertion. The consequence of the
close and anxious attention he had paid to
business since his arrival,, was, that the climate
began thus early to show its effects upon his
health. He was now unwell for several days ; and
at the end of the month had a second attack of
the disorder so fatally prevalent in Bengal.
Mrs. James writes from the palace, March 4 :
66 The Bishop has twice been unwell. I thank
God, however, each attack was taken early;
Dr. Nicholson has given him large quantities
of calomel, and, though certainly weakened by
it, he is now so much recovered, that he pre-
sided at a meeting of the Society for the Pro-
pagation of the Gospel, which had been fixed
for this morning, and has been out in the car-
nage this evening; he has, indeed, had too
great a press of business, which began imme-
diately on his arrival, and had rather thickened
on him than diminished till the beginning of his
illness. His table has been literally deluged
with papers, and it has been no slight incon-
venience that with numerous cases of import-
ance before him, he could make no reference to
CALCUTTA. 65
his books and authorities for several weeks, as
they could not be unpacked and arranged, the
palace not being ready for our reception for
more than a month after we arrived." The
Bishop adds, at the end of the letter, " I am so
extremely busy, that I am obliged to give up
all private letters for the present. Marianne has,
therefore, written for me ; indeed, she has taken
the entire charge of all our domestic affairs.
I do not yet know the faces of our forty-three
servants, or any thing relating to our private
matters, except paying for them."
On Saturday, March 8, the Bishop was suf-
ficiently recovered to be able to attend Lord
Amherst from the Government-house to the
Ghaut, at which place he took his leave; and
the Earl, after taking leave of the Hon. W. B.
Bayley, and Sir Charles Metcalfe, Bart., mem-
bers of the council, Chief Justice Sir Charles
Grey, Sir Edward Ryan, and the other chief
officers of the government, went down the river
in the state barge to embark on board His Ma-
jesty's yacht the Herald, on his return to England.
The yards of all the vessels were manned,
and the river was covered with boats. Car-
F
66 CALCUTTA.
riages of every description lined the esplanade,
and an immense crowd of people, in all the
variety of Indian costume, all eager to testify
their respect for the exalted character of the de-
parting Governor-general.
The Bishop's palace is situated at Chow-
ringhee, the best built and most airy part of the
suburb on the southern side of Calcutta, one
mile and a half from the cathedral. It is a
large Grecian building, with a deep colonnade
to each story, and the entrance is by a spacious
portico under which carriages drive. The rooms
are of noble size and proportions ; the largest, the
dining-room, being a double cube, and near eighty
feet long. It was now comfortably and handsomely
furnished, and the Bishop commenced his din-
ners to the clergy and others, by whose agency
he had begun to hope he might gradually ac-
complish many plans he had already formed for
doing good in Calcutta and its neighbourhood.
The first object which had engaged his atten-
tion was the advantage which would arise, if each
of the Company's chaplains, instead of being left to
find his own range, should have some particular
CALCUTTA. ()7
district assigned to him, within which it should
be his duty to visit the European sick, and to
perform all that are usually called parochial
duties among those who belong to the Estab-
lished Church : for this purpose he divided the
city of Calcutta into three ecclesiastical dis-
tricts, the new church in Fort William making
a fourth. The advantages of these divisions
were obvious to all, and the directions for car-
rying into effect this plan of the Bishop's, hav-
ing received the sanction of the Governor-
general in council, were published, with a plan
of the districts annexed, in a Gazette extraor-
dinary, on April 3, 1828.
In order to meet the objections which it was
natural some of the clergy should feel to this
new arrangement of their duties, he thought no
time was to be lost in pursuing an object
which Bishop Middleton had much desired ; and
after great perseverance and laborious corres-
pondence, he succeeded in procuring from the
government, that the issuing of marriage licences
should be placed in the hands of the clergy:
and he immediately appointed the chaplains of
the cathedral to be surrogates for that purpose,
F 2
68 CALCUTTA.
as a compensation to them for the loss they
might sustain from the adoption of parochial
divisions. He was most anxious also to enforce
the performance of evening as well as morning
service every Sunday throughout the diocese, in
all the three Presidencies, wherever the circum-
stances of the population made it practicable ;
thinking it better even to shorten the morning
service during the hot season, (which in some
cases he found it necessary to allow,) than to
make the length of it an excuse for entirely
omitting that appointed for the evening.
With regard to those who were placed as
missionaries in the parts of the diocese remote
from the three seats of government, he well
knew, for it was one of his favourite maxims as
a parish priest at Flitton, how much more rea-
dily a man listens to spiritual instruction when
it falls from one whom he believes to be his
superior in information in temporal matters
also ; and with the hope of giving the mis-
sionaries an advantage of this sort, it was his
intention to supply them all, by degrees, with
such books of practical information on modern
inventions and discoveries in the useful arts, as
CALCUTTA. 69
might enable them to establish a superiority of
this kind over the natives among whom their
ministry might be cast ; and so to obtain an in-
fluence among them, that might gradually, as he
hoped, by the blessing of God, lead the way
to the more successful opening of channels for
the communication of religious truth. And he
had ordered a selection of the best books
adapted to this purpose to be carefully made,
and sent out from England. He felt, indeed,
the delicacy and caution necessary to be ob-
served in every step he might take in the mis-
sionary cause. He considered that one indis-
creet act might do more harm than many dis-
creet ones would do good. He regarded the
Indo-Britons (as the half-castes are now be-
ginning to be called) as the class most to be
looked to for a supply of persons likely to cul-
tivate a successful intercourse with the native
population, as missionaries and catechists ; and
he therefore took particular interest in whatever
concerned their education, and used, as often
as he was able, to attend the examinations at their
different schools in Calcutta.
On the 10th of March, the Bishop had
70 CALCUTTA.
much satisfaction in collating Mr. Robinson,
the chaplain and intimate friend of Bishop
Heber, whom he had just before appointed to
the vacant archdeaconry of Madras. A man
whose piety, no less than his talents, and his
attainments as an orientalist, as well as a theolo-
gian, place his name in the ranks of those who
are ornaments to the Indian church. This was
the only piece of preferment it fell to the lot of
Bishop James to bestow, and he spoke much
of the pleasure he had in so bestowing it ; ex-
pressing to the new archdeacon, his sense of
the service he had rendered to the cause of
religion by his translation of the Pentateuch into
the Persian language.
A few days afterwards, the Armenian Bishop
Paul came to pay his respects. His appear-
ance was very venerable, an old man with a
long grey beard, dressed in a gown of black
velvet, lined with red, and a black silk cowl
over his head ; he was attended by a single
monk, and an interpreter; he had come from
Dacca, his usual residence, about three hundred
miles from Calcutta, to visit those of his church
who were resident in that city, where they ap-
CALCUTTA. 71
pear to be numerous. He spoke of the great
antiquity of his church, many of his nation
having become Christians before Tiridates was
converted by St. Gregory, in the fourth century.
Echmiatzin, he said, was founded on the spot
where that conversion took place, and that its
name, when interpreted, is " Unigeniti de-
scensio." He spoke of the extension of Chris-
tianity by the Church of England; and dwelt
with particular delight on the circumstance of
the Armenian church, after having suffered so
long persecution from the Persians, being again
placed under a Christian power; Echmiatzin,
in the province of Erivan, the metropolitan
seat of their church establishment, having just
fallen under the government of Russia. His
visit was a most interesting one.
At six in the morning of the 27th, the Bishop
went to consecrate the burial-ground in Fort
William, and afterwards the church, a neat
Gothic building, dedicated to St. Peter : it had
before been licensed, and Mr. T. Procter had
been officiating there to a numerous and regu-
lar congregation. It was the Bishop's inten-
tion, in whatever part of his diocese he might
72 CALCUTTA.
be, to preach, if possible, on all the great festi-
vals; and on the 6th of April, being Easter
day, he preached at the cathedral, and admi-
nistered the sacrament to a large body of com-
municants.
. On the following day he thus writes to his
mother:
" I have been obliged, ever since I arrived,
to abstain from private letters, except, I think,
one little scrap to you ; but as this is, they say,
the last ship that sails this season, I must write
to you, and to my uncle at Dartford. I have
had much to do, and some matters of so im-
portant, others of so delicate a nature, and re-
quiring so much caution, that I have had but
little time to spare from such occupations, even
for the ordinary business of the diocese. I
have been twice ill, but not very seriously ; and
the little fever that accompanied my illness, is,
they say, a good symptom for my health in this
terrible climate. We have had no rain, and the
heat begins to be excessive, which adds to the
tediousness of the way of doing business here.
From one's not being able to stir out, what
CALCUTTA. 73
would be an affair of a ten minutes 5 interview in
England, is here a matter of lengthy correspond-
ence for hours, and even for days.
" We rise at five in the morning, ride our white
horses till a little after sunrise, return and bathe,
breakfast at eight, then shut ourselves up
during the heat of the day; unless any very
urgent business obliges me to go out in the
carriage, which I have already been sufficiently
warned to avoid as much as possible. The sun,
our greatest enemy, is totally excluded from
the house : three long colonnades, one over the
other, protect the southern front; these are fur-
nished with green blinds made of cane, besides
which, the windows have also Venetian blinds,
and thus we exist without even a hint of sun-
shine ; such is here the necessary caution for
the preservation of health. As soon as the
sun sets, the European world is alive again ;
we then take an airing in the carriage, and re-
turn to dinner at seven o'clock, and by ten are
going to bed.
" I have opened a chapel in the palace, where
the litany is to be read every morning, and the
74 CALCUTTA.
whole service on Sundays, for ourselves and
our immediate neighbours, for we are a mile
and a half from the cathedral, and must save
ourselves the hot drive during the intense heat.
All my plans have hitherto gone on well, and
we are happy enough ; but, at the same time, it
is nothing like what we used to enjoy, and
never can be. On this day last year I preached
my farewell sermon at Flitton ; it has not been
out of my head during any leisure moment that
I have had. God bless you all.'
TO THOMAS CALDECOTT, ESQ. DART FORD.
Bishop's Palace, Calctttta,
April 7, 1828.
66 My dear Uncle \
*****
u I think you would be amused to hear me
discussing some very secular matters, which in
this country necessarily come under the Bishop's
eye, some of them involving questions of legal
difficulty ; and I assure you I have found great
use in the principles of law which I gleaned in
olden time at Dartford, and for which I cer-
tainly never supposed such demand was likely
CALCUTTA. 75
to be made upon me in the course of my life.
However, all is for the best. * *
" I am going to make the Archdeacons more
efficient officers, and hope by degrees to esta-
blish every thing in an uniform and consistent
manner. It is true, I have long journeys to
make ; but this is regarded by every one here as
the greatest advantage attached to my office, both
in point of health and pleasure. I shall, however,
as soon as things are fairly arranged, report to
government on the requisite addition to our
ecclesiastical establishment, and then take with
pleasure such coadjutors as they may think pro-
per. *
" It is a curious sort of life that one leads here ;
shut up for fear of the sun during the whole
day; and whenever one stirs out, attended by
men with silver maces, (such is the necessary eti-
quette,) and surrounded by almost papal honours.
The Judges seem to live quietly and comfort-
ably enough : they are not called on, except the
Chief Justice, to keep up the same state that I
am, who am placed alone at the head of a de-
partment, with a very large palace, and a suit-
'O CALCUTTA.
able establishment, yet nothing too much for my
situation. * # * *
" I think we shall set out for the Upper Pro-
vinces with the south winds at the end of June,
and return, perhaps, after going as far as Delhi,
in the early part of next year. We shall pro-
ceed at least as far as Benares or Cawnpoor by
water. In our land journey we are to have a
military escort, and if I am allowed to choose
the officer to command, it will be pleasant
enough."
On the 8th of April, Easter Tuesday, the
Bishop confirmed about four hundred young
persons at the cathedral, among whom it gave
him pleasure to see a few native converts. He
afterwards addressed to them a plain, but forci-
ble exposition of the baptismal covenant, and
the duties arising out of it ; which he concluded
thus :
" And now let me hope that the service of this
day may make a due impression, not only on you,
who have been confirmed, but on all who are as-
sembled here; that it may serve to suggest to many
CONFIRMATION. 77
the Christian's true and only support under afflic-
tion, and teach them to call to mind, hue very moment
of trial and temptation, the vows which all have
made unto the Lord their God ; that having witness-
ed your ratification of them on this day, they may
look with reverence on this service, which in the
seductiveness of worldly occupation might else
have been carelessly passed over, or perhaps for-
gotten. May the remembrance of it sink deep in
every breast ! and by the blessing of God, may
it be the subject of contemplation in your secret
hours of retirement and prayer, when you
commune with your own hearts, and in your
chambers, and are still! For myself, it is im-
possible I should not feel an especial interest in
the spiritual welfare of those who are, as it
were, my first offerings at this altar, the first
fruits of my ministry in this land : and I shall
not cease to pray for your advancement in that
lively Christian faith which alone leads to Chris-
tian practice. Remember then that you have
now yourselves ratified your vows before God;
think of them observe them obey them live
in them ; and his grace will confirm you unto
the end, that you may be blameless in the day
of our Lord Jesus Christ."
78 CALCUTTA.
The heat of this day was excessive, and the
Bishop suffered greatly from fatigue. But two
days after he went out again at five o'clock in
the morning, accompanied by Archdeacon Corrie
and Mr. Knapp, to confirm and visit the schools
at Dum Dura,, a military station,, a short dis-
tance from Calcutta, on the road to Luckipoor ;
Mrs. James was also of the party, and they all
remained during the heat with the Chaplain,
Mr. Macpherson, and his family, with whom they
passed a very agreeable day, and returned to
Calcutta in the evening. On the following
Monday, the 14th, they went to pass the week
with Mr. Charles Prinsep, at his pretty villa at
Ishera, on the bank of the river, four miles
short of Barrackpoor, thinking that the Bishop
would derive benefit from the fresh air of the
river : here, however, he was again taken un-
well, as was also Miss Ommanney, though her
illness was clearly traced to her having staid out
sketching till near seven o'clock in the morning.
Fortunately for both, medical assistance was
promptly at hand from Barrackpoor ; and they
were soon able to return to Calcutta, where the
Bishop remained some days under Dr. Nichol-
son's care, and was too unwell to appear at the
CALCUTTA. 79
Government-house on the 23rd, St. George's day,
when Mr. Bayley, the acting Governor-general,
gave a splendid entertainment, followed by a
ball, in honour of the King's birth-day.
The heat and the long drought were now felt as
unusually oppressive even by those who had long-
been accustomed to the climate ; and had been
much against the recovery of the Bishop's
strength. There was no rain till the 27th of
April. Mrs. James writes from the palace on
that day, " How can I express the delicious
feeling of the first heavy shower in India ! we
have been here since the middle of January,
and have not seen rain till now. Last night we
had a north-west wind and a little rain, and to-
day a most refreshing shower has fallen ; every
living thing appears to breathe anew, and every
little bird seemed anxious to plume his feathers
in the first drops that fell. Before this time
last year, fifteen north-westers had taken place ;
they usually begin about March, and continue
till the rains set in in June. The thunder last
night was terrific to English ears, and the light-
ning vivid and blue. My dearest husband is
80 CALCUTTA.
still unwell; it is impossible for any one to
regain strength and spirits during the excessive
heat, but even he appears to be refreshed by the
shower."
From that time, however, he got better, and
recovered his spirits, as the folio wllng letter
will show, addressed, on the 4th of May, to the
Editor of these Memoirs, his mind being then
full of the duties of his station, and making but
slight mention of his late illness.
Bishops Palace, Calcutta,
May 1th, 1828.
" My dear Edward,
* * * " On Holy Thursday I proceed
to consecrate the chapel at Bishop's College, an
act to which I look forward with great satisfaction.
I mean to provide a breakfast in the College Hall
for those who may attend on the occasion. No
invitations will be issued, but any may come
who please ; and as they have so far to come,
they must be provided for. Besides, I am glad
of the opportunity of fostering a little the good
CALCUTTA. 81
feelings of people towards our establishment
there, which is much needed just now.
" And yet I have no fear, but that all will be
well in a short time; and by the beginning of next
year, I trust to have the public voice loud in its
favour. The misfortune is, party spirit runs
high here, as in other places ; I always dis-
courage it by not being a party man, without
fearing that either side in the end can think me
its enemy. Little ebullitions will occasionally
break out, but hitherto I have been fortunate in
allaying them. Such things, however unwhole-
some to the mind, people tell me belong to this
climate; as if, indeed, the heat of India were
to be understood in a moral, as well as in a
physical sense an idea truly alarming, and sug-
gesting a strict watch over one's self.
" I hope, I have secured that my arrange-
ments will go on well when 1 leave Calcutta for
the Upper Provinces, which will be in the end
of June, perhaps.; but I have not been able
to fix the time yet. We are, I believe, to
have a military escort, and what is in some
sort a preventive against the worst dangers, a
G
82 CALCUTTA.
medical man. * *
& * # #
" I have just received notice of a present of
four hundred pounds, for general objects con-
nected with the Society for Promoting Christian
Knowledge. The spirit with which all charita-
ble subscriptions are supported here is really
gratifying to see : and I have in many respects
a most encouraging prospect before me.
" I have had a great deal to do in what may
be called more especially church matters; and
several new regulations to make, which cer-
tainly were wanted : here one knows what
one is about. In the missionary cause it is
a little more difficult to get a clear view of the
proper line to be taken ; nor, till I have made
my visitation, shall I venture on any general
views, though I shall have an anxious eye upon
them in every part. I am quite clear of this,
that there is much which may be improved by
and bye. I have had some trouble with the mis-
sionaries themselves, as you will probably
have heard ; not indeed with many, for I am
happy to say, that with the exception of the
cases which have occurred here, in general
CALCUTTA.
they have all conducted themselves much to my
satisfaction.
C(
Perhaps I may have been made more cau-
tious from seeing that some things have been
done latterly rather too much in a hurry ; and
hence, as I shall not have a progressive report
to make, I may appear to be remiss in the
cause. No matter; if it pleases God that I
live out my time, I have no fear but that justice
will be done me in this respect.
" As to domestic matters, it sounds alarming
to say, that I have now been unwell three
times, and that Marianne has been slightly so,
for the second time; but we have both of us
been more free from fever than is common, and
this is an excellent sign. All persons at first
coming have their seasoning, and I have had
mine three times over. The heat is dreadful ;
so great that multitudes of natives are dying
of cholera morbus; and some public measures
have in consequence been ordered by the go-
vernment* Many Europeans have also suf-
* The Calcutta papers of March 31, state, from the returns
made to government, that eight hundred natives had died of
o2
84 CALCUTTA.
fered. We are of course very careful of our-
selves. I have a chapel in the palace, where I
read and preach in the morning, during the in-
tense heat, (for Mr. Knapp at present offici-
ates at Barrackpoor,) and it is a great accom-
modation to the few families in this immediate
neighbourhood. We go to the cathedral at
eight on Sunday evenings ; but during the
excessively hot months of April, May, and June,
it is too much to drive a distance of one mile
and a half to the cathedral and back, during the
heat of the day ; and I have already had warn-
ing enough that I cannot do such things with
impunity.
" I had much pleasure in appointing Mi\
Robinson to the archdeaconry of Madras, and
he sailed about a month ago. * * *
" By the bye, this clerical letter must be tire-
some to Sarah; she had rather hear what we
are all about. Marianne is sitting with me in
the library, finishing a drawing of the house for
.
this dreadful scourge in that month. The government had
appointed twenty-five native doctors to be stationed at the
different thaunahs (police stations) with supplies of medicine.
NATIVE FEMALE SCHOOL. 85
Mrs. Larpent. Elizabeth Ommanney and her
brother Walter, are in the drawing-room.
Little Freddy is asleep up stairs ; Mr. Knapp
employed in his own room below. The Pun-
kahs are going merrily, and all is well."- .
Returning from their early ride on Tuesday,
May 6th, the Bishop and Mrs. James stopped
in the Cossipoor road to make their first visit
to the native female school, an institution pro-
mising much good through the indefatigable
exertions of Mrs. Wilson, the mistress, who
has formed it under the guidance of the Church
Missionary Society, from the small schools which
were before scattered in different parts of Cal-
cutta and the surrounding villages. They were
much gratified with seeing the little black chil-
dren, some of them in their native dresses and
Hindoo ornaments, learning to repeat Christian
hymns, and to read lessons from the Gospels.
About seventy usually attend this, which is the
central school, partly Indian and partly Indo-
Portuguese. One little black girl read to them
a chapter of St. Matthew's Gospel in Bengalli ;
and others seemed anxious to do so too. But
the sun was now getting high above the hori-
86 SCHOOLS.
zon, and it would have been dangerous to delay
returning to the palace.
About this time the Bishop was making in-
quiry as to the general state of the schools
in connexion with the English Church, and
particularly those supported by the Society
for Promoting Christian Knowledge : and he
found that that Society has four principal dis-
tricts or circles of schools in the neighbour-
hood of Calcutta, in which it is estimated that
near two thousand native children are in course
of education upon Dr. Bell's system; the
Church Missionary Society has twelve schools,
containing about six hundred boys, besides their
five schools for native females under Mrs. Wil-
son. The free school has near three hundred
boys and girls. The orphan grammar school
for boys, and that for girls, (both of which are
supported by subscriptions raised among the
English residents,) contain near four hundred
Indo-British children; and the aggregate of
these, together with the scholars of missionaries
belonging to other societies, the Bishop consi-
dered as affording a satisfactory prospect of the
harvest that may hereafter be hoped for, when
HINDOO COLLEGE. 87
from this number many a sower shall go out to
sow the seed.
Meanwhile, though he had not personally
visited them, he was no inattentive observer of
what was going on in the Hindoo and Maho-
metan colleges in Calcutta, both of which are
largely assisted by the government from the
annual supply for public instruction. The ob-
ject of these two colleges is to instruct the
Hindoo and Mahometan youth in English litera-
ture but, alas! without the Scriptures. The
exhibition of the students of the former institu-
tion, at the public distribution of their prizes in
January, had recently attracted much notice; they
had acted scenes from Shakespeare with great
success, and the astonishing progress they had
made had been the subject of frequent discussion
among the wealthier Hindoos : the Bishop la-
menting deeply the fear which caused the ex-
clusion of the Scriptures, saw, from all that
was passing around, that both these institutions,
in their present state, obviously led to deism ;
still, as he observed that it was deism not di-
rectly opposed to Christianity, but to Hindoo
Polytheism, he could not but regard it as tend-
88 BISHOP'S COLLEGE.
ing to remove the main bulwark of their ido-
latrous superstitions, and gradually opening a
way for the admission of the truth and the
life.
But he saw also that this great work must be
wrought by the ministry of native teachers :
under the blessing of the Almighty theirs must
be the agency employed. The education of
the Indo-Britons, therefore,, (which had been
strangely neglected till of late,) he regarded as
the great means of forwarding the diffusion of
Christian truth ; and he looked to the time as
not far distant, when a supply of missionaries
might be found in India, and not sent out from
England. For these reasons he was a watchful
Visitor at Bishop's college ; and having gone
there a few weeks after his first visit in January,
for the purpose of examining the students in
the college-hall, he intimated his intention to
repeat the examination at stated intervals, which
he continued to do, as often as he could find
opportunity.
To secure the best interests of this noble in-
stitution, on which his main hopes of promoting
BISHOP'S COLLEGE. 89
the Christianizing of India were centered, was
the object of his most anxious concern, and, as
has already been seen, had engaged his earliest
attention from the very day of his arrival at
Calcutta. He had now had the happiness to
succeed there in a delicate matter which had given
him much concern ; and after paying another
visit to the college in March, he thus embodies
his reflections on it in a letter to the Secretary
of the Society for the Propagation of the Gos-
pel in Foreign Parts, by whose munificence,
jointly with that of the Society for Promoting
Christian Knowledge, the establishment was first
founded and has been since supported :
" It is impossible for any one who has ever
known Oxford, or Cambridge, not to feel a re-
verence and affection for Bishop's college as
soon as he enters within its walls. The manner
and appearance of the place, the very dress of
the professors, has a charm indescribable ; and
I am almost ashamed to confess the weakness
into which my feelings internally betrayed me,
when I first surveyed such an edifice on the
banks of the Ganges. But it would be se-
ducing the judgment to let these feelings
90 BISHOP'S COLLEGE.
carry us too far, and when I ask myself, whether
this institution, in its present form, will effect
all that is expected of it in England, I am sorry
to confess that I feel something more than
anxiety as to the result. It is meant to be a
school for the students, and a university for the
probationers, and both are arranged and go-
verned on a collegiate plan approaching as nearly
as possible to such institutions in England;
but let me ask, admirably as these institutions
answer their purpose in England, should we
look to Eton or Winchester, to Oxford or Cam-
bridge, as places calculated to change raw boys
into humble and patient, but zealous and spi-
rited missionaries? are they (except only in
such rare instances as prove the rule) found
to do so even with men? Ought we then to
expect this from an establishment so formed in
this country? I must freely say I think not.
# # # * *
" It may appear a trivial matter after saying
so much, but as far as I know the world, there are
few things that contribute more powerfully to the
formation of the character of the mind, than the
constant memorial suggested to it by the dress or
habit a person wears. In order to assist, there-
BISHOP'S COLLEGE. 91
fore, in imparting an ecclesiastical character to
the institution, and giving something more, per-
haps, of a clerical turn to the minds of the stu-
dents themselves, I have ordered that cassocks
of black china crape should be provided for
them, and caps; a dress well according with
the climate, and which may easily be accommo-
dated both to our summer and winter ; it will
be preferable to the present European coat and
waistcoat ; and besides, will serve instead of
limits or bounds which seem otherwise necessary
to be imposed. It will also prevent the stu-
dents from mixing too indiscriminately with
young people around them. A gown and cap,
which might be thrown off at pleasure, would
answer no such purpose as I have here had in
view."
The letter then speaks of other regulations he
had made for the college, with the approbation
of the principal and professors, and enters into
the details of a plan for enlarging its accom-
modations; then of the provision the Bishop
hoped to make for the Garrow mission^ and the
impossibility, as he feared, of finding a fit suc-
cessor for the lamented Mr. Christian at Bhagul-
MISSIONARIES.
poor ; and after expressing a wish that more
missionaries might be sent out, it concludes with
the following passage :
" Let me make it my especial request to the
Society, that the strictest attention be paid to
the temper and deportment of persons selected
for the high and important office of missionaries.
If they have not steady, sober judgment, and
mild manners, whatever other acquirements or
abilities they may possess, they will never pro-
duce any good effect here. This is true, per-
haps, as to every country, but doubly forcible
is the application of this truth in this land.
All Eastern people learn by the eye rather than
by the ear by example rather than by precept ;
and if they see a person offering to instruct
them, whose habitual deportment and balance
of mind are less even and easy than their own,
so far from being inclined to look up to him
with respect as a teacher of heavenly things,
they will, I fear, rather think slightingly of
Christianity for the sake of the individual.
They have, from all I can see and learn of them,
a suspicious acuteness of observation, and a de-
licacy of mind that makes them difficult of ac-
MISSIONARIES. 93
cess to teachers in general, and absolutely un-
approachable by a rude and unconciliating man-
ner : they must be won, if won at all, by being
shown the beauty of Christian holiness demon-
strated by Christian example ; in their present
state, few truths can be taught them otherwise
than this. Let us have another Schwartz in
temper, in manner, in judgment, and in Chris-
tian feeling, and I fear not to say, that, under
the blessing of God, we may look for a
Schwartz's success.
" Recent events have induced me to make
this my special request. I shall make it circu-
lar to all the societies in London with whom I
am in correspondence ; and I trust it will be re-
ceived by all with the same good will with which
I write it."
The other parts of the above letter relate to
the details of matters which are not of public
interest, though they show how anxiously the
writer was occupied in fulfilling the various
duties of his arduous office. He had been
engaged in making provision for carrying
into full effect the statute of the college
94 BISHOP'S COLLEGE.
for the appointment of a syndicate to superin-
tend the press established there, and had been
seeking out those who were qualified and willing
to become associate syndics in the different
oriental languages. In the alterations he pro-
posed to introduce in the system of education
pursued at the college, and the discipline by
which it was governed, he had had the benefit
of the experience of his vigilant and active pre-
decessor in the see, and had himself paid per-
sonal attention to the progress of the students ;
and being led to draw a plain distinction be-
tween a university education in England, after
which professional studies are to begin, and the
education at Bishop's college, which is intended
to be at once a school to the students and a
university to those who are probationers in
theology, and are thence to enter immediately
on their duties as catechists and missionaries ;
he could not but wish that something more pro-
fessional, something more of direct preparation
for the ministry, above all, more of scriptural
study, should be there pursued ; that it should
not be forgotten, that it was instituted as a
mission college, and that the object should be,
not so much to educate the students for classical
BISHOP'S COLLEGE. 95
scholars., as to qualify them to go forth as ca-
techists and teachers of scripture lessons to the
heathen, and hereafter, perhaps, to be ordained
as ' ministers of Christ, and stewards of the
mysteries of God/
The Bishop always spoke with pleasure of
his being the almoner of the venerable Society
for Promoting Christian Knowledge : he had
already been the bearer of their liberal contri-
bution to the wants of the church which is rising,
notwithstanding all discouragements, at the
Cape ; and he had a vote of credit to a consi-
derable amount, (1000,) with which he hoped
to have many opportunites of forwarding their
truly evangelical designs in the course of his
journeys through the provinces : from this sura
he now gave three hundred rupees towards the
expense of translating and publishing Bishop
Porteus's Evidences in the Armenian language.
Ascension-day, May 15th, was the day fixed
for the consecration of the chapel and burial-
ground at Bishop's college ; a ceremony which
had been expected with much interest by
the Christian part of Calcutta. The Bishop
96 BISHOP'S COLLEGE.
arrived at the college soon after five o'clock in
the morning, and was met by Sir Charles Grey.,
and Sir Edward Ryan, as well as by the learned
principal and professors. A numerous com-
pany was seated in the chapel, which was
quite full ; and the presence of a party of
Armenians, with several ladies, full dressed for
the occasion in the rich costume of their coun-
ty added something of eastern splendour to the
solemnity of the scene, when the Bishop entered
at the western door, attended by his chaplains,
and followed by all the clergy ; and proceeding
up the aisle, repeated alternately with them the
verses of that sublime Psalm with which the
English form of consecration begins.* An excel-
lent sermon was preached by the principal of the
college, Dr. Mill : and when the services of re-
ligion were concluded, all the visitors who at-
tended the chapel were received by the Bishop
in the college-hall, where he had provided a pub-
lic breakfast.
The following note of an address was found, with-
out date, among his papers ; but it would appear to
have been on this occasion, while the guests were
* Psalm xxiv.
BISHOP'S COLLEGE. 97
still assembled, and the students were present in
the hall, that on the Principal making some con-
gratulatory address to him on his having by
this day's ceremony completed the work which
Bishop Middletori had begun, the Bishop re-
turned answer in these words :
" I do, indeed, feel it to be a matter of much
congratulation, that it should have fallen to my
lot to officiate at this most important rite and
ceremony in this college in an establishment
devoted by the first Bishop of the diocese to
such great and noble objects. But it is not
to myself alone that congratulation belongs : to
you, sir, to all whom I see assembled here, no
trifling share of gratification has been afforded,
I am well persuaded, by the religious services
of this day. Where is the heart so dull, that
does not expand to the prospect here opened
before us that does not feel exultation at wit-
nessing the solemn dedication to the service of
God, of an institution devoted to the culture
of the noblest powers and faculties of man,
and directing them to the highest and most ex-
cellent of all purposes the promotion of Chris-
H
98 BISHOP'S COLLEGE.
tian knowledge ? Where is the man that feels
the benefits of Christianity himself, and does
not anxiously wish to impart them to his fellow-
men ? Where, indeed, is the Briton, who,
viewing these sacred walls, does not feel honest
pride at the spectacle afforded by so magnificent
a monument of the spontaneous liberality of our
countrymen at home, the voluntary offering of
British Christian feeling?
" But if there are many who participate with
me in such thoughts as these, on the present oc-
casion, there are those to whom they must be
doubly cheering, and to whom every idea con-
nected with this place has an hourly increasing-
interest. I mean those who are destined here-
after to fulfil the hopes of our Establishment,
and preach the pure doctrines of our church
to the eastern world. The time surely will
come, when many a youthful and aspiring mind,
while engaged in the missionary's high career,
will look back with an especial reverence on
the names of those who first issued forth from
these walls to proclaim the power of the Word,
and display the light of truth in a benighted
BISHOP'S COLLEGE. 99
land; many a Christian heart on distant shores
shall glow with double fervour at the recital of
the names of those to whom this proud and dis-
tinguished privilege was allowed. Reflect long, I
beseech you, my young friends, on such thoughts
as these ; and while you consider the blessings
that may arise to thousands from your labours,
let the thought stimulate you to fresh exertions
in your preparation for the ministry ; let it
inspire you with new ardour in your sacred
studies, new vigour in all you have to do, and
make you, under the blessing of the Almighty,
worthy of the name of the first students in
THE MISSION COLLEGE OF CALCUTTA."
In the course of the morning, the Bishop
presided at a meeting of the syndicate of the
college-press, which, in addition to the usual
members, the Venerable the Archdeacon, the
Council of the college, Rev. Thomas Procter,
Rev. Allan Macpherson, and S. Tytler, Esq.,
was attended this day, for the first time, by
those other learned oriental scholars, whom the
Bishop had lately requested to accept the hono-
rary appointment of associate syndics in the
different languages :
100 BISHOP'S COLLEGE.
In the Sanskrit Horace H. Wilson,, Esq. of
Calcutta.
In Bengalli Lieutenant Hugh Todd, Ex-
aminer at Fort William College.
In Armenian Paron Johannes Avdall, teacher
in the Armenian Academy ; Rev. Mesrop David
Thaliathin, Deacon of the Armenian Church,
who had been admitted as a theological stu-
dent at the College, in 1826, on the recom-
mendation of Bishop Heber; and Paron Lazar
Agabeg.
In Arabic Lieutenant Hugh Todd; and
Robert M. Bird, Esq. Judge at Gorruckpoor.
In Hindostanee Captain Charles Rogers,
20th Native Infantry.
In Persian Edmund Molony, Esq. Acting
Secretary to Government in the General De-
partment; Cudbert T. Glass, Esq. Acting Se-
cretary to the Revenue Department, and Civil
Auditor ; Captain C. Rogers ; Robert M. Bird,
Esq. ; and Lieutenant Hugh Todd.
BISHOP'S COLLEGE. 101
At this meeting much important business
was settled relative to the revision of translations
already made, or in progress, in several of the
above languages; some regulations were also
made with regard to the press ; and the trans-
lation of several scriptural tracts was under-
taken, upon a plan suggested by the principal,
as the Bishop mentions in a letter which he
afterwards addressed to His Grace the Arch-
bishop of Canterbury. When the business of
the syndicate was concluded, he proceeded,
with the members of the Council, to inspect
the plans for the proposed addition to the
buildings of the college ; and after due consi-
deration of the prevalent winds and the nature
of the soil, as well as the uniformity of the
architecture, it was agreed that the best mode
would be to adopt the plan for erecting two
buildings on the southern side, similar to the
present wings, and so placed as to form a se-
cond court, fronting the river, like the present
one ; these buildings would afford accommo-
dation for forty additional students, and the ex-
pense would about be met by the votes of
credit the Bishop had for the purpose : one of
five thousand pounds from the Society for the
MISSIONARIES.
Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, and
one, also, of three thousand pounds, from the
Church Missionary Society, a certain number of
whose students were now to become admissible
at the college.
The Principal afterwards gave an entertain-
ment at his house, and in the evening the Bishop
and his party returned to Calcutta, after a very
interesting day. While crossing the river they
were overtaken by one of those tremendous
storms of thunder and lightning so common in
India, and encountered the whole force of it in
the carriage on their way to the palace.
The Bishop had expressed to more than one
person his opinion that the system pursued
with regard to the missions in India might be
advantageously altered, though he would not
venture to communicate his views on this sub-
ject, further than he had already done, to the
Societies at home, until he had had longer ex-
perience in the country. Meanwhile, he was
eagerly directing his attention to every object
that could increase the comfort of the mis-
sionaries themselves, or in any way tend to
MISSIONARIES. 103
promote the success of their labours. He had
requested the Editor of these Memoirs to make
a selection of books as presents to them on
his visitation journeys ; and he was now en-
gaged in correspondence with Archdeacon Ro-
binson, at Madras, with the hope of maturing
a plan they had jointly formed, for establishing
a station for sick missionaries on the Neelgherry
hills, in order to prevent the necessity of a sea
voyage in each individual's case. The follow-
ing is the substance of the information they had
collected on this subject, which will probably
be thought interesting.
Ootakamund is considered the most eligible
point on the hills for such a purpose, as far as
coolness of climate is concerned ; and it is, be-
sides, the residence of Mr. Sullivan, the col-
lector, a well-disposed, and intelligent man, who
would gladly give his assistance in forwarding
any scheme of usefulness. The government,
however, are building quarters there for sick
officers, and it is therefore probable there will
be a chaplain eventually stationed at the place.
The Church Missionary Society, also, have pur-
chased a house there, as a seminary for the
104 MISSIONARIES.
sons of their missionaries, and of other Euro-
pean residents in India; an institution which
promises much benefit to the rising generation.
The native population of Ootakamund is not
more than five hundred, and does not increase.
Infanticide was formerly known to be practised
there, and its existence is still suspected.
Another station much recommended is Drin-
hutty, sixteen miles from Ootakamund. The
climate here, though four degress warmer, is
preferred by many, as being on the eastern side
of the highest point of the hills, and therefore
sheltered from the violence of the Malabar
monsoon. The facilities for a missionary es-
tablishment at this place have been, and still
are, very great, but will decrease every day.
The natives, who are a fine race of men, and
amount, in Drinhutty and its vicinity, to five or
six thousand, have no caste, no temples, nor
any nearer approach to them than a house of
public revelry ; but the great intercourse they
have lately had with the men of the plains is
daily introducing Hindoo distinctions ; the mark
on the forehead, abstaining from meats, &c.
being already partially adopted, but still, it is
MISSIONARIES. 105
said, without any regular instruction in Hin-
duism. The establishment of a missionary sta-
tion, and a circle of schools in that neighbour-
hood, both the Bishop and Archdeacon thought
would be a most desirable object.
While such were the plans which occupied
the Bishop's attention with regard to the
southern part of India, the letters he received
from the neighbourhood of Delhi, show that his
mind was not less anxiously engaged in seeking
information how he might best make a similar
provision, which Bishop Heber had contem-
plated, for the missionaries of the northern pro-
vinces also.
The information sent from Delhi is as follows :
At Kote-Ghur, which is situated on the hills
at the northern boundary of Sirmour, the num-
ber of inhabitants is about two hundred ; at
Rampoor, the capital of the Bussahur country,
there are about five hundred. At this place are
two annual fairs, at which the cloth, sugar, cotton,
and indigo of the plains, are exchanged for shawl-
wool, tea, and China-cloths ; to these great inul-
106 MISSIONARIES.
titudes resort from Kunawur, and the Tartar
Chinese villages beyond the snowy range, as
well as from Cashmere, and other districts, with
which a communication might be opened by the
residence of an intelligent and judicious mis-
sionary, at either of the above places, and
copies of the Scriptures eventually introduced.
The climate would be well adapted as a re-
treat for sick missionaries of the northern sta-
tions ; and the hill people, being less enslaved
by caste, would be more readily led to abandon
their present superstitions. The language, as
far as Rampoor, is Hindostanee; beyond that
town, it is Tibetian. There is an enterprizing
Hungarian gentleman now in Kunawur, pre-
paring a dictionary and grammar, which will
greatly facilitate the labours of missionaries in
acquiring the language.
The hills about Bareilly are nearer than
those of Kote-Ghur, but the approach to them
is closed for a great portion of the year by a
belt of jungle, which it is dangerous even to
natives to pass. Still many eligible situations
might here be found, and it would be desirable
to select one, where Europeans and their Hin-
MISSIONARIES. 107
dostanee camp followers have not penetrated;
for it is invariably found, that they corrupt the
simplicity of the people, and greatly add to
their prejudices. The most advantageous mode
of proceeding among these people would be,
for the wife of a resident missionary to open a
school for girls ; the parents would easily be in-
duced to send them, as there is already an
opinion gaining ground of the superiority of
girls educated in English schools, over the rest
of their countrywomen ; and when a father
parts with his daughter in marriage, he makes
a sale of her, receiving ten or twenty rupees
according to her estimated worth, and as the
bargain may be. These women, carrying with
them the principles in which they are brought up,
might be expected to have much influence in
after life. The character of the hill people is
vigorous and animated, and greatly superior to
those of the plains. They are particularly fond of
imitating European improvements ; and there can
be no doubt, that they are more prepared to lis-
ten to missionaries than those of the hills near
Bhagulpoor or the Garrow country.
Such were the opinions communicated to the
108 SCHWARTZ.
Bishop from the northern parts of the diocese.
It does not appear that there was any spe-
cific measure he had in view to recommend;
nor is it probable that he intended to do more
at present than collect such information as might
serve to guide him in his inquiries, when he
should reach those provinces on his visitation tour.
It was impossible for an ardent mind like his,
to be engaged in the superintendence of the
missionary cause in India, without feeling a
deep interest in all that relates to the name of
the venerable Schwartz, and the circumstances
under which his ministry among the natives was
blest with such extraordinary success. The
Bishop used to say at his table at Calcutta, that
he wished " a copy of the Memoirs of Schwartz
might be placed in the hands of every student
at Bishop's college, and every missionary through-
out the diocese ;" and he took the opportunity
of an official communication with Mr. Kohl h off,
of Tanjore, the same who had been missionary
there when Bishop Middleton visited the place,
to make inquiry whether any of that excellent
man's writings yet remained in the mission.
The insertion of parts of the letter which he
SCHWARTZ. 109
received in answer, besides making known the
estimation in which the writer was held by him,
may perhaps lead to the appearance in English
of more of the papers to which he alludes.
" Tanjore, May 15, 1828.
My Lord,
" I beg leave to express my deep sense of
your lordship's kindness, and of the favourable
opinion you express of me. Through the
mercy of God, I have, indeed, long experi-
enced the consolations which religion affords,
and can testify that it is, as your lordship justly
says, * a never- failing spring of comfort;' but
yet, compassed about, as I am, with many in-
firmities, * * * it is necessary for me
to make my application to the venerable com-
mittee for leave to retire from the mission.
" With respect to any papers relative to the
Rev. Mr. Schwartz, I am sorry to have to reply
to your lordship, as I have already done 'to
others before, that, though he wrote much, there
is scarcely a scrap of his writings left in the
mission. He had a great deal to do in civil
110 SCHWARTZ.
and political matters, as well as in the more in-
teresting part of missionary labour, and I can
only attribute it to the multiplicity of business
on his hands, that he kept no copies of what he
wrote. There is, however, to be found in the
missionary publications in the German language,
a great deal of Mr. Schwartz's correspondence,
particularly interesting, which has not, to my
knowledge, appeared in English print. As I
have not a competent knowledge of the Ger-
man, at my request, Mr. Sperschneider under-
took some time ago the work of selecting and
translating parts of this into English, and had
made considerable progress in his work ; but as
it required more time than he could spare from
other duties, he laid it aside. I am sure, how-
ever, that there is abundant matter in these
volumes for compiling interesting memoirs of
the revered Schwartz, and other excellent men
who were his fellow-labourers.
* * * " Your lordship's proposed
visit to the archdeaconry of Madras I was re-
joiced to hear of; as I am assured that the
same lively interest will be taken in our labours
by your lordship, as was felt by the late excel-
ORDINATION. Ill
lent Bishop Heber, whom we greatly loved arid
respected while living, and whose memory we
still hold most justly dear.
* * *
" I remain, with great respect,
" My Lord,
" Your Lordship's most obedient
" and faithful servant,
" J. C. KOHLHOFF."
Sunday, May 18th, was the day appointed by
the Bishop for holding his first ordination,
which was to take place at the cathedral ; and
he had pleasure in acceding to the general wish
that it should be at the hour of public prayer.
Two gentlemen who had been admitted to the
order of deacons by Bishop Heber, the Rev.
Charles Wimberley, M.A. of Emmanuel Col-
lege, Cambridge, one of the Company's chap-
lains, and Rev. Mr. Adlington, a missionary
of promising attainments, who had been sent
out by the Church Missionary Society, and em-
ployed as catechist at Benares, now received
priest's orders at his hands, being presented
to him by Archdeacon Corrie. It had a singu-
lar appearance, to see a Bishop engaged in the
112 WHITSUNDAY.
highest exercise of his spiritual office, the act
of ordination, and a large congregation, wrapt
in the devotional feelings which attendance at
that solemn rite of Christianity cannot fail to
inspire, while the Hindoo bearers, wearing
their turbans and cummerbands, were stationed
in different parts of the church to keep the
punkahs in motion ; for the heat was great. All
the servants of the cathedral are Hindoos.
Mahometans would not be present at the Chris-
tian worship ; and the Indo-Britons are not
employed.
The following Sunday being Whitsunday,
the Bishop preached again at the cathedral, and
afterwards assisted in the service at the commu-
nion, though he was unable to administer the
elements. Such, indeed, was his state of bodily
weakness at this time, from the heat of the cli-
mate, that he was obliged to have cushions
placed to support him in the pulpit, and actually
preached on his knees; and in that posture
delivered an eloquent and energetic discourse
on Romans iv. 5.
This day was much remembered by him, in
CALCUTTA. 113
the retirement of his closet, as the anniversary
of the day of his own consecration at Lam-
beth ; the day on which, joining his own prayers
with those of his brother bishops, he had de-
voted himself to the superintendence of the In-
dian church. Weak as he now was in body,
he was in good spirits, and looked forward to
leaving Calcutta on his visitation journey, as
the means of re-establishing his health. His
cheerfulness very rarely forsook him. He was,
indeed, always a practical admirer of that well-
known maxim which Fuller so quaintly ex-
presses, " that an ounce of mirth, with the same
degree of grace, will serve God farther than a
pound of sadnesse."*
On Friday, June 6th, he had much happiness
in officiating at the marriage of Mr. Augustus
Prinsep and Miss Ommanney, which took place
at the cathedral. The bride was given away
by the acting Govenor-general, the Hon. W. B.
Bay ley. In the evening the party at the palace
was enlivened by the musical as well as con-
versational talents of the Count De Vidoa, an
* Fuller's Worthies, llarttbrdshire. Ed. 1622.
114 CALCUTTA.
extraordinary Italian traveller, who having first
visited Egypt, and then passed through Ger-
many, Sweden, Norway, and the whole of the
north of Europe, had come through Russia to
the northern provinces of India; and was then
at Calcutta, on his way to New South Wales,
intending to proceed thence, through China to
North America, and so back to Italy.
The weather at this time continued intensely
hot ; no rain had fallen for a long time ; there
was, as the Bishop expressed it, " a sort of
dead whiteness in the atmosphere, that was
almost suffocating." The cholera morbus was
still making dreadful ravages among the native
population, and several Europeans had been
amongst its victims ; in few instances, indeed,
even at this Presidency, has the progress of this
disease been more awfully rapid than in the case
of Roger Winter, Esq. as eminent a man in
his professional character at the bar, as he was
amiable in the relations of private life; who,
after his splendid exertions in the discussion
on the stamp tax, was apparently in perfect
health on the morning of May 24th, and being
BIBLE SOCIETY. 115
seized with cholera, was a corpse at four o'clock
that evening, and before sunrise the next day
was laid in his grave ! *
A meeting of the Auxiliary British and Fo-
reign Bible Society was held at Calcutta, June
18th, when the Bishop, who was foremost in
every undertaking which had for its object the
diffusion of the knowledge of the Holy Scrip-
tures, became Patron of the society ; and, pre-
paratory to the business of the day, was pre-
sented with a complete set of the Society's
oriental versions of the Bible. In returning
his thanks, in answer to the kind address which
was made to him by the President, Mr. Udney,
in the name of the Committee, on that occasion ;
after expressing the high gratification with
which he received this testimony of the Society's
confidence and regard, and his sense of the im-
portant services which it had rendered to the
Christian cause in India, he thus concluded :
* The lamented deaths of Sir Edward West and Sir
Charles Harcourt Chambers, two out of the three Judges of
the Supreme Court at Bombay, which occurred this same
summer, marked it as peculiarly fatal to those whose duties
required of them any lengthened exertion of their mental
powers.
116 BIBLE SOCIETY.
" How, indeed, should any Christian feel
otherwise than anxious for the furtherance of
the great and noble object of this Society,
when he reflects on the history of Christianity
in the East ? When he hears that well-known
fact, which the sight of these several transla-
tions of the Bible at this moment forcibly brings
to one's recollection, namely, that amidst the
deluge of Mahometan superstition which has
swept over so many fair portions of the Asiatic
continent, and overturned so many Christian
churches that had been reared by the primitive
labourers of the Gospel ; a successful stand
has ever been made by the inhabitants of those
countries, who had once been put into posses-
sion of the holy Scriptures in their native
tongue. The Armenian church, the Syrian, the
Coptic, the Abyssinian, and our own venerable
church of Travancore at this day, bear witness
to this striking fact ; some, it is true, in a more
pure, some in a less pure form, but all in some
sort have still preserved their adherence to the
faith, and shown themselves founded on " that
spiritual rock, which is Christ." Let us hope,
in looking at these volumes, that our labours too
may so be blessed, that where we have scat-
CALCUTTA. 117
tered the seed, a similar spirit of perseverance
may be given, under the providence of God,
and that amongst these several nations, churches
may thus be founded, against which ' the gates
of hell shall not prevail/"
Mrs. James writes thus to her sister, Mrs.
Edward James, from the Bishop's palace, Cal-
cutta, June 10, 1828.
" It may seem almost
absurd to say I have been very busy in India,
where ladies absolutely do nothing, and certainly
one feels little inclination for exertion of any
kind ; but nevertheless, I have been very busy
working and drawing for a sale of fancy articles
for the benefit of the native female schools. The
supply of things which has arrived from England
being this year smaller than usual, I am anxious,
if possible, to make up the deficiency. It is
to be on the 17th, so that I have not much
time ; and we are to set out for the Upper Pro-
vinces on the 25th. I would certainly rather
take a trip to see you at Sheen, than to Delhi
and Merut; and yet I look with some plea-
sure to it, and shall be delighted to get the
118 CALCUTTA.
Bishop away from the mass of business that
daily crowds in upon him here. He is better
than he was in health, but certainly has more
on his hands than one person can or ought to do.
# # #
" There will be two pinnaces, and nine or
ten boats in company besides quite a little
fleet. Our elephant train does not begin till
after Cawnpoor. We are furnished with tents
and all camp equipage by government ; and I
believe we are to have a surgeon attached to
us, and a military escort after leaving our boats,
so that we shall be quite a large party. We
must hasten the natives in their preparations,
for they are slow, even to stupidity ; and al-
though we are to set out in less than a month,
the only thing apparently in progress is a score
of sheep now fattening for every eatable is to
be carried with us. We take our saddle-horses
and palanquins, and a light carriage. The
Commander-in-chief^ Lord Combermere, has very
kindly promised to come and meet us. We are
told to take up warm clothing for the winter,
so that I expect we shall be quite refreshed,
and we shall escape September in Calcutta,
VISIT TO A NATIVE LADY. 119
which is the most unhealthy time, after the
rains. * * *
" June 19. I must now resume my letter,
and tell you what we have done. Last Monday,
after preparing for the sale, 1 went with Mrs.
Ellerton, in the evening, to visit a native lady,
the wife of Rajah Boidonath Roy Bahadur, who
gave a munificent donation of twenty thou-
sand rupees, some time ago, to the central
school, under Mrs. Wilson's care. She and her
daughter-in-law were delighted at our visit, and
came out of their apartment to meet us. The
Ranee is a pleasing young woman of about
twenty-eight, and has good manners ; she had
learned to shake hands, and sit on a chair,
although she did not seem very comfortable in
that position, and appeared much inclined to
tuck her feet under her. Her daughter-in-law,
a modest, tall, and pretty girl of fourteen, is
betrothed to the eldest son, but not yet mar-
ried. They were both diligently employed in
learning English ; they were delighted when we
mentioned their books, and begged us to ques-
tion them in English words. They were dressed
gracefully in white muslin, edged with pink
120
VISIT TO A NATIVE LADY.
and silver, very narrow ; the girl wore it over
her head. They had a profusion of necklaces,
ear-rings, and bracelets of beautiful pearls ;
pearls, also, in the hair ; and the girl wore a
very large ring, with pearls, suspended at her
nose. Their conversation showed considerable
acquaintance with English fruits, flowers, and
animals. We sat with them nearly an hour,
and they showed us many curiosities ; amongst
others, a turtle from Penang, large enough to
carry a man on his back ; its legs were of enor-
mous thickness, and in form like those of an
elephant. When we took our leave, I pro-
mised to visit them again on my return from
the Upper Provinces next year. The Rajah
is by no means the richest of the natives in the
neighbourhood of Calcutta; he has, however,
this splendid place on the Barrackpoor road.
The house is large, and built in the style of an
Italian villa one story high. In one handsome
room, in which he receives Europeans, I was
surprized to see a grand piano-forte. He is
fond of natural history, and has a large mena-
gerie and aviary, and last year sent some valu-
able animals to England as a present to the
King.
NATIVE FEMALE SCHOOLS. 121
" On Tuesday, the meeting of the Committee
for the Native Female Schools took place in
our drawing-room ; a large number of persons,
principally ladies, were assembled, and we were
glad to have the palace filled on such an occa-
sion. The Archdeacon read the report; and
when the business of subscriptions and dona-
tions was begun, I was particularly pleased to
see the Rajah Boidonath Roy come forward,
and state that the Ranee was desirous to give a
donation, and he wished to place it in Mrs.
Wilson's name. On my saying how much
more gratified we should be, if he would allow
it to stand in the Ranee's own name on the
books, he consented, and put down her name for
two hundred rupees. I did not know at the
time, that they are scrupulous about writing or
pronouncing their wives' names. This is the
first native lady who has given her name or
support to the schools, and I certainly thought
much of it, and trust the example may be fol-
lowed by others. Several other natives came
forward immediately, and subscribed different
sums to the female schools, for the first time.
So that we have now seven or eight ; and we
may reasonably hope their deeply-rooted preju-
122 FEMALE SCHOOLS.
dices will by degrees give way, and their poor
females may learn to think of something more
than how to plait and oil their hair.
" After the business of the meeting was
over, we had a splendid sale in the large dining-
room, which was arranged the day before with
tables down the centre, and at the top of the
room, like a bazaar. The articles were in part
from England, in part made in the palace, and
in part contributed by the ladies of Calcutta.
The collection amounted to seven hundred and
eight rupees. Many natives made purchases,
and it was extremely pleasing to see their
anxiety to be introduced to Mrs. Wilson, to
whose judicious care and attention the institu-
tion of the female schools entirely owes its pre-
sent prosperity.
" I have been to see our pinnace ; it will be
comfortable, and the size and quiet of it will
remind me of dear Flitton, and how happy we
used to be there. I pray God we may be as
happy here! It makes me sigh to think how
far my letter has to go."
FEMALE SCHOOLS. 123
The report which the Archdeacon read, stated
the completion of the building of the central
school ; and the collecting of the children, who
used to assemble in twenty-nine schools, into
four, which are situated, as nearly as possible, at
equal distances from the central school. The
number of children in daily attendance at Shaum
bazaar was reported to be eighty, and at each
of the three others, thirty : making, with the
seventy at the central school, a total of two
hundred and forty. All of whom come almost
daily under Mrs. Wilson's immediate inspec-
tion. There are also four schools at Burdwan,
in which about one hundred girls assemble under
Mrs. Deerr.
It was stated also, that the expenses attending
the building and support of these establishments
must have exhausted the Committee's funds, but
for a munificent donation of one thousand
pounds from the Church Missionary Society, in
addition to five hundred pounds reported in the
preceding year, of which sum four hundred
arose from the sale of fancy articles by ladies in
England ; and a further sum had been raised in
a similar way by ladies in Bengal.
124 FEMALE SCHOOLS.
After the report was read, a subscription
was entered into in aid of the funds. The
Bishop, in addition to his own subscription,
gave one hundred pounds in the name of the
Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge ;
Chief Justice Sir Charles Grey, also, contri-
buted liberally, as did the Baboo Cassinauth
Mullick, and other native gentlemen, besides the
Rajah mentioned in the letter. In all, two
thousand sicca rupees were collected in the
room. The sale then commenced : it was a
gratifying sight to all present, and showed, that
however enervating the climate, a benevolent
object will always call forth the exertions of
British ladies; but it afforded, also, on this oc-
casion, the most pleasing demonstration to the
natives, of the superior excellence of those holy
principles of Christianity, which, if the Hindoo
female shall once imbibe them, will assuredly
elevate her alike in the scale of moral virtue and
of civil life : and the female mind thus raised, we
may surely look to more enlightened days for
India, and hail the time as approaching, when,
66 turning from their vain idols," the kingdoms of
the East shall " become the kingdoms of the Lord,
and of his Christ, for ever."
CALCUTTA. 125
The Bishop, feeling that he had, at this time,
accomplished all he had hoped to do in the first
summer at Calcutta, while he was preparing
for his journey to the Upper Provinces, wrote
the following letter to the Archbishop, stating
what he had done.
TO HIS GRACE THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF
CANTERBURY.*
" Bishop's Palace, Calcutta,
June, 1828.
" My Lord Archbishop,
" I have the honour to inform your Grace,
that I was installed in the cathedral church of
Calcutta, on the 20th day of January last ; since
which period, my time has been almost inces-
santly taken up with the various duties belong-
ing to my office.
" As the hot season was approaching, I issued
a permission to the chaplains of the three Pre-
sidencies, in certain cases, to shorten the morn-
ing service. * % The permis-
sion was only for the hot season, which in most
* This letter, though sent from Calcutta, does not appear
to have reached the late Archbishop ; these extracts, therefore,
are published from the Bishop of Calcutta's notes of what he
had written.
126 REGISTERS.
parts is during March, April, May, and perhaps
June. And I enjoined that no unauthorised
curtailment, such as had in many places been
common, should in future be made. *
* * *
" The Honourable Company having ordered
registers to be made, and quarterly returns of
all marriages, baptisms, and burials, whether by
clerical administration or other, I have ordered
that they shall all be received at the Registrar's
office of this Archdeaconry : * in the first place,
because of the great convenience such a mea-
sure affords to the public at large; next, be-
cause I think the church ought to be the main
organ of the government in such matters ; and,
thirdly, because the Bishop will thus always
have means of inspecting, and, I hope, reform-
ing, any abuse that may occur as to lay minis-
trations. I have made a representation to Go-
vernment on this latter subject ; but the cases
of absolute and undeniable necessity are very
numerous in this country.
* The Government Gazette, dated Fort William, April
3, 1828, contains a general order, in which the Governor-
general, in council, directs that the certificates of baptisms,
marriages, and burials, shall, in future, be transmitted to the
Registrar of the Archdeaconry of Calcutta, instead of the
Secretary to Government in the General Department.
PAROCHIAL DISTRICTS. 127
" Finding that Calcutta was considered as
one parish, and that much inconvenience arose
from the circumstance, that all who belong to
the Church of England, except the military,
were obliged to attend St. John's, the cathedral
church, for the administration of baptism, or
marriage, or for the burial service ; I have di-
vided the city, for ecclesiastical purposes, into
three parochial districts, the Fort making a
fourth, in order that the officiating minister of
each may have his duties better defined ; and I
trust, also, that a better connexion may thus be
established between each chaplain and those
who attend his church. The sick will now be
visited as the canon enjoins, for they will know
to whom to apply ; and a clergyman will not be
obliged to refuse baptism most uncanonically,
as heretofore, to those who bring their children
to his church on Sundays, or holidays. I have
taken care that the established custom as to the
senior chaplain, should not be interfered with.
I shall hope to make the same arrangement here-
after at Bombay and Madras.
"On the 8th of April, I administered the
rite of confirmation to four hundred and one
128 BISHOP'S COLLEGE.
persons, seven out of which number were con-
verts from Hinduism, sent from a school be-
longing to the Church Missionary Society,
then under the superintendence of the Rev. Mr.
Reichardt.
fe I am happy to make a good report of the
present state of Bishop's College. In con-
formity with the statutes of the College, I
have appointed, according to the best selec-
tion I could make, a syndicate and associate
syndics in most of the several languages of
these parts. The Principal, Dr. Mill, who, in
addition to his other valuable acquirements, is a
competent Sanskrit scholar, suggested the pro-
priety of having certain important theological
and scriptural tracts translated, first into Sans-
krit, as being thus the more easily transferable
into most of the other eastern languages. On
the 15th of May we met, and with the assist-
ance of Mr. Morton, a missionary of the So-
ciety for the Propagation of the Gospel, of
considerable learning, and of Mr. Wilson, our
associate syndic in the Sanskrit, most of the
tracts were undertaken ; some few only remain.
It has been my object to take care that simpli-
MARRIAGES. 129
city should be observed as much as possible,
and fidelity to the original.
" With regard to the subject of marriages,
on which my much lamented predecessor ad-
dressed your Grace at length, I too have some-
thing to say. No one could with more touching
accuracy, have described the evils occasioned
by the present system, or have pointed out more
forcibly than he has done, the want of a remedy.
" I have now heard, and attentively consi-
dered, all that the most acute lawyers here have
to advance upon the subject; and licences are
in the course of being issued in the same man-
ner as in England. The appointment of Sur-
rogates in certain districts, perhaps in all, will
follow ; and I hope much of the difficulty com-
plained of by Bishop Heber will admit of a
remedy being applied by me. If there be any
hazard, placed as I am here, it is my duty not to
shrink from it, but to act for the best ; the evils of
the present system calling urgently, as they do,
for a remedy, and two long years having
elapsed since my predecessor wrote : they were
K
130 MARRIAGES.
then urgent, and I ought not now to fear to
act. I believe, that originally, marriages were
solemnized on the simple permission of the Go-
vernor-general as guardian of the parties : in
1813, before the appointment of a Bishop, this
was commuted for regular licences.
" With regard to the publication of banns in re-
mote situations I can find no copy of the regula-
tions issued by Bishop Middleton, and shall there-
fore only direct my attention to the best mode under
all circumstances of preventing those evils which
the publication of banns in parish churches was in-
tended to obviate, and shall interfere only with this
object. I have commenced a correspondence with
his Excellency the Commander-in-chief upon this
matter, and shall be glad to find that my view of the
subject is confirmed by the law-officers of your
Grace's courts in England. * * *
" I have heard from Ceylon, New South
Wales, and Malacca, but have at present nothing
important to communicate respecting the church
in those places.
" I have found it my duty to recommence
VISITATION. 131
that inquiry with regard to one of the chaplains
at Bombay., which my predecessor left unfinished
on account of the absence of the chief witness,
and I shall report again to your Grace here-
after. I am sorry to say some delay has oc-
curred in this matter, but it has arisen from cir-
cumstances which I could not control.
"On the 20th, I hold my primary visitation
here, and shall then set out for the Upper Pro-
vinces. I have circulated letters of inquiry,
according to the old English practice, which,
I am quite sure, cannot but be doubly useful
here. My inquiries have chiefly had reference
to the state of the church, as the rock on which
all should be founded. I have not been neg-
lectful of the missions, which certainly require
great attention ; but I feel that I have not yet
had that experience in this country which can
assure my steps. Nothing, however, shall be
wanting on my part which can in any way tend
to the advancement of our great and holy cause.
K I remain, my Lord Archbishop,
" your Grace's most obedient
" and faithful servant,
J. T. CALCUTTA.*
K 2
132 CHURCHES.
The Bishop had so arranged his plans for
the visitation of his diocese, that he should be
able personally to inspect each part of it, in
the first five years, still making Calcutta his
principal residence ; at the end of that time, he
had reason to hope that he should have coad-
jutors in his laborious and gigantic undertaking.
With a view to informing himself, as correctly
as he could, of the means actually provided for
the public worship of God, and for the reli-
gious instruction of those who profess the doc-
trines of the Established Church, he had, with
the assistance of Mr. Abbot, his registrar,
during the summer, procured a statement of
the number of churches, or other places in which
clergymen have been licensed to officiate, and
the number of ministers appointed to each. In
the whole archdeaconry of Calcutta, which is
co-extensive with the Presidency of Bengal, he
found, that, exclusive of the city of Calcutta,
which has three churches with four ministers,
besides the cathedral with two, and Bishop's col-
lege chapel in the neighbourhood there are only
thirty- one stations, with twenty- nine licensed mi-
nisters : in seven of these only were churches then
built, at Dum Dum, Chinsurah, Dacca, Merut,
CHURCHES. 133
Futty-ghur, Benares, and Penang, and three more
were being built, at Ghazipoor, Dynapoor, and
Agra; in the remaining twenty-one stations, divine
service must still be performed, either in rooms
in private houses, or in bungalows, set apart
for the purpose. In the archdeaconry of Ma-
dras, which is the part of India where the
Christian church was earliest planted, he found,
that besides the town of Madras itself, which
has three churches, with four ministers, and
Masulipatam, which has two there are only four-
teen stations, with a chaplain appointed to each ;
in only six of these are churches already built, and
no more than one new one in progress, though
many are wanted. From the archdeaconries of
Bombay, Ceylon, and New South Wales, he
had not yet complete returns ; but the accounts
which he received from all sides, showed how
insufficient is the number of stations, as well as
of clergy, throughout the diocese, and that
though " the fields are white already to the har-
vest," "the labourers are but few."
The Bishop had always expressed his opinion
with regard to those chapels in London, and
other populous places in England, which had
been opened for divine worship, without any
,-
134 PAROCHIAL DISTRICTS.
parochial districts being assigned to them
that it was an innovation on the church, and a
departure from its constitution, which our fore-
fathers never contemplated, and which our pos-
terity will have to lament in the broken attach-
ment it will cause, unless a remedy be applied
by ourselves ; and acting upon this principle,
when he found a similar system to prevail
throughout the extensive diocese over which he
was called to preside, he set himself directly to
strengthen the establishment of the church, and
further the object for which it was first ordained^
by introducing among his clergy that pastoral
superintendence of their congregations, which
is technically called " cure of souls ;" and thus
assimilating, as much as possible, the duties of
a minister of the church in India, with those
of a parish priest in England, the weekly visitor
and friend of his people ; rather than of the
Sunday preacher unconnected with his flock.
And beginning with the division of Calcutta into
such parochial districts, he had the satisfaction
to find that the Governor-general, and the mem-
bers of the council, entirely coincided with him
in his views of the benefits that would arise.
From much that had come under his own eye
VISITATION. 135
at Calcutta, and from much that he had heard
from others at a distance, he saw reason to
lament most deeply, the frequent examples of
the neglect of the sabbath so common among
Europeans in India, all works being in full
activity on that day, and the almost total want
of that salutary influence which a due' obser-
vance of the holy day of rest might have over
the natives ; and he hoped that he might here-
after prevail in effecting some improvement in
this matter, but felt it could not be while he
.was yet but a stranger in the land.
The time had now arrived, when the Bishop
was to commence the visitation of his diocese,
and he had fixed to begin with the Presidency
of Bengal ; which alone he expected would
occupy him for eight or nine months. Notice
had been given some time before that he would
this year confirm at all the principal stations or
districts in the archdeaconry of Calcutta; and
desirous to obtain the best information he could
respecting the actual state of the diocese en-
trusted to his charge, he had, as he mentioned
in his letter to the Archbishop, previously cir-
culated questions on the following subjects, to
136
VISITATION.
be answered in writing by the chaplain at each
station ;
1. As to the extent of the district under
his care,
2. The number of churches, or other places
of Christian worship, within its limits.
3. The usual number of the congregations
who attend.
4. Whether the sick are visited ; and how
many such visits have been paid within the last
week or month ?
5. Whether the chaplain has been absent
during the last year ; and for how many days ?
6. How was his place supplied ?
7. How many schools he inspects?
8. How often he catechises the children ?
9. Whether there are any funds for charitable
purposes within the district ?
10. By whom such funds are managed?
11. How often in the year the sacrament of
the Lord's supper is administered ?
12. How the sacramental alms are appro-
priated ?
13. Whether there are trustees of the church
or bungalow ? or to whose care is it entrusted ?
VISITATION. 137
14. Whether there is any establishment al-
lowed for a clerk, ferashes, bearers, &c. ?
15. Whether there are a Bible and Prayer
Book, a surplice, plate and linen for the commu-
nion table, &c. ?
16. Whether the chaplain had any remarks
or complaints to make ?
The answers to these inquiries would have
furnished a mass of valuable information as to
the state of the church in India, if it had
pleased God that the Bishop should have lived
to finish the work he had taken in hand; but
the work was to be left to another ; his strength
was sinking under it.
Nor ought it here to be entirely concealed,
that the delicate nature of the anxiety which
had pressed most heavily upon him, was pecu-
liarly unfavourable to that mental repose neces-
sary for his recovery from the attacks of illness
with which he had been affected soon after his
arrival. That serious differences should have
arisen amongst those whom he trusted to find
united in heart, as well as in purpose, and
dwelling together as companions and brethren
K5
138 VISITATION.
in love, was, indeed, a source of painful dis-
quietude it was bitterness to his soul. Nor
would he rest till he had restored peace, and
brought them to "take sweet counsel together,
and walk in the house of God as friends." His
papers show how anxiously and unceasingly he
laboured to accomplish this end ; how he was
" in weariness and painfulness" by day, and " in
watchings often" by night, till he had suc-
ceeded ; having, " besides these things which
were without," that which also "came upon him
daily, the care of all the churches." These
unhappy differences, while they lasted, he felt
were against the sacred cause he had at heart.
It was his advice to his clergy on every
occasion it was his constant prayer for the
Indian church the very last supplication he ut-
tered in concluding his charge at Calcutta,
that unity and " peace might be within her
walls."
On Friday, the 20th of June, he held his
visitation, and delivered his charge to the clergy
at the cathedral, which was fully attended. An
able visitation sermon was preached by the
Rev. William Eales, M.A. the senior chaplain.
VISITATION. 139
The day had been fixed with the hope that the
rains would, by this time, have set in, and the
heat become less oppressive, but unfortunately
none had fallen for a long time, and the weather
was more than ordinarily sultry; the thermo-
meter on that morning being 92 in the shade.
The Bishop returned to the palace quite ex-
hausted with the heat ; and from this day may
be dated the beginning of his last illness. He
made an effort to receive his clergy at dinner
in the evening, which he was desirous to do,
having something that he wished to say to
them in private. He passed a restless night,
and was very unwell. The next morning Dr.
Nicholson pronounced the attack to be of the
same nature as those he had suffered before,
and to have been brought on by the heat and
over exertion of the preceding day, and that
he would soon recover if he could be got away
from the scene of his anxious occupations at
Calcutta, and proceed up the river on his visi-
tation journey.
At this time, the Bishop communicated to
Dr. Nicholson the fears he could not but begin
140 EMBARKATION ON THE RIVER.
to entertain, that the climate was peculiarly
hostile to his constitution ; he had enjoyed good
health in England, and found himself fully equal
to every exertion he wished to make ; but since
his arrival in India, he had undergone repeated
attacks of illness, and was much weakened by
them. Dr. Nicholson, however, seemed to
think that great benefit might be expected from
the bracing air of the river ; he saw no reason
to doubt that this attack would go off as the
others had done, and thought that the Bishop
might still enjoy good health in India, if he
could hasten immediately from Calcutta, and
commence his tour of the Upper Provinces.
Arrangements for this purpose were now
made with all possible expedition : every assist-
ance was given by his private friends every
attention paid by the government that could
facilitate the preparations ; and on the evening
of Tuesday, the 24th, the Bishop left the pa-
lace, and embarked on board his pinnace under
a salute from the Fort. The pinnace provided
for him and Mrs. James, was a six teen-oared
boat, having a good sitting-room, and bed-room,
ISHERA. 141
built on the deck, and a bath-room and servants'
offices below ; this was followed by a carriage-
boat, two horse-boats, a dhoby or washerman's
boat, and a cook-boat, making five, besides the
pinnace. Mr. Knapp, and Dr. Spens, the phy-
sician, had a pinnace between them, with two
boats for their attendants ; and Mr. and Mrs.
Augustus Prinsep, who were to accompany the
party as far as Patna, followed in another pin-
nace, with four attendants' boats also.
After some delay in getting clear of the
shipping, the little fleet rode gallantly on the
tide, and was moored for the night off Ishera,
Mr. Charles Prinsep's place, a few miles above
Chitpoor, and eight from Calcutta. The Bishop
was very unwell, though he was somewhat ex-
hilarated by the fresh air, and the novel scenery
about him. The Hooghley is here a beautiful
river; on each side are pretty villages, sur-
rounded with orchards of mangoes, cocoa-nut, and
other fruit trees ; and the ghauts, or landing-
places, are many of them splendid flights of
stone steps, leading down to the edge of the
water, with one or more picturesque temples
built on the top.
142 CHINSURAH.
A few hours sail from Ishera, brought them
to Chins urah on Wednesday at noon ; the wind
and tide failing before they reached the place,
they were amused with seeing a dozen of the
dandies jump into the water with a rope ,to tow
the boat, or push it with their hands whenever
they clumsily ran it aground, a mode of pro-
ceeding with which they became more familiar
afterwards. Chinsurah was an old Dutch co-
lony, and was known as a Christian settlement
long before the English had possession of Ben-
gal. There is a small but neat church here,,
which at Bishop Heber's request the govern-
ment placed at his disposal. It had lately
again become vacant ; and as Mr. Jackson, one
of the Company's chaplains, whom the Bishop
had just stationed there, had only arrived since
the visitation at Calcutta, and had had no time
to prepare the candidates for confirmation, the
Bishop could do no more than make inquiry
into the state of the church and the schools,
which he found satisfactory : he then proceeded
on his voyage, hoping to confirm there when he
returned to Calcutta.
As they advanced up the country, the wind-
THE HOOGHLEY. 143
ings of the river, and the mouths of its various
tributary streams, displayed much scenery that
was not devoid of interest, though the land-
scape was entirely flat. The sameness of the
clumps of tall bamboos, and plantations of
sugar-cane, was agreeably relieved by groves of
peepul-tree and palm, and all the luxuriant va-
riety of Indian foliage ; near the water side, the
natives were busily employed in gathering the
indigo and pressing it in the fields ; on the
banks were many handsome pagodas ; and they
were often reminded, as they passed, of the su-
perstitious veneration in which the sacred stream
is held. The Hooghley is considered by the
Hindoos, who call it " the Gunga," to be the ori-
ginal channel of the Ganges, and therefore the
most holy for the purposes of ablution and bu-
rial. On more than one of the large sandbanks
thrown up by the river, the party observed
human skulls and bones whitening in the sun ;
and in oue place, a crowd of vultures eagerly
at work, with an adjutant waiting at a distance
for his share of the feast, showed that a more
recent prey had been washed ashore, and was
lying at the edge of the jungle-grass.
144 PLASSEY.
The Hooghley is formed by the union of the
Cossimbazar and the Jellinghy rivers, the two
most western branches of the Ganges ; the for-
mer is usually the best for navigation, and up
that channel the course lay to Burhampoor,
which was the next station to be visited.
As they approached the town of Plassey, a
large drove of cattle crossed their track ; they
were the property of the neighbouring Zemin-
dar, and were swimming across the river to
other pasturage : they were small cows, or buf-
faloes, with a hump on the back, and the num-
ber of heads and horns appearing above the
water, had a singular effect. The Bishop,
though weak, was in good spirits, and often
left his books to come out on deck, taking an
interest in every place they passed. He re-
marked that it was near this spot, the celebrated
battle was fought in 1757, which decided the
fate of Bengal, and ultimately of India ; when
Colonel Clive, with about a thousand Euro-
peans and two thousand sepoys, entirely de-
feated the army of the Suraje ud Dowlah,
which was estimated at more than fifty thousand
men.
BURHAMPOOR. 145
On the second of July, they reached Bur-
hampoor, a military station, with a modern town
rising up around it, and beginning to afford a
mart for the silk goods, and beautiful works of
carved ivory, which are manufactured at the
neighbouring town of Cossimbazar. Here they
were kindly received by Mr. Smelt, the col-
lector, whose brother was an intimate friend
of the Bishop at Oxford, and who now paid
him every attention his weak state of health
required. He was, at this time, attacked with
a violent pain in the right side, for which leeches
were abundantly applied, and produced consi-
derable relief, Dr. Spens and the medical gen-
tleman of Burhampoor, not seeming to ap-
prehend that it would return. The pain
left him, however, much debilitated, and very
unwell.
Unfortunately, too, he was here greatly dis-
tressed by letters from Calcutta, which awaited
his arrival ; by these he learnt that the matters
which he had so anxiously endeavoured to com-
pose, again called for his interference, and that
his exertions to conciliate had been rendered
ineffectual ; the train of evils that he foresaw
146 BURHAMPOOR.
would arise from this, and the injury it would be
to the Christian cause., made his heart heavy in-
deed, and brought new affliction to the bed of
sickness.
On the tenth, with great exertion he dressed
himself, and administered the rite of confirma-
tion to several young persons in Mr. Smelt's
drawing-room, there being no church at present
at Burhampoor, though it is a large station,
both civil and military. Service, however, is re-
gularly performed by Mr. Hammond, the Com-
pany's chaplain stationed there, in the mess-
room at the barracks, or in a bungalow. In
the evening of the same day, the Bishop was
carried in a tonjon, or sort of open sedan, here
much used instead of palanquins, to the water-
side, and, returning on board the pinnace,
seemed to enjoy the fresh air on the river. Be-
fore leaving Mr. Smelt's house, he wrote to
congratulate Lord William Bentinck, the new
Governor-general, intelligence of whose landing
at Calcutta he had just received. An earth-
quake occurred one night while the party re-
mained at Burhampoor, which awoke and
alarmed all the inhabitants ; so severe was the
MOORSHEDABAD. 147
shock, as to make a small crack in Mr. Smelt's
house, and a considerable one in the wall of the
hospital, which is two stories high.
Proceeding on their voyage early the next
day, they passed through the old city of Moorshe-
dabad, which extends several miles on both sides
the river, and is inhabited by native, as Burham-
poor is by European, population. There was
something disappointing in the appearance of this
former capital of Bengal, and honoured residence
of the Nawab. The court was removed to this
city from Dacca in 1704, by Jaffier Khan, and
it continued to be the capital until the conquest
of Bengal by the British, in the middle of the
last century; when Calcutta, on account of the
superior mercantile advantages of its situation,
began to arise gradually from its marshy jungles,
till it now vies in splendour with the most
magnificent cities of the world. The Nawab
still has his court here, and a fine palace is now
being built for him, but his present residence
is mean and shabby. He still goes, however,
occasionally in great state to pay his visits at
Burhampoor, scattering rupees among the crowds
that gather round his elephant.
1.2
148 JUNGEYPOOR.
July 12th, they reached Jungeypoor, and
spent the day at the house of the Hon. Mr.
Ramsey, the resident. Some of the party went
to see the Company's silk works, which have
been for many years under his superintendence.
This is the largest silk station the Company
have, and many thousands of persons are em-
ployed. The country-people feed their own
worms, which are managed by women and chil-
dren, and the cocoons purchased for govern-
ment. In this climate they reckon on gathering
four crops of mulberry-leaves from the same
field in each year, the best in December. The
silk is all sent to be wove at Moorshedabad.
Mr. Ramsay presented the ladies with speci-
mens of the coarse, but strong silk, from the
jungle or wild silk- worm, of which great quanti-
ties are here produced. The jungle- worm feeds
from other leaves besides those of the mulberry.
The Bishop was unable to visit the works,
though he said he felt better this day, and was
nearly free from pain: his spirits were good,
and he talked with cheerfulness of their near
approach to the Rajmahal hills, and of the field
of usefulness which would lie before him when
he should reach the Upper Provinces.
VISITATION PLAN. 149
It does not appear that at this time he
entertained any serious apprehension about his
own health; the pain which he had suffered
at Burhampoor had now left him, the weather
was becoming cooler, and he felt it favourable
to the recovery of his strength ; he looked for-
ward to being able to resume his duties, and he
pursued his journey still "in hope and not in
fear," as he often expressed to her in whose
affectionate confidence every feeling of his heart
reposed.
There was a full month before he was to
reach Patna, where he had given notice that it
was his intention to visit the clergy, and hold a
confirmation on August the 16th. While there he
had hoped to consecrate the new church which
Bishop Heber recommended should be built at
Dynapoor, and proceeding thence, after visiting
Chuprah, and other European stations in the
neighbourhood, to consecrate also the new church,
at Ghazipoor : by the end of August, he pro-
posed to reach Benares, where there is a church ;
and he had the pleasure to hear from Mr. Proby,
the chaplain, that several candidates were de-
150 VISITATION PLAN.
sirous of the Christian rite of confirmation in
the midst of that far-famed seat of Brahminical
learning and Buddhist superstition, which is,
as it were, the Mecca of the Hindoo pilgrims,
and is esteemed so holy above all other places,
that they call it, " the Lotus of the world," and
many of the wealthier Rajahs, in distant parts
of Hindostan, keep vakeels, or delegates, re-
siding there, to perform, for their benefit, the
required sacrifices at the Vishvayesa temple,
and the expiatory ablutions in the sacred stream
on which the city stands.
Early in September he was to visit Allahabad,
and leaving the Ganges, either there or at
Cawnpoor, as the state of the river and other
circumstances might determine, he intended
to travel by land from thence, and to visit
Lucknow in his way to consecrate the new
church at Futteghur, and then to proceed to the
stations at Bareilly and Delhi. From thence
he had made his plan to come down the river
Jumna to Agra, where the pleasing duty
awaited him to consecrate another church, or at
least the ground for burial, if the church were
AGRA. 151
not finished.* From Agra he was to reach
Kalpy in the beginning of December, and, pro-
ceeding from Benares, or from Patna, was to
spend the Christmas with Mr. and Mrs. Au-
gustus Prinsep, at Sheergautty, Mr. Prinsep
having been appointed Zillah Judge in that
* The foundation-stone of the church of St. George, at
Agra, had been laid on April 23rd, (the king's birth-day,) 1828.
The Bishop was to have laid it, but the time did not coincide
with his visitation journey ; and he was desirous there should be
no delay, hoping, if possible, when he visited Agra in November,
to consecrate and open the church. A silver trowel had been
presented to him at Calcutta on the occasion, and with it a
copy of the following inscription, by Rev. Dr. Parish, the
chaplain, which was placed on the stone.
In nomine individuae Trinitatis :
Anno ix Georgii quarti D. G. Britt. Keg. F. D,
Quum rebus societatis Anglicanae
Apud Jndos mercaturam facientis
Civilibus prseesset
Vir honorabilis Gulielmus B. Bay ley,
Militaribusque
Dux ille fortissimus ac nobilissimus
Stapleton Combermerensis,
Bharatpur devicta
Et ubique felix ;
Anno I. Johannis Thomae,
Tertii sedis Calcuttensis Episcopi ;
Jacta sunt fundamenta
Sumptibus Societatis, &c.
Faxit Deus ut hocce opus ad uberrimos Evangelii
Fructus redundet !
152 RAJMAHAL.
district ; and returning to Calcutta early in Ja-
nuary, the Bishop hoped to visit Dacca and
Chittagong from thence, before the hot season
again commenced. Such were the plans he
had made before he set out on his visitation
journey ; and on these his mind dwelt with cheer-
ful anticipations of doing good, under the most
discouraging circumstances of illness and of pain.
On the party returning to their pinnaces, and
leaving Jungeypoor, about an hour's sail, with
a fair wind, brought them, before it was dark,
to the destined place of anchorage for the night,
near the town of Sooty; and on Monday, at
noon, the little flotilla entered the main stream
of the noble and majestic Ganges, which is
here near five miles broad, though above five
hundred miles from its mouth. The blue out-
line of the Rajmahal hills, now rose in sight in
the distance, and was refreshing to the eyes of
all the party, being the first rising ground they
had seen since their arrival in India. The
country was well wooded, and on the nearest
shore, besides the usual indigo and paddy-
grounds, the people of the neighbouring vil-
lages were seen busy with their crops of wheat
RAJMAHAL. 153
and Indian corn. A violent, but passing storm
of rain, which fell at the time, added the va-
rieties of light and shade to increase the beauty
and interest of the scene. When the air was
cooled by the rain, the Bishop was carried in a
chair on deck, and enjoyed the prospect of the
long-talked-of hills. These hills, which appear
to be of the primitive or granitic formation,
have for ages opposed an effectual barrier to
the encroachments of the river, which has so
greatly changed its course through the plains of
Bengal. It is stated by Mr. Hamilton,* that the
quantity of land which the action of the mighty
stream has destroyed within a few years, be-
tween Sooty and Colgong, in Bahar, a distance
less than a hundred miles, will amount, on a
moderate calculation, to forty square miles, or
twenty-five thousand square acres. But then
fresh alluvions have been formed in other places,
and the new island of Sundeep alone, is said to
contain more than ten square miles.
They passed this day several large Hindoo
villages, and the bank opposite the ancient
town of Rajmahal was chosen as the place of
* Hamilton's Hindostan, vol. i. p. 11.
154 BHAGULPOOR.
anchoring for that night. The servants were
here alarmed at a report that there were tigers
in the jungle-grass close by, which was of the
extraordinary height of nine or ten feet, and
topped with a beautiful white down, like swans'
feathers; but no tigers were seen or heard.
Their fears probably arose in some measure
from a little disappointment at not having the
town, with one of their favourite bazaars, to go
to. But it was found preferable now to fasten
the boats to a good bank every night ; and the
servants and dandies going on shore to cook
their rice, currie, and ghee, formed themselves
into picturesque groups, around their little fires,
according to their different castes.
About noon, on July the 16th, they reached
Bhagulpoor, or Boglipoor, in the province of
Bahar. The Bishop was this day so ill, that he
could not land till the evening; he was then
with difficulty moved on shore to the house of
Mr. Nesbit, the magistrate, where he was most
kindly received. Mrs. Nesbit had long known
Mrs. James's family in England, and was, indeed,
felt by her as a friend, under the dreadful
fears which now began to agitate her mind.
BHAGULPOOR. 155
The pain in the side had increased to such
alarming violence as to excite the worst appre-
hensions, if it should not be subdued. The
medical treatment was prompt and vigorous;
profuse bleeding with leeches, and ten grains
of calomel, given seven times in twenty-four
hours. Dr. Spens, with Mr. Innis, the surgeon
of Bhagulpoor, urged an immediate return to
Calcutta, in order that Dr. Nicholson's decision
might be had upon the necessity of taking mea-
sures for the Bishop going out to sea, with as
little delay as possible. It was determined to
return, and no time was to be lost ; but it was
not till the 23rd, that the acute pain was so far
alleviated, that it was thought prudent to re-
move the patient from Mr. Nesbit's house to the
pinnace.
The following letter, sent from Bhagulpoor,
was begun by Mrs. James soon after leaving
Jungeypoor, as the date shows :
" From the Jane Pinnace,
"JulyU, 1828.
" Here we are, sailing along briskly on the
Hooghley, which in this part is called the Sooty
156 LETTER PROM
or Moorshedabad river, with a delightful breeze,
which we hope will carry us into the great
Ganges before night. This is the first day,
however, that I can say we have really enjoyed
it. Before this reaches you, I trust you will
have received a letter from Elizabeth, in which
I requested her to say how unable I had been
to write since we left Calcutta; it is painful,
indeed, to send dismal letters to so great a
distance, if it can be avoided. My dearest
husband was ill when he came on board our
pinnace at Calcutta, on the 24th of June, having
been over-fatigued on the 20th, the day of his
first visitation: the weather was particularly
hot,* and the duties of the day were too much
for him. I was truly glad to get him away
from the constant fatigue of business at home,
* How trying to the constitution the heat of this summer
must have been to Europeans in India, may be seen from the
following extract from a letter addressed to the Bishop at
Bhagulpoor, by a gentleman, who was travelling in the neigh-
bourhood of Delhi, at the end of the month of June :
" We have suffered greatly from the excessive heat since
we left the hills. At Kurnal it was impossible to stir out of
doors, and the earth and the air burnt almost as a furnace.
The thermometer, to-day, stands at 106 in the shade, and
136 in the sun. It is grievously oppressive. The wind
blowing fiercely, and clouds of heated dust passing over us ;
but no rain comes to our relief* r The drought often reminds
BHAGULPOOR. 157
which was wearing out his strength; and to
move him,, with Dr. Nicholson's leave,, quietly
into his pinnace. From that time till our
leaving Burhampoor on the 10th instant, he con-
tinued very ill; the physicians would not call
it a decided liver complaint, although his liver
was certainly affected,, and the pain in his side
so violent, as to oblige us to have recourse to
strong remedies, the debilitating effects of which
I greatly dread. I thank God, he is now quite
free from pain of any kind, and though very thin,
pale, and weak, is certainly gaining strength,
and has begun to take quinine. The least ex-
posure to the glare of the sun, even in a car-
riage or palanquin, has always brought on
faintness, and disordered his whole system, ever
since he has been in this country ; he has in-
variably guarded against such exposure as much
as has been possible, with the duties he has had
to fulfil, and still I am alarmed when I think
how often his illness has returned. Nicholson,
however, (whose opinion is considered the first
me of the words of Scripture, 'I will command the clouds
that they rain no rain upon the earth ;' and most applicable
are they to this land. When a shower does fall, the alumi-
nous smell that first reaches you, is like that of heated bricks
quenched in water."
158 LETTER FROM
in India,) says, that he may not be troubled
with any more returns of it ; and that he does
not at present see that it is of any decided
consequence ; we must therefore hope for the
best. The hot weather is now over, and I must
own, that I look forward with great comfort
to the purer and more refreshing air of the
Upper Provinces, and to the approaching cold
weather : these, I trust, may be of infinite use.
I have an eager wish that he should remain on
the hills, if possible, during the whole of the
next hot season, and march down again in the
rains ; but, I fear, this is by no means certain.
I think it of material consequence, but you will
hear how it is settled in good time.
* " I had left off writing for
a few minutes, to eat some mangoes, which are
certainly the most delicious of fruits ; and had
just come to the sixth and last, when I found
we were entering the mighty Ganges in a squall
of rain, which made the distance across it
appear still greater ; it is, indeed, a noble ex-
panse of water ; and I hear, that as we ad-
vance, and the river becomes fuller, when more
rain has fallen, we shall hardly be able to see
-,
BHAGULPOOR. 159
the opposite banks. The serang has just put
his head in, to tell us of his great skill in having
brought us to the *" Burra Dheria,'* for which
he has received a present of a few rupees, and
the next thing to be done, is to wash the head
of the pinnace in the Ganges' water ! After
all this, I hope she will not fail to carry us on
in safety. We have now very pleasant wea-
ther, two heavy showers usually in the course of
the day, and now and then comes quite a pour-
ing day ; it is hot only for a short time before
the rain falls, which is fortunate for us, as we
are only able to have a hand-punkah in our
cabin. We are rather crowded, it is true, as
I could not bear that little Freddy and his
nurse should be in another boat than our own,
so that his cot stands in one corner of our
sitting-room ; it is, however, a very commo-
dious boat ; we have a good sized back cabin,
in which we sleep, and a room adjoining, with
a cold bath and shower bath ; there is, also, a
room for the servants in front of our sitting-
roorn. We really find ourselves very comfort-
able and snug, and I enjoy our being quietly
together again of all things, it puts me so much
* Great Sea.
160 BHAGULPOOR.
in mind of Flitton. Mr. Knapp, and Dr. Spens,
the physician, who is appointed by government
to accompany us, have a similar pinnace be-
tween them of a smaller size ; and the Prinseps
are in a very pretty one belonging to his bro-
ther ; we enjoy meeting in our cabin of an
evening soon after sunset, when we come to
anchor, which is usually about seven o'clock :
the dandies are proverbially timid, and they
always take care to fasten the pinnace to the
shore under the snuggest bank they can find.
" We have just now come in sight of the
first rising ground we have seen in Bengal, the
Rajmahal hills ; they are not very high, but
we see them plainly in the distance. Our next
station is Bhagulpoor, and you will be interested
to hear that we are going to the house of Mr.
and Mrs. Nesbit, our old friends : it will really
give me great pleasure to see her again ; she
wrote most kindly to me at Calcutta, saying,
she hoped we should take up our quarters with
them during our stay. There is, I believe, nei-
ther church nor chaplain at Bhagulpoor, although
it is a large station. Mr. Knapp will preach there
on Sunday. The Bishop must not attempt it.
BHAGULPOOR. 16 L
" We are sorry we had left Calcutta before
Lord William Bentinck's arrival, of which we
heard by the same conveyance which brought
us a packet of delightful letters from England,
at Burhampoor; they were, indeed, a cordial
to the Bishop on his sick bed. We were
amused with the account of your looking at
our pictures at Somerset House ; though I am
sorry to think we were not placed nearer to
each other. Bishop Heber's Journal fortunately
reached us before we set out from Calcutta, and
you may imagine with what interest we have
been reading it.
*****
" My little Freddy is now looking better than
at any time since we have been in India ; he
does not attempt to speak yet, but perfectly
understands what is said to him both in Hin-
dostannee and English ; and I fear, notwith-
standing all my care, he will pick up the former
the quickest of the two*. I have had some
trouble, as every one has, who has occasion to
deal with the tribe of ayahs,* but he is pretty
well off now. You will be surprised to hear that
* Nurses.
M
162 LETTER FROM
I have ventured to engage another European
woman, the third I have had : she was strongly
recommended; and when I tell you, that she
is the daughter of a soldier, born on her mo-
ther's passage out, is at this time only twenty,
and has been twice married to soldiers, to the
first at twelve years of age, that she is now
a widow with one child, and has spent three
years in England since 1821 you have her
history. She has been a great comfort to me
during this sad illness of the Bishop's ; his own
native servants, the kitmutgars, and the bearers,
whom he is obliged to take, are but of little
use.
" We have bought for our land journey a
very pretty, light, palanquin carriage, which
holds four people ; we have our carriage-horses,
and saddle-horses, and one palanquin; and
when my dear husband recovers his strength,
and enjoys himself as he used to do, it will be
delightful indeed. I do not at all dislike India,
but I own I have my fears that it will never
suit him, and he shall never, if I can help it,
remain here to sacrifice his health ; indeed, I
BHAGULPOOR. 163
trust he will be as fully prepared to resign the
bishoprick, should it become necessary, and will
make it as much a point of duty to do so, as
he did to accept it."
" Bhagulpoor, July 20th. We arrived here
on Wednesday last, the 16th, and were most
kindly and hospitably received by Mr. and
Mrs. Nesbit; but I grieve to say, I have only
bad news to add to my letter. This is
reckoned the most healthy and delightful station
on this side of India ; and I had promised
myself much benefit to my dear husband from
our visit to it, but God has willed it other-
wise. The pain in his side has returned : he
has been much worse, and I cannot describe
the alarm I have suffered. He has certainly
two clever men to attend him, but the complaint
is, as they say, very obstinate it is now pro-
nounced to be decidedly a liver case, and the
sea is strongly recommended. We shall there-
fore return immediately to Calcutta, as soon as
he can be put on board the pinnace. I am
most anxious for Nicholson's opinion. As soon
as the season is fit, we shall probably be sent
to sea. This I am persuaded, that he never
M2
164 BHAGULPOOR.
can enjoy health in this climate ; he might make
his visitation to Penang, or new South Wales,
or even Bombay, which might restore him, and
give time, which he thinks it will be right to
consider, for his successor to come out before
he returns to England. Our trust is in the
mercy of Him, in whose hands are the issues
of life and death, that the intermediate time
may be passed in a manner neither injurious
to my poor husband's constitution nor to the
interests of the great cause in which his heart
is embarked. He now finds it is impossible
that he should remain here and fulfil his duties,
and this it is which makes him think of re-
signing. It is, indeed, with great regret, that
he speaks of abandoning all that he is now so
deeply engaged in, just as he begins to feel
that he really is doing much good, and that
all his plans are succeeding exactly as he had
wished. He will write soon to the Bishop of
London.* He is extremely anxious about his
successor, that he should be appointed without
* This letter, together with another written in March,
were kindly communicated to the Editor by his Grace the
Archbishop of Canterbury, at that time Bishop of London ;
but they were of a nature altogether confidential, and there-
BHAGULPOOR. 165
delay, so as to arrive, if possible, before we
leave India. Our destination now seems so
uncertain that I know not where your next
letters may reach us ; but wherever we may be,
I will write as often as I can find oppor-
tunity. If we return to England, as I pray
to God we may, we shall come with empty
pockets, but with grateful hearts."
While lying on his sick couch at Bhagulpoor,
the Bishop's attention was occupied with in-
quiring about the impression made among the
hill people of the neighbourhood, by the mis-
sionary labours of Mr. Christian, who had fallen
a sacrifice to the climate but a few months
before ; and whose death has destroyed the
fair hopes to which his friendly and successful
intercourse with the natives for three years,
had begun to give rise.* He was too ill, how-
ever, at this time, to commit any thing to
fore not proper to be published ; as was also a letter written
by the Bishop of Calcutta, at an earlier date, to the Bishop
of Durham.
* An interesting extract from Mr. Christian's journal may
be seen in the Report for 1828, of the Society for the Pro-
pagation of the Gospel, p. 180.
166 RETURN TO
writing. Within sight of the room he occupied
in Mr. Nesbit's house, stood the Hindoo mut,
erected by the Puharrees to the memory of
Mr. Cleveland a monument, at once recording
the popularity that amiable man had acquired,,
and the grateful feelings the native population
were eager to evince for the kind consideration
with which he had treated them. Several days
now passed before the medical gentlemen thought
it safe to advise removal, and it was not till Wed-
nesday, July 23rd, that, taking leave of their
kind host and hostess, the Bishop and Mrs.
James returned to their pinnace, and began to
retrace their voyage to Calcutta. Mr. and Mrs.
Augustus Prinsep had been obliged to take
leave of them at Bhagulpoor, in order to pro-
ceed up the river to Patna, on their way to
Sheergautty.
July 29th, was the first day that the Bishop
seemed to regain a little strength ; he was now
nearly free from pain ; a little nourishment was
allowed, and he was carried every morning into
the next cabin. Unfortunately they had lost
a whole day, since passing Moorshedabad, be-
ing obliged to lie to, in consequence of some
CALCUTTA. 167
of the cook-boats being missing : the serang
reported that they were lost during the night, and
there was reason to fear that some sad accident
had happened. At last, however, after having
the satisfaction to ascertain that their servants
were all safe, and that the alarm had been
caused only by their not being able to keep up,
the Bishop and Mrs. James left the dhoby's and
the other boats to proceed more leisurely, and
determined to make every effort with their own
pinnace to reach Calcutta before the sitting of the
council should be over for that week. But this
was a matter of some difficulty. They had still
a great distance to go ; and the wind was di-
rectly contrary, so that all use of the sails was
necessarily given up ; but the rate of the current
was nearly four miles an hour, and by the dan-
dies making extraordinary exertions, and rowing
incessantly for two days and two nights, they suc-
ceeded in reaching the Chandpaul Ghaut at Cal-
cutta, on Thursday the 31st, a council day, just in
time to send in a letter to the government be-
fore the council broke up, which would not meet
again till the following week.
The Bishop was now something better, though
168 CHANDPAUL GHAUT.
still so weak as not to be able to go ashore,
nor equal to the exertion of putting on his
clothes. The Governor-general and Lady Wil-
liam Bentinck most kindly sent immediately to
offer the use of the government-house, which
was much nearer the river than the Bishop's
palace, in case it should be found advisable to
move him on shore. But as soon as Dr.
Nicholson came on board, he gave it as his
decided opinion that it was best he should not
be moved from his pinnace ; that no time was
to be lost in getting him out to sea ; and that
Penang was the destination he should most re-
commend for the present, until there should be
strength to bear the voyage to England ; for
that he ought not, on any account, to think of
remaining in India, a decided enlargement of
the liver having taken place, though it appeared
to have been giving way to prompt and skilful
treatment.
Upon hearing this opinion, the Bishop felt it
a point of duty immediately to take such mea-
sures as should lead to the appointment of his
successor ; he dictated a letter to the Right
Honourable the President of the Board of Con-
CALCUTTA. 169
trol, tendering his resignation of the Bishop-
rick of Calcutta after a certain date, but ex-
pressing a hope that he might still be able to
superintend the duties of the diocese from
Penang or Bombay, until his successor should
have time to arrive from England. Having
taken this step, which was a great relief to his
mind, he received visits in his pinnace from Sir
Charles Grey, and a few other friends, and
also from his valued substitute in duty, Arch-
deacon Corrie, with whom he entered into the
details of much that had occurred during his
absence ; and repeating most earnestly his for-
mer advice, gave the best directions he could,
under the unfortunate circumstances, the intel-
ligence of which had so greatly distressed him
on his sick bed at Burhampoor. Meanwhile
Mr. and Mrs. William Prinsep lent their kind
assistance to Mrs. James, in making the best
arrangements the urgency of the case would
allow, for finally leaving the palace.
It was at first proposed that the government
yacth should take the Bishop to Penang, and
orders were given to prepare her for sea im-
mediately. But it was afterwards thought more
170 SAUGOR ROADS.
advisable that he should have a passage in the
Honourable Company's ship, Marquis Huntly,
Captain Fraser, which was then lying in Sau-
gor Roads,, and ready to proceed direct to that
island, on her voyage to China.
On Wednesday, the 6th of August, he left
the Chandpaul Ghaut, and proceeding down
the river from Calcutta, reached Fultah, twenty-
five miles, that evening; Dr. Spens accom-
panying in the pinnace. For the last two days
distressing sinkings and faintings had come on,
but he now repeatedly assured Mrs. James that
he felt himself better as he approached the sea,
and talked, with his usual cheerfulness, of the
excellent arrangements she had made for his
comfort.
The weather being calm, they were fortu-
nately able to go down the whole way to the
ship in the pinnace. On the evening of Sa-
turday, the 9th of August, they reached the
Marquis Huntly, lying at the new anchorage
below Diamond Harbour, when every thing was
extremely well managed by Captain Fraser for
putting the Bishop on board. A cot was
AT SEA. 171
lowered, in which his mattress was placed, and
he was swung easily up the side of the vessel,
and was soon comfortably placed on a sofa
in the cabin. He was much pleased with the
way in which it was done; his spirits were
raised by finding himself at sea ; he was free from
pain ; he thought that he was certainly better,
and for some days the hopes of all around him
were raised ; but the shivering fits which shortly
came on, followed by violent perspirations for
three successive evenings, and the increase of
distressing hiccups, had convinced Dr. Spens,
as well as Mr. Stirling, the skilful surgeon who
now attended him, that he was really getting
worse ; and Mr. Stirling, a few days afterwards,
kindly felt it to be a point of duty no longer
to conceal from Mrs. James, that the symptoms,
most to be dreaded, were beginning to appear,
and that hope was nearly at an end.
None but those who have themselves felt the
anguish of watching the close approach of the
severest of all the trials to which our fallen
nature is liable, can imagine, either what her
feelings were on hearing this, or how great the
exertions she made to smother them when she
172 AT SEA.
found that it was still necessary for his good
that she should do so. Having sought where
to weep, and to commune with God, she re-
turned to the bedside, from which it was now
become doubly painful to her to be absent for a
single moment.
On Sunday, the 1 7th, after she had read to
him, amongst other scriptures, the eighteenth
chapter of St. Matthew, he remained collected
long enough to give utterance to a beautiful
train of reflections on the ministration of spirits
in the immediate presence of God, into which
his thoughts fell on her pausing at the tenth
verse, where our Saviour, speaking of children,
says, u I say unto you, that in heaven their
angels do always behold the face of my Father
which is in heaven."
On the following Thursday, a great altera-
tion for the worse had taken place, though
he still thought himself better, and his mind,
when free from delirium, was cheerful as it
had always been, and full of hopes of recovery.
It now became evident, however, that the
most alarming symptoms were rapidly gaining
AT SEA. 173
ground; that human skill could do no more,, and
that his end was fast approaching. Mrs. James
seeing this, made up her mind, with the fortitude
which became her, to the trying task of commu-
nicating to him the awful truth. Great, indeed,
was her agony in this afflicting hour ; but God
was merciful, and granted to her prayers that
help which is never sought in vain, by them
that have learned to seek it right ; her sobs were
suppressed for the sake of him whose slumbers
she was watching : sad and wan as he looked,
she knew it was but sleep : she felt it would be
wrong in her to let him wake and find her
weeping ; and besides, whenever he opened
his eyes, and looked on her, it was always with
a smile, and the expression of an affectionate
fear lest she should be tired with fanning away
the flies and musquitos.
It had been his delight, that she should re-
gularly read to him some portion of the Scrip-
tures every morning, since illness had rendered
him incapable of reading for himself; and on
this occasion she made a selection of passages
from the Book of Psalms to lead to the com-
munication it was her painful duty to make.
174 LAST ILLNESS.
Knowing, as she did, every thought of his heart,
how little he imagined that his death was so
near, and at the same time, how calmly and
resignedly he would hear it, she disclosed to
him the delusiveness of his hopes, and the
reality of his situation. The way in which he
received this unexpected intelligence exemplified
strikingly the virtues of resignation and pious
submission to the will of God, and gave a
practical proof, far beyond any that words could
give, how prepared he was to die. After a
momentary pause, he thanked her most warmly,
and said, K If it is so, my hope and my firm
faith is in Jesus Christ !" He was then silent,
and soon fell into a quiet sleep; on awaking,
he again expressed, in the most tender manner,
his thankfulness for the unreserved communica-
tion which she had made to him. He after-
wards fixed that they should receive the holy
sacrament together the next morning; and at
intervals, in the course of that afternoon, calmly
gave directions about his papers ; and having
instructed Mr. Knapp to add a few lines, which
he dictated, to a document relating to the
Bishop's college at Calcutta, (which was now
his latest, as, on his arrival, it had been his
AT SEA. 175
earliest care !) with great effort he held the pen,
while his hand was guided to make his signature
to it; and having done that, he said, " Now
every thing is off my mind ! "
The next morning he received the sacrament
with Mrs. James, at the hands of Mr. Knapp.
During the administration of the holy rite, he
was quite collected, and afterwards showed the
subject on which his thoughts were dwelling, by
making many Christian reflections on the state
of the soul, as strength remained for utterance,
which was now only in a low whisper. He ex-
pressed, also, his confident hope, that as he
had given up his prospects in England, his
health, and his life, for the sake of the church,
something would be done for his widowed wife,
and his fatherless children.
As evening came on, it was evident his
strength was sinking, and that the hour which
was to close his useful and active life was now
drawing near. The pulse, though at 170, could
hardly be felt to beat. The feet became cold,
and the eyes dull, the hands refused any longer
176 REFLECTIONS.
to answer the grasp of affection he sunk into
a dose, and at nine o'clock quietly breathed his
last.
Thus he departed, in the forty-third year of
his age, and the second of his consecration, to
the great loss of the Indian church, for the go-
vernment of which, in all the various situations
of difficulty into which its prelates must be
thrown, his previous habits, as well as his na-
tural endowments, had fitted him in an eminent
degree. His mind was by nature quick and
vigorous ; and to the acquirements of a scholar,
and a highly-cultivated taste in the fine arts,
he had added a large stock of general infor-
mation, the result, not only of private study,
but of much travel in foreign countries, and
acute observation of human nature. Such ac-
complishments, united with sound judgment,
most conciliating manners, and the more ster-
ling recommendations of real Christian bene-
volence, and a warm and generous heart, rea-
dily won for him the esteem and regard of all
who knew him, and made him the chosen ad-
viser, not of his family only, but his friends.
REFLECTIONS. 177
Above all, he possessed a deep vein of sincere
and genuine piety, diffusing an amiable cheerful-
ness over his temper, and showing its influence on
his whole conduct and habits, as his guide in the
daily concerns of life. Hence sprung an impera-
tive sense of duty which rose superior to all con-
siderations of self in those trying emergencies
of life, which are sent to prove what is in the
heart of man. To the Church of England he
was firmly attached, because he considered it as
exhibiting, not merely the best, but, as he often
said, the only true scriptural form of Chris-
tianity ; though, in some things, he lamented
the decay of her discipline, and was desirous to
model his own diocese, by adhering as strictly
as possible to the spirit of her constitution.
In the pulpit, he was an impressive and per-
suasive reasoner; in private exhortation, the
less popular, but not less useful walk of minis-
terial duty, he was happy in his gentle way
of applying the test of Scripture to the con-
science of his hearer, and in so doing, always
making himself felt as a kind friend, and not a
harsh reprover. Mild, frank, and open in his
disposition winning in his address prompt in
N
178 REFLECTIONS.
decision, and, possessing a peculiar tact in all
nice and difficult situations, he had qualifica-
tions which, as they fitted him in an eminent
degree for the high office he was called to fill
in the church, so, if it had pleased God that
he should have lived to complete the career which
he had so well begun, they would have placed
his earthly name among those who shall be
recorded to future ages in the ecclesiastical his-
tory of India, as having prepared and led the
way to the " turning of many unto righteous-
ness."
He was always of a contemplative and philo-
sophical turn ; and how tranquilly, how familiarly,
he had accustomed his thoughts to dwell upon
the approach of death may be seen from the fol-
lowing reflections, found in his pocket-book, and
evidently written before he went to India :
" As for death, no one who has, in the course
of his life, from illness or any other cause, once
made up his mind to contemplate it calmly and
religiously no one who has ever resolutely re-
garded the hour of his dissolution as at hand,
CALCUTTA GAZETTE. 179
ever loses the calming and soothing influence
which that hour has once produced upon his soul :
he will feel, because at such an hour he has felt,
how unsearchable are the ways of Him that
ruleth over all ; he will believe, because he has
then believed, that there is a saving mercy
beyond the grave, and that faith in the Re-
deemer is the only thing that can bring a man
peace at the last. And that feeling once at-
tained, the sting and the pain of death are
gone, and the joy in believing is full."
As soon as the melancholy news reached Cal-
cutta, the following gazette extraordinary was
published :
GOVERNMENT GAZETTE EXTRA.
" Fort William.
Ecclesiastical Department, Oct. 17, 1828.
" With deep sorrow the Governor-general in
council announces to the public that he has re-
ceived official information of the decease of the
Right Reverend the Lord Bishop of Calcutta.
N 2
180 CALCUTTA
" His lordship was seized with severe illness
in the month of July last, while in progress on
a visitation to the Western Provinces ; and a
voyage to sea, which had been prescribed as
affording the only chance of recovery, proved
inadequate to stay the violence of the disease.
It proved fatal, on the 22nd of August, on
board the Honourable Company's ship, Marquis
of Runtly.
" His lordship's exercise of the important
functions of his exalted ministry in this country
was comparatively short ; but the claims he had
established to the regard and esteem of the
members of this society, and of the community
of the settlement, will make his loss a source of
sincere regret.
" Within the short space of little more than
five years, the British community in India have
thrice had to bewail the loss of the chief minis-
ter of, their religion in the country, and the
name of Bishop James will be associated in
their recollection with those of his predecessors,
not more by the similarity of his fate, than by his
amiable disposition and exalted virtues.
GAZETTE. 181
" As a mark of respect to the high station of
the deceased, and of mournful regret for the
loss sustained by this community, the Governor-
general in council is pleased to direct that the
flag of Fort William shall be hoisted half-mast
high, at sunrise to-morrow morning, and shall
continue to be so displayed during the day;
and that forty-three minute-guns, corresponding
with the age of the deceased, shall be fired from
the ramparts in the afternoon.
" By order of the Right Honourable the Go-
vernor-general in council,
" H. T. PRINSEP,
" Secretary to Government."
The following notice appeared the same day
in the Calcutta journals.
" We have the melancholy task assigned us
of announcing to our readers the death of the
Right Reverend John Thomas James, Lord
Bishop of Calcutta. This event, for which the
previous illness of his lordship had in a great
measure prepared us, took place at sea, on his
passage to Penang, on the 22nd of August, on
182 CALCUTTA GAZETTE.
board of the Honourable Company's ship Mar-
quis of Huntly.
" The career of his lordship has indeed been
brief; and, removed by PROVIDENCE to a better
world before he had long entered on the dis-
charge of his sacred and important duties in
India, Bishop James has left us little record of
him, since he arrived among us, except the high
esteem in which his character was held by all,
and the manifestations he had already given
of a zeal and judgment in the faithful discharge
of his episcopal functions, from which the hap-
piest results to the church in India were fondly
anticipated, had it but pleased HEAVEN to spare
his life.
" Before he assumed the episcopal duties in
this country, Dr. James had distinguished him-
self at home as a traveller and a scholar ; and
his name will find a place in the literature of
his country. By the few to whom his short
residence at Calcutta, and the brief interval of
health which he enjoyed during this period, had
afforded an opportunity of becoming acquainted
PENANG. 183
with him, his memory is endeared by many re-
collections of the piety and excellence of his
character, the soundness of his judgment, and
the extent and variety of his general informa-
tion."
After a dismal and tedious passage, Mrs.
James, with her little boy, Mr. Knapp, and her
servants, reached Penang, Sept. 1, when a ge-
neral order was immediately issued by the go-
vernment, announcing the sad intelligence of
the Bishop's death, and directing, that, as a tri-
bute of respect to his rank, the flag at Fort
Cornwallis should be hoisted half-mast high
during the next day, and that forty-three minute
guns, corresponding with the years of his age,
should be fired from the ramparts.
It had been found necessary that the funeral
should take place during the voyage, and Mr.
Knapp had had the painful duty to perform the last
solemn office of the church, in the presence of the
captain,passengers,and officers,and the ship's com-
pany. An impressive funeral sermon was preached
at Penang, Sept. 7th, by the Rev. Robert Denton,
the Company's chaplain, from St. Luke, twenty-
184 PENANG.
second chapter, the latter part of the forty-
second verse, " Nevertheless, not my will, but
thine be done;" and the following letter was
addressed by him to the Rev. A. M. Campbell,
late Secretary to the Society for Promoting
Christian Knowledge, Lincoln's Inn Fields, Lon-
don :
" Fencing, Sept. 1, 1828.
" Reverend and dear Sir,
"When I had the pleasure of addressing
you prior to my departure from Madras, in Sep-
tember last, I little thought that I should have
to communicate to you, from this place, the
afflicting intelligence, that it has pleased God
to visit the Indian church with another severe
calamity in the death of the third Bishop of
Calcutta. Your accounts from Calcutta will
most probably have informed you of the severe
indisposition of the late Bishop James, which
compelled him to return from Boglipoor to Cal-
cutta, when so far advanced on his visitation of
the archdeaconry of Bengal. He was too un-
well to land at Calcutta, and was removed from
his pinnace to the Marquis Huntly, on which
PENANG. 185
ship the government had provided him a passage
to this place.
" It was his intention, had God pleased to
spare his life, to have remained here, until an
opportunity offered to convey him to New South
Wales ; but another destiny awaited him, and
he was removed from this life on the 22nd of
August. For a few days, after leaving the
river, he seemed to improve in a trifling degree,
but his illness had reduced him so much that he
sunk under it.
" His lordship's disease was a decided attack
of the liver. Mrs. James with her infant son,
and his lordship's domestic chaplain, Mr. Knapp,
an old friend and school-fellow of mine at Eton,
are now living with me, and will most probably
remain here until the latter end of next month,
when they will move down the straits to meet
the first homeward-bound China ship, and pro-
ceed to Europe.
" It is impossible to reflect upon the calami-
tous blow which has again fallen upon the
Indian church, without giving way to the most
186 PENANG.
sincere and poignant sorrow. It seems, indeed,
useless to expect any longer that such an ex-
tensive diocese, as that of Calcutta, can be
superintended by any single individual, how-
ever able and zealous he may be. Bishop
James had had time only to commence his ar-
duous duties, before it pleased the Almighty to
call him into his presence ; but knowing what
he had to accomplish, he was perhaps induced
to leave Calcutta when any thing but strong and
well. From the time of reaching India, his
lordship had been a sufferer more or less, and
a few days before he quitted Calcutta, he
exerted himself very much in delivering his
charge, and going through the other business at
the visitation. Mr. Knapp says, he never con-
sidered him well after that day ; and as he as-
cended the river, he continued to get worse,
until his medical advisers were compelled to
order his return, and get him to sea as fast as
possible. All their exertions were, however,
of no avail, and the church of Christ in India
has to deplore the loss of another father, who
was strenuous in cherishing and supporting her
to the very utmost of his power. His presence on
this island alone would have been of immense
PENANG. 187
value, as it has never but once enjoyed the be-
nefits of an episcopal visitation.
" I imagine it is probable that this letter may
reach England, via Sincapore, some time before
you can hear from Calcutta or Madras, as it
is uncertain when we may have an opportunity
of forwarding the melancholy tidings to those
places.
" Believe me,
" Reverend and dear Sir,
" Yours most faithfully,
" ROBERT DENTON,
" Officiating Chaplain,
" Prince of Wales's Island."
It was thought best, that Mrs. James and
her little boy should remain at Penang, till the
return of the earliest ships from China should
afford opportunity of a passage to England.
Mr. Knapp had kindly promised that he would
not leave her until he had seen her safe to her
father's house ; and both he and Captain Eraser
paid every considerate attention that her discon-
solate situation would admit.
o
188 NORTH ISLAND.
Two dreary months she passed on this island,,
and dreary they could not but be, though
under Mr. Den ton's hospitable roof, and from
Sir John and Lady Claridge, and all the British
residents, she experienced every proof of kind-
ness and sympathy that could possibly tend
to alleviate the poignancy of such grief as
hers.
Early in November,, she left Penang to touch
at Sincapore, on the way to North Island,,
which is situated off Sumatra, at the mouth of
the straits of Sunda, there to await the return
of the first China ships, on their homeward-
bound voyage. The government had provided
a passage to this point in the Honourable Com-
pany's ship, the Hastings, under command of
Captain Laugh ton, of the Bombay marine, who
was to convey Mrs. James and her infant boy
to North Island, and afterwards to proceed
with Mr. Ibbetson on an embassy to Batavia.
At six in the morning of November the 5th,
several friends came to conduct her on board
the Hastings ; and, leaving Mr. Denton's house,
she commenced her long, lonesome, and melan-
choly voyage.
EAST SHEEN. 189
It is no part of the object of this memorial
to give any account in detail of the voyage to
England, which had nothing extraordinary to dis-
tinguish it, but the very painful and distressing
circumstances under which it was made. It
will be sufficient to say, that having touched at
Malacca and Sincapore, the Hastings reached
North Island November 27th, and there waited
the arrival of the Berwickshire, China ship, Cap-
tain Madan, which was to leave Canton on the
17th. On the 3rd of December, Mrs. James and
her small party left the Hastings for the Berwick-
shire, and sailing from the straits of Sunda,
touched at St. Helena, January 19, 1829, and on
the 19th of March landed at Portsmouth, having
received from the officers and every one on board
both vessels, all the soothing attention her me-
lancholy situation called for. On the following
day, Mrs. James and her little boy joined the
two children she had left, with such different
hopes only nineteen months before, at her
Father's house at East Sheen.
o 2
190 CONCLUDING REMARKS.
Having now brought these Memoirs to a close,
I trust it will not be thought that my anxiety
to do justice to the memory of one, who was
bound to me by more than the ordinary ties
of fraternal affection, will have induced me to
outstep my province, if I notice very shortly two
remarks which have reached me, respecting him >
and which have, in part, led to this publication.
It would not be for me, even if the cir-
cumstances rendered it possible, to institute a
comparison between him and those other emi-
nent persons whose laborious steps in the same
exalted path of duty in India, had before con-
ducted them to an early grave. But if it be
true, that it has been asked, whether the Bishop
lived long enough to render any services to
the Indian church ; to this question I trust
the foregoing pages may be found to convey a
sufficient answer. It pleased God, indeed, to
remove him before he could see any fruit from
the seeds which he had sown ; but as I have
shown, that he was not wanting in exertion, I
hope the result will prove, that he was not un-
wise nor unprofitable in his labours.
CONCLUDING REMARKS. 191
But a reflection, more serious in its nature, be-
cause grounded on a matter in which the Bishop
might seem to have been free to choose, has
been made on his ready acceptance of a situ-
ation, for which his constitution, not being ro-
bust, is said to have rendered him unfit; every
one who is alive to the peculiar obligations
which lie upon a minister of the gospel, will
feel how delicate is the ground into which this
subject leads. I might content myself with re-
minding the reader of these pages, that the
Bishop acted under the opinion of his physi-
cians, in a matter on which they were far better
able to form a correct judgment than himself:
but I will further venture to produce from his
own memorandum-book, the following reflec-
tions, written at sea, in October 1827. The
passage is one of touching interest; but it is
one which, had it not been thus called forth,
would not have seen the light :
" As sure as one looks upon the sea, England
rises upon one's thoughts : the constant and un-
varying noise of the ship's motion, the same-
ness of the vast expanse on every side, and
the listlessness of a passenger's day, contri-
-19*2 CONCLUDING REMARKS.
bute to give a melancholy tinge to all one's
thoughts : one thinks of all that is at home ;
sometimes of what might be, and ever and
anon of what might have been. Had I been
consulted as to my wishes, I am sure my an-
swer would have been ever the same ; had any
one ever asked me for what I thought myself
best fitted, or in what office I thought I might
be most efficient, I am sure it would not have
been any thing approaching to the awful respon-
sibility of a Bishop, or the isolated eminence of
any such dignity.
" I am sure I should have been a happier
man ; and I think, too, I might have been made
better use of, in a way more quiet and humble,
and, after a fashion, more congenial to my
habits and feelings. But it is not for us to
choose. I sought it not; and I accepted, after
twice declining, what I found I had no longer
any excuse for continuing to decline. So far
I am content with what I have done.
" As far as I have entered on a field of most
extensive usefulness, instead of one of a more
limited range as far as I have embarked with
CONCLUDING REMARKS. 193
an earnest desire to promote the saving know-
ledge of Christianity, by the best means in my
power I make a good answer to my consci-
ence, though I feel myself to be but a feeble
instrument. I dare not, however, boast of such
perfection of feeling, as to think my motives
have been so pure, that they have been swayed
by no thought, that the welfare of my family, or
my own (I blush to write it) earthly name may be
bettered. I cannot deceive myself, nor say that
these considerations have not, at some mo-
ments, had a share in my thoughts; hence, I
feel my imworthiness to become an overseer of
the flock of Christ ; 1 know my own imperfections,
and the need I have of my Redeemer's aid.
" In not attempting to conceal from myself
that these motives have mingled with others of a
purer sort, I have acted honestly with my own con-
science ; I have deceived neither myself nor others ;
and I trust to be justified as a Christian should.
I have obeyed the summons, and I repine not,
except for those who I hope will one day be
the better for it my children."
194 CHARGE TO THE CLERGY
The best conclusion to this volume, will be the
following passage from the Charge, which the
Bishop addressed to his Clergy, at the Visitation
he held in the Cathedral Church at Calcutta,
June 20, 1828:
<( You, who have a parochial or district adminis-
tration committed to your hands, labour under
a most weighty and important charge; by your
care and diligence is to be promoted the Christian
character of our countrymen and brethren in the
midst of an idolatrous land. Far removed, as
they are, from the tombs of our fathers, apart
from those persuasions to Christian faith, those
incentives to Christian practice, which our domestic
circles and family connections are so well calcu-
lated to impart far from those holy scenes which
they have been accustomed from infancy to rever-
ence and admire ; on you depends, under God, the
preservation of their religious feeling, the mainte-
nance of Christian knowledge, and of virtuous
practice. It is your's to procure for the edifica-
tion of the eastern world, an example of Chris-
tian life and manners; it is your's to furnish
illustrations of it in your several congregations,
AT CALCUTTA. 195
such as the missionary may triumphantly refer to as
the real fruits of the gospel ; to form the minds
and hearts of your hearers, and, above all, so to
fashion yourselves, that, amongst a people, who
look but too little on aught but externals, and
who learn more aptly by the eye than by the ear,
may really be made visible the kingdom of God on
earth in the power of his holy word.
" Let this be held ever in remembrance, that
our British establishments have risen to great-
ness and eminence in this country, purely through
the reputation of the superior justice and inte-
grity of our countrymen ; that our acknowledged
adherence to the plighted faith, our better de-
fined ideas of right and wrong, have won for us
the confidence of the Native Powers, and, aided
by our practice, confirmed their attachment to
ourselves.
" But whence came these principles ? this notion
of equity and truth? It was from Christian
Britain ; and if there be some supposed exceptions
to the rule, if there be some who have showed a
good disposition of mind in these respects, and
yet whose conduct in other matters does but little
1% CHARGE TO THE CLERGY
remind us of any sense of religious obligation,
still let it be remembered, that they too had their
early habits formed in our Christian land ; they
came out ready furnished with those ideas/ and
fortified with those habits that belong to our
countrymen; and, whatever their after course
might be, they derived from thence all their better
thoughts, having had their first nurture and ad-
monition in the Lord.
" They, too, are of your especial charge, who
are now forming so large a class in this country,
they who are united with us in all but the locality
of their birth the Indo-British population. They
claim, indeed, your particular attention. I mean
not to derogate, in any \vay, from the credit due
to those excellent institutions, civil and military,
which have been established, as well with a view
to their religious instruction, as their advance-
ment in the arts of life ; but these afford not all
that the youthful mind naturally looks for and re-
quires : some staff is wanted, whereon to lean
during the weaker stage of youth some hand to
guide and chasten the incorrect wanderings of a
young person's first steps in the great world.
Having known, as often happens, little more of
AT CALCUTTA. 197
parental care than what an annual pecuniary pro-
vision may display; bereft of that fascinating
domesticity of sentiment that introduces our du-
ties under the guise of pleasure, and ushers us to
the busy scenes of opening life, with the con-
fidence of those who know they have a home;
where should such look for friends or advisers, but
to the person whose voice is already known to
them in the way of Christian admonition, and of
pastoral superintendence; who is known as their
friend in the Lord? But I trust I may say,
that no youth thus situated as to those around
him, will ever have to complain of the want of a
friend and monitor to whom he may defer, while
there remains an officiating minister of the Church
of England in the district in which he lives.
" For the furtherance of the practice of this and
of other duties, some facility has lately been af-
forded you in the division of the capital, in an
ecclesiastical sense, into separate parochial dis-
tricts. The sphere of your occupations is thus
ascertained by fixed limits, and your particular
duties better defined; nor, do I doubt, but that
in this and other matters of superintendence, you
will find daily fresh satisfaction and interest, as
198 CHARGE TO THE CLERGY
your congregations will benefit and advantage.
Among those duties the performance of which is by
this arrangement materially promoted, and one of
those that more especially tend to connect the spiri-
tual pastor with his flock, I may mention the visi-
tation of the sick. The frightful rapidity of dis-
ease in this climate, precludes indeed, in many
cases, the possibility of such a duty being
performed ; and furnishes the strongest argument
for your admonition of those who delay from day
to day the time of their repentance. But still
there are, with many a sick man, hours of repose
not unmixed with fear ; there is oft a trembling
period of convalescence, when the soothing pro-
mises of the gospel act feelingly, and yet harmo-
niously, on the senses ; in such a moment its sacred
truths will usually be heard more patiently, and
make room for a more lasting impression than
would, perhaps, have been formed when the body
was full of health and spirits, rejoicing in all the
pride and carelessness of pleasure and of ease.
u At such a day, a clergyman, whose influence
arises from his professional character, is viewed
as the dearest of friends ; he comes to his neigh-
bour's dwelling with the voice of Heaven, and
AT CALCUTTA. 199
the peace of God ; nor, to the sufferer alone, does
his labour become profitable, but to all those
whose natural affection and attachment have drawn
them around the bed of sickness. Parents, bro-
thers, friends, as they listen to the fervent prayer,
find such words, at such a moment, in the fullest
accord with the sentiment of their own souls,
and often learn more closely than before to com-
mune with their God. It may well be called
the office of a friend ; no one but he who, from
his manner, conduct, and advice, has inspired in
his people the most implicit confidence, can ever
expect such confidence in return ; he alone who
has seemed to admit them to the pure recesses of
his own heart, will ever be called upon to hear
the secret workings of the mind of another, or be
solicited to console the labouring and anxious
spirit of the sick man. It is some time, indeed,
as the long experienced parochial clergyman will
testify, before any one newly arrived on his charge
is ever so confidently invited ; with experience
alone of his character, conies this pious trust on
the part of others, that proves the strongest as-
surance of his ability in his profession, and the
surest test of the sacred excellence of his cha-
racter.
CHARGE TO THE CLERGY
" There are,, also, amongst us here assembled,,
those to whom another charge is given on whom
an anxious eye is turned from many a distant
land, and whom, indeed, the whole Christian
world most attentively regards. Hard, indeed, is
the path you have to tread, great your devotion,
and high your honour in the Lord. There is an
interest in your peculiar sphere of duties, an ap-
proximation in the nature of your daily occupa-
tions to the earlier ages of Christianity, that
throws, in idea, a grateful and refreshing shade
over all your toils : it was thus, Paul planted
and Apollos watered ; it was thus, with mild per-
suasive grace, that the priests and catechists of
the first Christian century, laboured patiently and
endured all things in hope. We know not, indeed,
much of the minute details of their proceedings in the
missionary cause ; we read not enough of their pa-
tient practice, their persevering travail. The per-
secution of princes, the bloodshed of holy mar-
tyrs, the machinations and cabals of evil coun-
sellorsthese are the striking facts on which the
pride and worldliness of the historian is apt to
dwell ; these are the showy passages of human
life that are held in popular remembrance, and
exalted for the gaze and wonder of posterity.
AT CALCUTTA. 201
Yet were there then moments of fear and hope,
of anxious solicitation, and sometimes, too, of
gratitude towards heaven for the sheep of another
fold. Oft, in climates scarcely less torrid than
our own, has the matted shed heard the tidings of
goodwill to mankind ; and the wildly- gazing, half-
conscious assembly, gradually seemed to fasten
on the closing words of the preacher. Oft have
those been rebuked, that call, " what God hath
cleansed, unclean and common ;" or those, that
" pray in the corners of the streets and public
places." Oft has one been tolerated with true
Christian patience, " that is weak and eateth
herbs;" and oft have those been chidden, " that
change the glory of the incorruptible God into
the image made like unto corruptible men, and to
birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things."
And there were men, sainted in their domestic
feelings, hallowed in their quiet obedience to the
commands of their Saviour; men, that sought not
the seductive praises of their fellows that talked
not of imaginary and impossible perfections, but
walked humbly with their God.
" These are the cheering thoughts with which you
must often be conversant. Go on, blessing and
CHARGE TO THE CLERGY
twice blessed. Be it my duty to guard your interests,
to study your welfare, to aid, to advise with you
in all spiritual concerns, to strengthen you in all
things according to my ability ; and to prove myself
(a title I covet more than all) publicly, privately, the
missionary's friend. And if there should be any
now present who are not of the same communion
with ourselves, let me repeat here what I have
elsewhere said, " None that cometh in the name
of Christ, shall ever be regarded as a stranger by
me." The curious and carnal questions, which the
refinements of European study have brought forth,
concern not those whom we have to instruct in
" the first principles of the oracles of God." The
plain, and yet saving truths of the gospel, the
primary essentials of Christian doctrine, in " the
pure word of God," are all that a missionary here
can or ought to attempt to exhibit to his hearers.
If some of those who, in our native country, dis-
sent from our establishment on certain questions,
and thus place themselves without our pale, are too
apt to regard us with somewhat of an un-
friendly view, here, at least, all such feelings ought,
and must vanish and disappear in sight of our
common adversary ; all those who are Christians in
principle are with us, and not against us ; the only
AT CALCUTTA. 203
dissenters in this land should be the idolatrous
heathens, or the professed enemies of the cross of
Christ.
" Think not such sentiments as these to be in-
compatible with true zeal ; or that because such
feelings seem abhorrent from the selfishness of
enthusiasm, that enthusiasm's better part is not
here. Believe me, it is no lukewarm spirit that
forgets all carnal animosities, that lays aside all
worldly motives in sight of the altar of God, or
that sacrifices the lively gratification of party feel-
ing for the sake of the common cause. Believe
me, it is no lukewarm spirit that now presses this
point upon your attention, and prays sincerely
that this accord and harmony of all Christian
teachers may be accomplished to forward the work
of Christianizing this land.
" But we, brief, trembling mortals, what need we
arguments to establish peace and concord ! where
so many daily examples occur to remind us of the
frail tenure of our lives, and of the absolute
worthlessness of our sublunary concerns and un-
stable condition here? Over our heads are now
hanging the sad memorials of those who before
204 CHARGE, ETC.
me have addressed you from this chair. Mute
and silent now is the voice that once was so at-
tentively listened to as replete with knowledge in
all our professional studies ; he, whose wise and
pregnant sayings are yet remembered as the watch
words of his flock. He, too, is gone, whose loss
we still are mourning with all the freshness of a
recent wound ; whose mild benevolence, whose bril-
liant talents, whose warm devotion and sainted
heroism of mind won the feelings, as they improved
the conversation, of all around him.
" I will not press upon the sentiments that these
recollections bring heavily home to every man's
bosom, but, my reverend brethren, let us not
fail to make use of them as we ought; let
us all be consenting unto that accord and har-
mony which our great Master so unceasingly la-
boured after, and so strenuously recommended;
let us each in his station do our best to promote
this end, and to our endeavours add an earnest
prayer for our Jerusalem, that unity and " peace
may be within her walls"
THE END.
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