dinances of our God, you cannot conceive the hope and heartfelt interest with which we view the spot that may hereafter be hallowed unto us, and be the means of bringing hundreds of our poor negroes to a knowledge of their Saviour.

Religion is spreading rapidly among the negroes; we are, in this district (it being a remote mountainous situation), more backward, I believe, than most parts of the island: but even here, the word is heard with eagerness and gladness: they rejoice greatly when they hear we are expecting any of the brethren's missionaries to visit us (which they do occasionally when going from one station to another) and will sometimes assemble to the number of 150 after their day's labour, at our family prayers in the evening, to hear the missionary preach, or expound the scriptures.

Extract of a Letter from the Rev. L. Stobwasser, lately a Missionary in Antigua, written on his passage to Jamaica, and dated in the Downs, June 3d, 1823.

"It has always been the practice of the Missionaries of the brethren's church, whenever they could possibly do it, to establish schools among the Negroes. It is evident what an influence may be obtained on the minds of children by means of schools, especially if the sole aim of them is to procure for them a more immediate access to the sacred books of Scripture.

"Among negro slaves, a Sunday School seems the only one practicable. Our method is, to give to every child a lesson pasted on a small board, which they put into a bag or pocket they have for that purpose, and in which they exercise themselves in the evenings, also at noon, and in the field at their breakfast-time. We take care to find on every estate, if possible, a negro who is able and willing to instruct them; and when there are no such negroes to be found, we encourage the most able we can get to visit us once or twice a week in the evening, besides Sunday, in order to be qualified by us for the instruction of others: much has been done by the brethren in this way; and in our negro congregations in Antigua, teachers are not wanting to give effect to the charity which the generous friends of Missions and Sunday Schools might feel disposed to exercise in this cause. "When I first came to the island of Antigua, Sunday Schools were generally

reckoned to be impracticable, though frequent and not unfruitful attempts were made, especially by our truly indefatigable brother, James Light (now in Jamaica). By degrees the prejudices of the planters against permitting the negro children being taught to read, which in the beginning were very perceptible, wore away; and we see on those estates where the children are most generally instructed, the benefi cial consequences of it. Quite a different generation seems there to rise, and gives the prospect of happier days for the ne groes.

"The moral depravities of that class of people are so deeply rooted, that a mere cessation of slavery would not cure them in the least of their laziness, impertinence, lying, stealing, and lasciviousness. The education of the negro children has been entirely in the hands of their parents, or of other negroes, who, in most instances, were by no means able to do any thing for their moral or religious improvement. Such children were too often severely corrected by their parents for speaking the truth. They were taught that telling a lie in one's own defence is no sin; that to pick up a thing which was not their own, is not stealing, especially if it belonged to their master; and they never learnt to discriminate between regular marriage and an illicit connexion. The children of unconverted negroes are hardly ever brought up in a better manner, unless they go to the Sunday School.

"There is now an amazing desire among the children, and even among adult negroes, to learn to read; and many have declared that they wish to be able to read the Sacred Scriptures themselves, for their comfort and instruction. An opportunity to satisfy such a laudable desire is now afforded, which, if permitted to pass away, may perhaps not soon return, but which, under the blessing of God, may lead to an entire reformation of the slave population of Antigua."

Contributions to the proposed fund, to be specifically described as intended for "The West India Moravian Missionary Fund," will be received by the Treasurer of The London Association, J. G. Lockett, Esq. 1, Upper Conway Street, Fitzroy Square; Messrs. Morlands; Sir P. Pole and Co.; Messrs. Hatchards, Nisbet, &c. London; and Messrs. Ricketts and Co. Bristol.

The Christian public will read with great satisfaction the following report of Bishop Heber's first Episcopal Charge, as reported in the Calcutta papers,

Episcopal Visitation and Ordination at the Cathedral, Calcutta, on Ascension Day, Thursday, May 27.

After the morning service for the day, which was read by the Rev. T. Thomason,

and a Sermon preached by the Rev. Dr. Parish, from Ezek. xxxiv. 28, the Lord Bishop of Calcutta took his seat at the altar, and addressed the clergy assembled.

His Lordship commenced his charge by congratulating the Clergy on the probable increase of their number from twenty-eight to thirty-one; and expressed his sincere gratitude for the munificent and parental care which prompted so beneficial a measure. A plain statement of the spiritual wants of India, his Lordship conceived, would so far excite the zeal of our brethren at home, as not to disappoint and render vain the benevolent and Christian solicitude of our rulers; while it would serve to show the reason we have to be grateful for the measures they have already adopted.

His Lordship then entered into some detail of the ecclesiastical establishment in India, in order to point out where the deficiency was principally observable, and the causes from which it had proceeded.

In adverting to the backwardness of the English Clergy to enter into the East India service in question, His Lordship remarked, those, indeed, would be much mistaken, who should anticipate in the fortunes of an Indian Chaplain a life of indolence, of opulence, of luxury. An Indian chaplain must come prepared for hard labour, in a climate where labour is often death; he must come prepared for rigid self-denial in situations where all around him incites to sensual indulgence; he must be content with an income, liberal indeed in itself, but altogether disproportioned to the charities, the hospitalities, the unavoidable expenses, to which his situation renders him liable. He must be content to bear his life in his hand, and to leave, very often, those dearer than life itself, to his care alone who feeds the ravens, and who never or most rarely suffers the seed of the righteous to beg their bread. Nor are the qualifications which he will need, nor the duties which will be imposed on him, less arduous than the perils of his situation. He must be no uncourtly recluse, or he will lose all influence over the higher classes of his congregation; he must be no man of pleasure, or he will endanger their souls and his own: he must be a scholar and a man of cultivated mind, and at the same time condescend to simple men; for here, as elsewhere, the bulk of his congregation must be ignorant and poor; nor in his intercourse with the humbler classes of his hearers has he always the same cheering circumstances, which make the house of the English parochial minister a school and temple of religion, and his morning and evening walks a daily source of blessing and of blessedness. His servants will be of a different creed from his own. His intercourse will not be with the happy

harmless peasant. His feet will not be found at the wicker-gate of the well-known cottage; beneath the venerable tree, in the grey church porch, and by side of the hop-ground or the corn-field; but he must kneel by the bed of infection or despair, in the barrack, the prison, or the hospital.

I

But to the well-tempered, the well-educated, the diligent and pious clergyman-— who can endear himself to the poor without vulgarity, and to the rich without involving himself in their vices; who can reprove sin without harshness, and comfort penitence without undue indulgence; who delights in his master's work even when divested of many of those outward circumstances, which, in our own country, contribute to render that work picturesque and interesting; who feels a pleasure in bringing men to God, proportioned to the extent of their previous wanderings;-to such a man as Martyn was,-I can promise no common usefulness and enjoyment in the situation of an Indian chaplain. can promise, in any station to which he may be assigned, an educated society and an almost unbounded range of usefulness. I can promise him the favour of his superiors, the friendship of his equals, and affection, strong as death, from those whose wanderings he corrects, whose distresses he consoles, and by whose sick and dying bed he stands as a ministering angel. Are further inducements needful? I can promise to such a man the esteem, the regard, the veneration of the surrounding Gentiles, the consolation at least of having removed from their minds by his blameless life and winning manners, some of the most inveterate and injurious prejudices which oppose themselves to the Gospel, and the honour, it may be, of which examples are not wanting among you, of planting the cross of Christ, in the wilderness of a heathen heart, and extending the frontiers of the visible Church amid the bills of darkness, and the strongholds of error and idolatry.

His Lordship then adverted to the great assistance afforded to the Ministers of the Gospel in India by the parental care of government, the bounty of individuals, and the labours of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge; in the establishment of schools, the distribution of religious tracts, and the management of lending libraries, which his Lordship wished to become universal.

The Missionaries who attended the visitation were then addressed by the Bishop, who alluded to the intent and importance of their labours; and this led his Lordship to the consideration of the great question of the conversion of the heathen, and to some remarks on the late publication of the Abbé du Bois. The unchristian spirit

in which that work is written was severely and deservedly reproved; and his gross mis-statements were confuted by an appeal to the Protestant converts of Agra, of Benares, of Meerut, and of Chunar. "Bear witness," said his Lordship, "those numerous believers of our own immediate neighbourhood, with whom though we differ on many, and doubtless on very important points, I should hate myself if I could regard them as any other than my brethren and fellow-servants in the Lord *. Let the populous Christian districts of Malabar bear witness, where believers are not reckoned by solitary individuals, but by hundreds and by thousands. Bear witness Ceylon, where the cross has lost its reproach, and the chiefs of the land are gradually assuming, without scruple, the attire, the language, and the religion of Englishmen. And let him finally bear witness, whom we have now received into the number of the commissioned servants of the church, and whom we trust, at no distant day, to send forth, in the fullness of Christian authority, to make known the way of truth to those his countrymen from whose errors he has himself been graciously delivered."

In concluding this part of his address, his Lordship observed, that "even from the taunts of an enemy a wise man will increase his wisdom-and if we learn from the volume I have quoted, greater moderation in our language, and greater circumspection in our deportment-a more strict adherence to the union and discipline of the church, and a more careful abstinence from every thing like exaggeration in those accounts of our progress in the work which are sent to our friends in Europe; it is apparent, that some essential hindrances would be greatly lessened which now impede the progress of the truth, and a more abundant blessing may be expected on our toils from him who is the God of peace, and order, and modesty."

In alluding to the character and Episcopal labours of the late excellent Bishop Middleton, his Lordship observed, that had the mind of that great and good man been attracted to secular purposes, he was possessed of every quality on which the world bestows its favour. But though his memory was stored with all profane and civil literature, the application of his learning and talents was to ecclesiastical purposes alone. He was, perhaps, the second critic of his age, yet he edited no Greek classics: he was stored, said his Lordship, as I have been assured, with an inexhaustible supply of lighter and more elegant literature, yet he sought to be re

The Converts of the Baptist Mission at Serampore.

membered as a divine and theologian alone. Nay more, when his life-long labours were at length approaching to their term, as if fearing the applause of men even in those branches of learning which were strictly appropriate and ministerial, he consigned, as a last sacrifice, his laboured manuscripts to the flames, content to live only in the memory of those who loved and honoured him, and desiring no further praise than that which he shall one day receive, of "Well done! good and faithful servant!"

"This continued his Lordship in conclusion-this is a copious subject, and one on which I should have been tempted to enlarge, if I were not aware of your exhausted condition, from the length which this morning's service has already reached; and if, to say the truth, my own feelings were sufficiently tranquil to indulge in the praises of one whom I had not the happiness to know, while I am yet smarting under the recent loss of a distinguished and excellent friend, from whose eminent talents, from whose amiable temper, from whose high religious principles, and his repeatedly expressed intention of devoting his ample means and powerful mind to the service of that God from whom he received them; I had anticipated the most important and essential aids, in securing the prosperity of the Indian church, and furthering the triumphant progress of those Gospels in which his hope and heart were laid up, and in which, while he lived, his life was hidden *.

"A few days only are gone, since, with animation on his benevolent countenance, he expressed to me his gratitude to God for the many blessings he had received, and his desire to dedicate to God, through Jesus Christ, a larger proportion of his time, his means, and his influence; a few hours only are past since those good resolutions are gone thither, where they are best known and appreciated by a gracious God, whom he had served from his youth, and who, when his noon of life had scarcely begun to decline, saw fit to call him to his recompense and his repose. In him India-in him the Anglo-Indian churchin him the cause of missions here and throughout the world-in him the poor of every caste and country have lost a fearless, a kind, a bountiful, an unpretending friend; but he will not have died in vain, if the consideration of his sudden mortality induces us to ponder the worth

The late Sir Christopher Puller. This gentleman relinquished an extensive and lucrative practice as a barrister, on being appointed supreme judge at Calcutta. He arrived in India only five weeks preceding his death, which took place, after an illness of a few days, on May 19th, 1824.