is fond of the English, and dresses in the style of an English gentleman. His eldest son is a promising youth. He speaks the English language well, and has a valuable library of English authors. He appears to be favorably disposed with respect to Christianity. We passed the village of Gurramcondah, where is a hill-fort, once of great strength, but now in ruins. The country, through nearly the whole of this long journey, is very poor and sterile. It consists of hills of naked rock, with narrow defiles between them, and occasionally fruitful valleys, in which rice is grown. Our accommodations on the road were often very bad; however, on the 21st of the same month, we arrived in safety at Cuddapah.

Cuddapah is the capital of the eastern district of the Balaghaut ceded territory, and is situated in latitude 14° 28′ N.; longitude 79° E. It is often called Cripa, which is a corruption of Cuddapah, and which means a threshold; as it is situated at the entrance of a valley, visited, formerly, and held sacred by the Hindoos. This town is situated on a hot, sandy plain, of considerable extent, and surrounded by distant hills. It is remarkable for its great heat, and on this account it is vulgarly called by Europeans "the frying-pan of India," resembling in its locality that utensil. From general testimony, and especially from Mr. Howell, who was born in the country, and has travelled a great deal in India, the heat must be prodigious. During the dry season, if there be any wind in the day-time, after the sun sets it dies away, and the atmosphere becomes suffocating; and this continues through the night. There are no dews, and the common people sleep out in the open air. The soil is sandy, and of a brownish color; and during the hot season all vegetation, excepting trees, is burnt up. The heat imbibed during the day by the earth, is retained through the night; while the many trees about the town tend to prevent the circulation of the air, and to aggravate the evil. Ever since last Septenber, fever has raged here, and few have escaped its assaults, though it has not been very destructive.

The town of Cuddapah was formerly much more extensive than at present, as the ruins all around indicate. These ruins, however, in general, are but the ruins of poor, wretched, mudwalled cottages. The town consists principally of such hovels, of one story, placed in tolerably good street-order, while those that are fallen down, and suffered to remain in that state, are almost as numerous as those which are inhabited.

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This will give a general idea of towns in all parts of India. Here are several mosques and Mahommedan burying-grounds, crowded with tombs, built in the style peculiar to that people, together with two ancient palaces belonging to them, the one of which is now the jail, and the other the treasury. In the latter building are kept both the cash collected in the district as taxes, and the public records. General appearances indicate the former dignity of the Moors here, and strikingly demonstrate their present degradation. As to extent of population, indeed, the Mussulmans are numerous in this place, being about one-third of the whole; but they are wretchedly poor, ignorant, and sensual. The other two-thirds of the population are Gentoos. They have but few pagodas in the town, and these are very small. These people are also generally poor. A sort of coarse cloth is made here, such as the people wear. In the neighborhood is a diamond-mine, now worked, and also an indigo-factory, where that article of commerce is prepared, of a superior quality, from the dried leaf of the plant. The population of Cuddapah and its vicinity is stated to be 60,000. Water is obtained from tanks and deep wells. Rice, dhole, and several kinds of grain, are grown in the neighborhood during the rainy and cool season. Here are both a civil and a military establishment for native troops; but there is neither church nor episcopal chaplain. To Mr. Haigh, the Zillah-judge, Mr. Brown, the registrar, and Dr. Geddes, we are much indebted for their great hospitality.

With the general aspect of the mission here we were much pleased. Mr. Howell and Mrs. H. are both Indo-Britons, or country-born, pious and worthy people, and greatly respected by the English gentlemen in the neighborhood, who show them every kind attention. Mr. Howell is an excellent, active, and useful missionary. He most commendably devotes his whole strength and time to the natives, and does not suffer his attention to be diverted from his great object by English services. We were highly gratified by his excellent spirit, his good sense, and his devoted piety. The Teloogoo language is spoken here by the natives in general, and Mr. Howell preaches in it with great fluency; indeed he is said, by competent judges, to have a very extensive knowledge of it, and to speak it as well as the natives.

A neat and comfortable chapel has just been completed here, forty-eight by thirty-two feet, with a good vestry at one

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end. The whole is built of burnt bricks, and plastered over with chunam, with a flat roof, which is supported by two rows of pillars. The chapel was raised under the superintendence of Mr. Howell, and does his taste and judgment great credit, as well as his good economy, for it cost only the small sum of 2400 rupees, and which was all raised by subscriptions in the country, and principally in the neighborhood. Mr. Howell has also built himself a parsonage-house near the chapel, a good and comfortable dwelling, with a hall and four bed-rooms, and verandahs both in front and behind. This house cost only 1400 rupees. It stands in a convenient compound, in which is an excellent garden, and a well of good water. Still nearer the chapel, Mr. H. is erecting a school-room for the native Christians' children; and a little farther off is a village of mud-walled cottages, in two rows, forming a street, consisting of thirty-six houses, and 148 residents, appropriated for the use of those natives who embrace Christianity, and consequently lose caste. All the cottages are inhabited. In this village is a school-room, used for that purpose till the new one is completed, and where all the Christian families meet for family-prayer, mornings and evenings. Here is a weaver's shop, in which are several looms; Mr. Howell being anxious to teach the people some business by which they may obtain a livelihood when they embrace Christianity, lose caste, and are abandoned by their friends. He has established a common paper-manufactory, with the same view, since we left Cuddapah. All the encouragements of a worldly nature Mr. Howell holds out to the natives, on becoming Christians, are to allow them to reside in one of these cottages, find them employment, and make them work for their own subsistence. He in the first instance provides them with looms, wheels, &c., which the people afterwards pay for by instalments. We cannot but highly commend this plan, which is the best of any that we are acquainted with to meet the case; and this, or some other, we think, must be acted upon, so long as the loss of caste in these countries is attended with consequences so appalling and discouraging. A subscription of fifty rupees per month, from a gentleman at some distance, enables Mr. Howell to erect these cottages, and to carry these plans into effect.

Mr. Howell has at present four schools connected with the mission, all under Christian instruction; one of Christian children, consisting of fifteen boys and twelve girls, taught

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by a Christian native; and two schools for boys and one for girls, the children of heathen parents, containing in all sixty boys and twelve girls. Mr. Howell finds it very difficult to obtain suitable schoolmasters. Besides these, he has under his superintendence two schools of Mussulmans' children, one of which is supported by Mr. Judge Haigh, containing twenty boys, and the other by Mr. Brown, in which are forty boys; but Christian principles, we are sorry to add, are not yet allowed to be introduced into these schools.

Mr. Howell settled here in December, 1822, since which he has baptized, of men, women, and children, 239; several of whom have removed to Chittoor, and belong to the congregation there; and five families have relapsed to heathenism. The above number comprised

About eighty of the above have gone to Chittoor, and twenty-five have been expelled. A church has been formed of native Christians, on the congregational plan, and twentytwo members have been admitted, nine of whom are at Chittoor, under the care of Mr. D. and Mr. W. Within the last two years, twenty-one couples have been married by Mr. Howell, and within that time there have been fourteen deaths.

On Lord's days Mr. Howell preaches twice to the native congregation in Teloogoo, when about a hundred attend, well dressed, and who behave with great propriety. They sit on the floor, according to their custom at other times. There is an obvious difference between them and other natives as to cleanliness and decency of dress, and this difference is in favor of the Christians, There is public service again on Wednesday evenings, when about eighty persons attend. On Friday evenings is a prayer-meeting, when there are fifty or sixty present. Several native men engage in extempore prayer. Mr. H. preaches at the jail to the prisoners on Saturdays. He has likewise conversational meetings in the school-room on Mondays. All the Christian children attend

the Sunday-school, and Mr. H. meets them before the afternoon service, to converse with and to catechise them.

Mr. H. employs three readers and catechists, to go from house to house in the evening of every day, to instruct both Christians and heathen. Their names are Luther, who was a Brahmin; Jonah, and Job, who were both Pariahs. They all seem to be pious and devoted men. The famous Ananderayer is here at present. He is advanced in years, and is` employed as a catechist.

Mr. Howell speaks of the professing Christians as being in general consistent; and, if they act otherwise, they are dismissed from the village. All the schools are supported by the subscriptions of gentlemen in the neighborhood, Mr. H. being very reluctant to draw on the funds of the Society for that purpose. We found them in a good state.

While here, we had an opportunity of attending a great Hindoo festival, called Gangamma Tirnal, or the great goddess Gangamma, held in the village called Cocottapetta, distant from Cuddapah about five miles. This was a most novel and affecting sight. About 50,000 people were assembled in a sort of grove, around the filthy pagoda, in which was the object of attraction and adoration. Before the door of this swamyhouse the people were sacrificing sheep and goats to the idol all the day, and streams of blood flowed in all directions. Around this place is a wide road, on which multitudes of bullockbasket-carts were driven, from which grain, of various kinds, was thrown to all such as chose to receive it, in fulfilment of vows., Between twelve o'clock at noon and six in the evening, we saw thirty men and two women undergo the ceremony of swinging upon hooks put through the skin of their backs. The machine which was used for this purpose was a bullock-cart. Over the axle-tree a post was erected, over the top of which a beam, about thirty-five feet in length, passed, and moved upon a pin. The longer end of this beam extended over the bullocks; at the end of it was a square frame attached, adorned with young plantain-trees, in which two persons could stand. When the hooks were inserted into the skin, the ropes attached to the hooks were lashed firmly to the top bar of the frame, so as to allow the people to stand upon the lower bar. This being done, and we saw the operation performed in several instances, the beam was raised upon its fulcrum, and the persons on the frame were elevated about twenty-five or thirty feet above the ground.