to be, more honest, and to each other they are not uncharitable; but they are, I fear, less likely at present than the Hindoos to embrace Christianity, though some of them read our Scriptures; and I have heard one or two speak of Christians as of nearly the same religion with themselves. They have, however, contracted in this country many superstitions of castes and images, for which their western brethren, the Turks and Arabs, are ready to excommunicate them; and, what is more strange, many of them, equally in opposition to their own religion and that of the Hindoos, are exceeding drunkards.

TO MRS. HEBER.

Tittyghur, January 25, 1824.

MY DEAREST MOTHER,

Our former packets will, I trust, before this time, have communicated to you the intelligence of our safe arrival, and of our subsequent proceedings.

Calcutta is a very striking place, but it so much resembles Petersburgh, though on a less splendid scale, that I can hardly help fancying myself sometimes in Russia. The architecture of the principal houses is the same, with Italian porticoes, and all white-washed or stuccoed, and the width and straightness of the principal streets, the want of

pavement, the forms of the peasants' carts, and the crowds of foot-passengers in every street, as well as the multitude of servants, the want of furniture in the houses, and above all, the great dinner-parties, which are one distinguishing feature of the place, are all Muscovite.

The public here is very liberal, but the calls on charity are continual, and the number of five and ten pound subscriptions which are required of a man every month, for inundations, officers' widows, &c. &c. are such as surprise an Englishman on his first arrival, though he cannot but be pleased at the spirit which it evinces. . . .

I am happy to set you at ease about pirates. There were, as you have been rightly informed, four or five years ago, a good many Arab pirates in the Bombay seas, but none that I have heard of ever ventured into the bay of Bengal, and even those who did exist are said to have been completely driven from the sea by the expedition which was sent some time back from Bombay against the Arabs of the Persian gulf. But with these seas I shall have little concern, since my journeys in that quarter will be chiefly by land. Those which I have to perform in this part of India will be mostly by the Ganges, on which sculking thieves are sometimes met with, but no robbers bold enough to attack European boats. I should have much preferred marching by land the whole way, as we at first proposed, but I found it impossible to leave Calcutta before the weather would have

become too hot for such a journey. At the commencement of the rains we shall set out, and boat it all the way to Cawnpoor. The boats are like houses, and as comfortable as such things well can be; but our progress, by this method, will be very tedious and wearisome, compared with the amusement of a land-journey with our tents and elephants. We shall, however, escape the rains, which is reckoned the only unhealthy season in Bengal, when every road is a puddle, every field a marsh, and every river a sea, and when a hot sun, playing on a vast surface of water and decayed vegetables, is regarded as the cause of almost all the diseases which are not brought on by intemperance and carelessness.

My morning rides are very pleasant; my horse is a nice, quiet, good-tempered little Arab, who is so fearless that he goes, without starting, close to an elephant, and so gentle and docile that he eats bread out of my hand, and has almost as much attachment and coaxing ways as a dog. This seems the usual character of the Arab horse, who (to judge from those I have seen in this country,) is not the fiery dashing animal I had supposed, but with more rationality about him, and more apparent confidence in his rider than the generality of English horses. The latter, however, bear the highest price here, from their superior size and power of going through more work. The Indian horses are seldom good, and always ill-tempered

and vicious, and it is the necessity of getting foreign horses which makes the expense so great as you have heard, while, after all, in this climate, four horses will not do so much work as a pair in England.

Believe me, dearest Mother,

your affectionate son,

REGINALD CALCUTTA.

I rejoice to hear that Mr. Puller is coming out as Chief Justice. He is a kind and worthy man, and will, I think, be very popular here, as well as be an agreeable and friendly neighbour to us.

TO THE VERY REV. THE DEAN OF ST. ASAPH.

January 27, 1824.

MY DEAR SIR,

In my last Letter I promised you that this should be a political one. I know not after all, now that I am sitting down to the task, that I have been able to acquire any information which will be new to you, or that I am as yet qualified to speak otherwise than with great hesitation as to the real state even of a small part of this great empire. From all external enemies British India (now comprehending either directly or indirectly threefourths of the whole vast peninsula,) appeared, till lately, secure. The Maharattas are completely con

quered and heart-broken; the kings of Oude and Hydrabad only hold their places at our will and pleasure, and their subjects desire nothing so much as that we should take the government of both countries into our own hands; while Russia is regarded as so distant a danger, that, during the latter years of Lord Hastings' government, and in fact to the present moment, the army of India has been allowed to melt away, and is now, as I am assured, perhaps the least numerous establishment (in comparison with the population, extent, and revenues of the country whence it is raised and supported,) that any civilized empire in the world can shew. It seems, however, that war with a new, and by no means a despicable enemy, is now inevitable, and has indeed already begun. The King of Ava, whose territories, under the name of the "Birman empire," you will see marked in all the recent maps, has been long playing the same Buonapartean game in what is called "India beyond the Ganges," (though in fact removed many hundred miles from that river,) which we have been playing in Hindoostan. His dominions had, till now, been separated from ours by a line of mountains and forests, which prevented almost all intercourse, either peaceable or hostile ; but by the recent conquest of the country of Assam and some other mountain Rajas, he has pushed himself into the immediate neighbourhood of Bengal, and has begun to hold a language about frontiers, neutral grounds, and ancient claims of the "golden empire," which the English in India are quite unac