principal apartments. There is, indeed, one enormous banqueting-house, detached from the rest and built at a great expence, but in vile taste; and which can be neither filled nor lighted to any advantage. It contains some bad paintings of Coote, Cornwallis, Meadows, and other military heroes, and one, of considerable merit, of Sir Robert Strange, all fast going to decay in the moist seabreeze, and none of them, except the last, deserving of a longer life.

There are some noble charities here; the military school for male and female orphans, where Dr. Bell first introduced his system, is superior to any thing in Calcutta, except the upper schools at Kidderpoor. The orphan asylums in the Black Town, though much smaller, put the management of the Calcutta free-school to shame; and at Vepery is the finest Gothic Church, and the best establishment of native schools, both male and female, which I have yet seen in India. The native Christians are numerous and increasing, but are, unfortunately, a good deal divided about castes, respecting which I have to make some regulations, which I have deferred till I have seen the missions in the south. The majority of the Missionaries complain of Christian David as intriguing and tracassier; I myself am not easily shaken in my good opinion of him; and I find good old Dr. Rottler thinks with me. I have, however, obtained the appointment of a select committee of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, to enquire into the real nature of the claims of caste still subsisting, and to

report to me at my return, which with my own enquiries may, perhaps, land us nearer the truth. I find there is a vast deal to do connected with the southern missions; and have had many intricate and important points referred to me, both by the Committee, Dr. Rottler, and Mr. Haubroe. My journey I foresee will not be a party of pleasure, but I rejoice that I have not delayed it any longer.

I also received very uncomfortable accounts of the new Syrian Archbishop in Travancore, who was in open war with the English Missionaries and the two Metropolitans who had till now supported them. On the whole I had abundant reason to pray heartily for health, discretion, and firmness, since in no part of India had I found so much expected from me.

The Armenians in Madras are numerous, and some of them wealthy. Mr. Sam, the principal of them, is a very sensible and well-informed man, a great traveller, like most of his nation, and who, more than most of his nation, has mixed and still mixes in good European society. He told me some curious particulars concerning his country, partly on his own authority, partly as interpreter to Mar Simeon, a dignified ecclesiastic from a convent near Erivan, whom I met with at Bombay, and who now again called on me. At Bombay they had called him Bishop, but I now found that he was only Episcopal Commissary from the Archbishop of Shirauz. I thought him now, as I had previously done at Bombay, a plain, modest man, very grateful for attention, but far less well-informed and in

teresting than Mar Abraham of Jerusalem. He told me, what I was glad to learn, that the Russians governed their new conquests on the side of Georgia very well and justly, and that the poor oppressed Christians of Armenia earnestly prayed that they also might become the subjects of the Emperor, instead of Persia and Turkey. He too, as well as Mar Abraham and the Archbishop Athanasius, expressed a desire to attend the English Church service, and accordingly came the day on which I administered confirmation.

On the whole I cannot but hope that many good effects may arise from this approximation in courtesy, &c. of the Eastern Churches to our own; when they find that we desire no dominion over them, they may gradually be led to imitate us. But it is painful to see how slight causes, as in the case of Athanasius, may endanger this alliance.

During my stay in Madras, I paid a visit to the Prince Azeem Khân, uncle and guardian to the Nawab of the Carnatic, who is an infant. All my Clergy accompanied me in their gowns, and we were received with as much state as this little court could muster, but which need not be described, as it did not vary from that of other Mussulman princes, and reminded me very much of Dacca on a larger scale. I was chiefly struck with the great number of "Ullemah," learned men, or, at least, persons in the white dress of Mussulman Ullemah, whom we found there.

While I was conversing, to the best of my power, with the Prince, Mr. Robinson was talking with