that prevails. Whether it is the relaxing influence of the climate, or what, I do not know; but there is every thing here to depress the spirits; all nature droops."

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April 27-Sunday. Enjoyed some solemn moments this morning. This is my first Sabbath in India. May all the time I pass in it be a Sabbath of heavenly rest and blessedness to my soul! Preached on Luke x. 41, 42; there was attention. After din

ner, went to Black Town, to Mr. Lovelace's Chapel. I sat in the air at the door, enjoying the blessed sound of the Gospel on an Indian shore, and joining with much comfort in the song of divine praise."

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April 28. Had much conversation with Dr. Kerr. At night, the Portuguese children sung 'Before Jehovah's awful throne,' very sweetly: it excited a train of affecting thoughts in my mind. Wide as the world is thy command'-and therefore it is easy for thee to spread abroad thy holy name. But oh, how gross the darkness here! The veil of the covering cast over all nations seems thicker here; the fiends of darkness seem to sit in sullen repose in this land."

April 30.- Walked by moonlight, reflecting on the Mission. My soul was at first sore tried with desponding thoughts; but God wonderfully assisted me to trust him for the wisdom of his dispensations. Truly, therefore, I will say again, 'Who art thou, O great mountain; before Zerubbabel thou shalt become a plain.' How easy for God to do it; and it shall be done in due time and even if I never should see a native converted, God may design. by my patience and continuance in the work to encourage future Missionaries. But what surprises me is the change of views I have here from what I had in England. There my heart expanded with hope and joy at the prospect of the speedy conversion of the Heathen; but, here, the sight of the apparent impossibility requires a strong faith to support the spirits."

After being detained a short time at Madras, the fleet sailed for the Hoogley; during which voyage,

Mr. Martyn again suffered, indescribably, from the relaxation of his frame. He rose in the morning with the deepest melancholy, and seemed, as he expresses it, left without a motive. "He looked forward to an idle, worthless life spent in India to no purpose. Exertion seemed to him like death-indeed absolutely impossible. But it pleased God at length to give him deliverance, by enabling him to exercise faith, and to remember that, as a sinner saved, he was bound to evince the most fervent gratitude to God.”

The great Pagoda of Juggernaut, now becoming distinctly visible, was a sight sufficient to rouse Mr. Martyn from almost any depths of depression, either of body or mind. Contemplating that horrid altar of blood and impurity, his soul was excited to sentiments of the tenderest commiseration for the children of wretched India, "who had erected such a monument of her shame on the coast, and whose Heathenism stared the stranger in the face."

Leaving Juggernaut behind, a tremendous hurricane, such as is often experienced in those latitudes, descended on the fleet, and, in an instant, every sail of the Union was rent in pieces. All was uproar in the ship; nor was there resource but to run before the gale; which had they been further on their way, must have driven them upon some sand-banks at the mouth of the Hoogley. Incessant lightning rendered the scene more dreadful. When nature began to shrink at dissolution, Mr. Martyn was much reconciled, he says, to it, by such thoughts as these. "What have I bere? Is it not better to go, and to be with Jesus, and to be from my body of sin and death?" But, "for the sake of the poor unconverted souls in the ship," he adds, "I prayed earnestly for her preservation."

To this danger, from which Mr. Martyn was mercifully delivered, another of a yet more formidable nature succeeded, when he had entered the mouth of the Hoogley, and was rejoicing in the happy termination of an eventful voyage.

On the 13th of May, the Union struck on a sandbank, near the Diamond Harbour; where her situation was awfully dangerous: for night came on, and the wind increased. The vessel was considered by the captain as lost, and all the passengers were in the utmost terror. Mr. Martyn "retired for prayer, and found his soul in peace;" nor was the fervent prayer of this righteous man ineffectual. After continuing in extreme peril for two hours, the ship very unexpectedly floated into deep water: thus being yet more deeply convinced that in God and in his hand were all his ways, and having his heart humbled in thankfulness to him as the author of all his mercies, Mr. Martyn arrived at Calcutta, from whence he thus disclosed the sentiment of his heart to a beloved Christian friend:

"My long and wearisome voyage is concluded, and I am at last arrived in the country, where I am to spend my days in the work of the Lord. Scarcely can I believe myself to be so happy as to be actually in India; yet this hath God wrought. Through changing climates, and tempestuous seas, he hath brought on his feeble worm to the field of action; and will, I trust, speedily equip me for my work. I am now very far from you all, and as often as I look round and view the Indian scenery, I sigh to think of the distance that separates us. Time, indeed, and reflection have, under God, contributed to make the separation less painful; yet, still my thoughts recur with unceasing fondness to former friendships, and make the duty of intercession for you a happy privilege. Day and night, I do not cease to pray for you, and I am willing to hope that you too remember me daily at the throne of grace. Let us not, by any means, forget one another; nor lose sight of the day of our next meeting. We have little to do with the business of this world. Place and time have not that importance in our views that they have in those of others; and, therefore, neither change of situation nor lapse of years should weaken our Christian attachments. I see it to be my

business to fulfil, as a hireling, my day; and, then, to leave the world. Amen. We shall meet in happier regions. I believe that those connexions, and comforts, and friendships, I have heretofore so desired, though they are the sweetest earthly blessings, are earthly still."

MEMOIR.

PART II.

FOR many years supplications had incessantly ascended up to heaven from Christians in India, for the spiritual prosperity of that benighted land; and for a considerable time a stated weekly meeting had been held at Calcutta, on the recommendation of Dr. Buchanan and Mr. Brown, for the express purpose of beseeching the Lord to send forth labourers into those fields which were white unto the harvest. What a manifest answer to these petitions was the appearance of Mr. Martyn among those who, to this effect, had been offering up their prayers.-One* of these, a name dear to all who admire zeal, integrity, liberality, and an entire consecration of bright talents in the cause of Christian philanthropy, was now about to commence his researches into the state of religion among the Syrian Christians: and the ship which conveyed him on that interesting errand, left the mouth of the Hoogley as the Union entered it. To him, doubtless, the sight of Mr. Martyn would have seemed an answer to prayer, demanding the warmest thanksgiving: the voice of a Christian Missionary would have been sweeter in his ears than those sounds which he afterward heard in Travancore, from the bells among the hills, and which reminded him of another country.

* Dr. Buchanan.