On the 11th of December, Mrs. Wilson, wife of the Rev. Isaac Wilson, after resid. ing a few months at Tranquebar, in prepa ration for their labours among the Natives, was carried off by an inflaminatory attack and died in the triumph of the Faith, greatly regretted by the Native Christians and the Scholars, to whom she had much endeared herself. The Rev. Joseph Bailey, with his companions, appointed to Nellore, in Ceylon, arrived at Trincomalee, in the Palmira, on the 1st of December. London Missionary Society. The Madagascar Youth, Coutamauve, mentioned before, at p. 229 of this Number, died as the Andromache was weighing anchor. Mr. Humphreys, for Malacca, and Mr. Bankhead, for Calcutta, arrived at Madras on the 21st of July: the Lonach left Falmouth on the 21st of March of last year: the labours of the Missionaries on board had been very useful. On the 5th of August, Mr. Bankhead sailed for CalMr. Humphreys was to sail direct for Malacca about the 15th. While at Madras, Mr. Humphreys writes— cutta: I witnessed the horrid ceremony of swinging two Young Men, who, evidently under considerable trepidation of mind, came forward with hooks in their shoulders their bodies adorned with flowers; and carrying in a bandkerchief leaves and small, fruits, which they scattered among the thousands around them, as they swung in the air. It was truly heart-rending to see with what avidity the deluded multitude endeavoured to procure a few of the leaves or flowers which fell from the unhappy men: even the Children clapped their hands in ecstacy, as the poor wretches swung around them in the air. Many of the Natives, who bad what they call Holy Birds, held them up that they might see the men, and thus they supposed added to their sanctity. Oh when shall the period arrive. that these deluded creatures shall see the error of their ways, and turn unto the Lord' their God!" The Rev. James Skinner, Missionary at Surat, died on the 30th of October. The Deputation to the South Seas, with the Missionary and Artisans, arrived in safety, and health at Otaheite, on the 27th of September, after a fine passage of four months and nine days. The Deputation was to stay four or five months in Otaheite,, and then to visit the Leeward Islands. Mr. Williams, Missionary at Raiatea, proceeding to New South Wales for the recovery of his health, touched at Otaheite in his way, and spent a day with the Deputation, before he sailed in the Westmoreland, from on board of which vessel he transmitted the above information, in a Letter dated Nov. 24, at the Bay of Islands, in New Zealand. Intelligence has since arrived that King Pomare died of dropsy, on the 7th of December. His remains were deposited, on the 11th, in a new stone tomb, at the upper end of the large Place of Worship which he had erected. A Regency, consisting of the principal Chiefs, had been formed, the heir to the crown not being two years of age. Wesleyan Missionary Society, Mr. Bell, who sailed in November for the Mission in the Gambia, arrived at St. Mary's on the 28th of January. Messrs. Leigh, Walker, and Horton, who sailed for Australasia in April of last year arrived at Van Dieman's Land on the 8th of August, after a quick and pleasant passage of 96 days. Messrs. Leigh and Walker proceeded forward to Sydney, which they reached on the 16th of September. Mr. Walker entered on his Mis sion to the Aborigines of New South Wales. On the 21st of October, Mr. Leigh writes that he was about to sail for New Zealand, in order to attempt a Settlement at Mercury Bay. Mr. White and Mr. and Mrs. Turner sailed from Gravesend in the beginning of February, in the Deveron, Captain Wilson, for New South Wales, in order to join Mr. and Mrs. Leigh in the New Zealand Mission. Mr. and Mrs. Gick arrived at New Providence, in the Bahamas, on the 20th of January; and Messrs. Oke, Crofts, and Parkinson, at St. Kitts, in the Philip Pro theroe, on the 9th of February. *Australasia. His Excellency Sir Thomas Brisbane, Governor of New South Wales, arrived at Sydney on the 7th of November. The late Governor, Macquarrie, was to set sail, on his return, in January. Miscellanies. CRUELTIES CONNECTED WITH HINDOO SUPERSTITION. (With an Engraving of the Preparations for burning a Hindoo Widow.) THE accompanying Engraving is taken from a Drawing by a Native Artist. It represents the preparations made for burning a Widow. She is seated on the pile, with the head of the corpse in her lap. Brahmins, or Priests, on each side, are repeating prayers. Some pagodas, or idolhouses, with native habitations, are seen in the back ground; and, in the front, part of the Ganges, or some tank of water. The people are quietly looking on. Perhaps the Artist meant thereby to insinuate that every thing was done with calmness and solemnity on these occasions : but if that be so, nothing but dreadful superstition could deaden the feelings in this manner, and make men look with barbarous indifference on a poor Woman deluded into self-murder. But these scenes are generally scenes of tumult and noise, particularly when fire is put to the pile: and the noise is very vehement when Europeans are present, in order to drown the cries of the wretched victim. Mr. Ward, whom we have often quoted on the subject of the Hindoos, has a Letter in the Volume published about the time of his return to India, on the Cruelties connected with Hindoo Superstition. We shall here extract the chief parts of that Letter. I am not aware how long the tribe of Rajpoots have been in the practice of putting to death their female offspring. It must have arisen at the time when the Hindoo Monarchs of this tribe reigned in Western India. A few children were saved by the benevolent efforts of Colonel Walker, when in India; but, since his return, the very families among whom the horrible practice had ceased, have again returned to the work of murder-not one survives. In and around Benares, infanticide is practised to a horrible extent. Instigated by the Demon of Superstition, many Mothers, in fulfilment of a vow entered into for the purpose of pro'curing the blesssing of children, drown their first-born, in the Burrampooter and other rivers of India. When the child is two or three years old, the Mother takes it to the river, encourages it to enter as though about to bathe it, but suffers it to pass into the midst of the current, when she abandons it; and stands an inactive spectator, beholding the struggles and hearing the screams of her perishing infant! At Saugor Island, formerly, Mothers were seen casting their living offspring among a number of alligators; and standing to gaze at these monsters quarrelling for their prey, beholding the writhing infant in the jaws of the successful animal, and standing motionless while it was breaking the bones and sucking the blood of the poor innocent! What must be that Superstition, which can thus transform a being, whose distinguishing quality is tenderness, into a monster more unnatural than the tiger prowling through the forest for its prey! At the Annual Festival in honour of Maha Deva (the Great God) many persons once. are suspended in the air, by large hooks through the integuments of the back, and swung round for a quarter of an hour, in honour of this deity: I have seen these poor wretches go through this, and the than following ceremony, more Others have their sides pierced, and cords are introduced between the skin and the ribs, and drawn backward and forward, while these victims of superstition dance through the streets. I have seen others cast themselves from a stage ten feet from the ground, upon open knives inserted in packs of cotton: sometimes one of these knives enters the body, and the poor wretch is carried off to expire. At the same festival, numbers have a hole cut through the middle of the tongue, in which they insert a stick, a ram-rod, or any thin sub. stance, and thus dance through the streets, in honour of the same deity. At the close of the festival, these Devotees dance on burning coals, their feet being uncovered. Thousands of Hindoos enter upon pilgrimages to famous temples, to consecrated pools, to sacred rivers, to forests rendered sacred as the retreats of ancient sages, to places remarkable for some natural phenomena, &c. These pilgrimages are attended with the greatest fatigue and deprivations; frequently with starvation, disease and premature death. Hundreds are supposed to perish on these journeys; and some of these places, the resort of pilgrims, become frightful cemeteries-to one of which, that of Juggernaut in Orissa, Dr. Buchanan has very properly given the name of "Golgotha." I once saw a man making successive prostrations to Juggernaut; and thus measuring the distance between some place in the north, down to the temple of Juggernaut which stands nearly at the southern extremity of India. The Hindoo Writings encourage persons afflicted with incurable distempers to cast themselves under the wheels of the car of Juggernaut, or into some sacred river, or into a fire prepared for the purpose; promising such self-murderers, that they shall rise to birth again in a healthful body, whereas, by dying a natural death, they would be liable to have the disease perpetuated in the next and succeeding births. Multitudes of lepers and other children of sorrow, perish annually in these prescribed modes. Mr. W. Carey, of Cutwa, the second son of Dr. Carey, states that he was one morning informed that some people had dug a deep hole in the earth, not far from his own house, and had begun to kindle a fire at the bottom. He immediately proceeded to the spot, and saw a poor leper, who had been deprived of the use of his limbs by the disease, roll himself over and over till at last he fell into the pit amidst the flames. Smarting with agony, his screams became most dreadful. He called upon his family, who surrounded the pit, and entreated them to deliver him from the flames. But he called in vain. His own sister seeing him lift his hands to the side, and make a dreadful effort to escape, pushed him back again; where, these relations still coolly gazing upon the sufferer, he perished, enduring indescribable agonies. O Lord, remember the covenant, for the dark places of the earth are full of the habitations of cruelty-that covenant, in which the Heathen are given to Thy Son for His inheritance. Every Hindoo, in the hour of death, is hurried to the side of the Ganges, or some other sacred river, if near enough to one of these rivers, where he is laid in the agonies of death, exposed to the burning sun by day, and to the dews and cold of the night. The water of the river is poured plentifully down him, if he can swallow it; and his breast, forehead, and arms, are besmeared with the mud of the river; for the very mud of the Ganges is supposed to have purifying properties. Just before the soul quits the body, he is laid on the earth, and then immersed up to the middle in the stream; while his relations stand round him, tormenting him in these his last moments with superstitious rites, and increasing a hundred fold the pains of dying. Very often, where recovery might be reasonably hoped for, these barbarous rites bring on premature death. It is pretty certain, that many private murders, using these rites, are perpetrated. How different the hopes-how strikingly different the departure of a dying Christian! Human sacrifices are enjoined in the Sacred Books, and made a part of the Hindoo Superstition in very early times. They describe the rites to be observed at the sacrifice of a man; and declare the degree of merit attached to such a sacrifice, compared with the offering of a goat, a buffalo, &c. The Hindoos speak of an instrument used in times not very remote,by which, with a jerk of his foot, a man lying prostrate before an image, might cut off his own head. An English Officer assured a friend of mine, that he saw a Hindoo sacrifice himself on a boat in the Ganges; laying his head over the side of the boat, with a scymitar he aimed a dreadful blow at his own neck; and, though he failed to sever the head from the body, he fell senseless into the river and perished! Human sacrifices not very different from these are still very common, especially at Allahabad. While the late Dr. Robinson of Calcutta resided at that place, twelve men were immolated at once, as sixteen females had been. Earthen pans were fastened to a stick tied to the waist. As long as these pans remained empty, they kept the men afloat; but each man with a cup continued filling the pans from the river, and as soon as filled they dragged the victim to the bottom. But the most horrible of all the immolations among the Hindoos, is the burning alive of Widows. Between Eight and Nine Hundred, in the presidency of Bengal alone, every year!! This is the official statement, signed by the English Magistrates. How many in the Presidencies of Madras and Bombay? And then how many more where the British Power does not extend? Where shall we find any thing like this in all the annals of time? Let us suppose that in each of the other Presidencies four hundred each year are immolated; and five hundred in all the other parts of India; and then we have the awful spectacle of Two THOUSAND WIDOWS burnt or buried alive every year in India! Search every human record, and bring forward every thing that has ever been practised by the scalping Indian, the cannibals in the South Seas, &c. and all is civilization, and the most refined benevolence, compared with this. Let all these Two Thousand widows be led along the streets of Calcutta, and sacrificed on the esplanade there, in one funeral pile! Not one drop more of blood would be shed, nor one more agony inflicted. But at hearing the news of such an immolation as this, all 264 CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE CHURCH MISSIONARY SOCIETY, [JUNE, a transaction. Britain would rise in consternation and horror; and protest in a voice loud enough to be heard at the extremity of the poles, against the repetition of so horrible Oh that I could collect all the shrieks of these affrighted victims, all the innocent blood thus drank up by the devouring element, and all the wailings of these ten thousand Orphans, losing Father and Mother on the same day, and present them at our Missionary Anniversaries, and carry them through every town of the United Kingdom. I should surely, then, be able to awaken every heart to the are heard. Such are the horrors attendant upon this organized system of departure from God! And thus are fulfilled the words of the Psalmist, Their sorrows shall be multiplied that hasten after another god. CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE Church MISSIONARY SOCIETY, 90 CONGREGATIONAL COLLECTIONS. At Merthyr Tydvil (Glamorganshire, by} At Church Langton (Leicestershire) by 3 Rev. Legh Richmond At Marston Trussells (Northamptonsh,) SCHOOL FUND. • 70 0 0 - 185 88 By Lincoln Association, · 61 9 7 - 323 14 6 · 600- 30 0 0 135 8 6 1234 17 5 • 100 D 01070 2 5 - 151 5 6 5080 7 10 COLLECTIONS. Gleed, Miss, Donnington 600 67 13 6 · 48 6 18 5 4 106 7 19 For Richard Waldo Sibthorp, Fourth Year, 5. By Manchester Association, For W. Wilkinson Fifth Year, Page 448, Vol. 1821. It was George Garrow, Esq., a Member of the Madras Corresponding Com. mittee of the Church Missionary Society, who presented to the Society the cast of Siva and Parvati: he had received it as a gift from a Brahmin.-136, col. 3. for John Pridmore, read John Pridham.176, col. 2. In the 250l, received from the Shropshire Association, was included the sum of 34. from Ludlow; being a71. for the General Fund, and sl. for the School Fund.-The total produce of the Missionary Box at Mr. Broughton's, Holborn Bridge, should have been stated as gol. gs. 184, col. I, 1.47. for Parian, read Pariar.186, col. 9. for My Letter to those persons, at the be ginning of Mr. Dealtry's Address, read My Lord-To those persons.16, col. 1, The total of the Gloucestershire Association should have been 37754. 66. 118, 2 JULY, 1822. Biography. MEMOIR OF THE HON. ELIAS BOUDINOT, LL.D. PRESIDENT OF THE AMERICAN BIBLE SOCIEty, who died OCT. 24, 1821, IN HIS EIGHTY-SECOND YEAR. THE HE distinguished subject of this Memoir was not engaged in the actual labour of a Missionary; yet the steady zeal, with which he devoted his eminent talents and commanding influence to the advancement of True Religion, both among Christians and Heathens, demand from us a tribute of respect to his memory. It is but seldom, indeed, that we can put on record such facts as are here briefly stated; and we trust that not a few of our Readers will be stirred up, by the example of this devoted Christian, to a more zealous discharge of their stewardship. · Dr. Boudinot was born in Phila. delphia on the 2d of May, A. D. 1740. He was descended from one of those pious Protestants, who, at the revo cation of the Edict of Nantes, fled from France to America. He had the advantage of a classical education, and pursued the study of the law under the direction of the Hon. Richard Stockton, a member of the first American Congress, whose eldest sister he afterward married. Shortly after his admission to the Bar of New-Jersey, Dr. Boudinot rose to the first degree in his profession. Early in the revolutionary war, he was appointed by Congress to the trust of Commissary-General of Prisoners. In the year 1777, he was chosen a Member of the National Congress; and, in the year 1782, was elected the President of that body. In this capacity he had the honour and happiness of putting his signature to the Treaty of Peace, which for ever established his country's independence. On the return of peace, he resumed the practice of the law. It was not long, however, before he was called to a more important station: on the adoption of the present Constitution of the United July, 1822. States, the confidence of his fellowcitizens allotted him a seat in the House of Representatives: in this honourable place he was continued for six successive years. On quitting it, to return once more to the pursuits of private life, he was appointed by that consummate judge of character, the first President of the United States, to fill the office of the Director of the National Mint, vacated by the death of the celebrated Rittenhouse: this trust he executed with exemplary fidelity during the administrations of Washington, of Adams, and (in part) of Jefferson. Resigning this office, and seeking seclusion from the perplexities of public life, and from the bustle and ceremony of a commercial metropolis, he fixed his residence in the city of Burlington: here, surrounded by affectionate friends, and visited by strangers of distinctionengaged much in pursuits of biblical literature-practising the most liberal and unceremonious hospitalityfilling up life in the exercise of the highest Christian Duties meekly and quietly communicating and receiving happiness of the purest kind he sustained, and has left such a 2 M -- |