ful boy with an air of very decided superiority. One of the gentlemen remarked to the Rajah, as he was caressing his daughter, that next year she would be shut up in prison! alluding to her marriage in which she was already betrothed, though only seven years of age! The Rajah assented, rather sadly as I thought, but added the perpetual native remark, "It is our custom, what can I do?"

After spending an hour in this way, the Resident privately intimated to one of the court our wish to retire, as it is contrary to native manners for the visitor to take his leave before he is dismissed: and they think nothing of spending two or three hours at a visit. Upon this the Rajah soon ordered the farewell ceremonies. A large silver salver was brought in by an attendant, from which the Rajah's uncle took a garland of flowers, and placed it over the head on the shoulders of the lady nearest his highness; a bunch of flowers was put into her hand, and rose water poured upon her handkerchief. A lump of pawn, which is some nasty stuff which the natives chew, was added; the lady then rose and curtsied to the Rajah, who returned a salaam. The same ceremony having been gone through with each individual in succession, we all rose together, and departed, wearing our garlands of flowers round our necks like so many aldermen in chains, and taking the first opportunity to dispose of the lumps of pawn to the native attendants. As we left the room his highness rose and retired another way, his servants shouting aloud all the names and titles by which this powerless potentate is pleased to distinguish himself.

The Rajah is of a kind and amiable temper, and fond of children. He has only two daughters, however, both of whom are now married to the same person. He caught hold of my lad as we were leaving the presence, and asked if he would stay with him, but the young gentleman made off in no very courtly style. His highness is certainly an intelligent man, and much better informed than most natives upon points of history and science. But all is neutralized by the deadly poison of idolatry. Profligacy of manners, rapacity and plunder, bribery and denial of justice, wicked and unmerciful tyranny, are the natural fruits of corrupt nature, when opportunity is afforded for their development. We ought no more to wonder at an idolatrous monarch being a curse to his subjects, than at a wild beast spreading desolation round his den. And such as the prince, such is every idolatrous subject in his sphere. Fraud and cruelty to others, intellectual darkness, and the absence of all domestic and personal happiness, are always to be traced wherever men are ignorant of "the grace of God that bringeth salvation."-Titus ii. 11. Every sojourner in India must be continually affected with the terrible exactness of the Apostle's description in

Ephesians iv. "The Gentiles walk in the vanity of their mind, having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart, who being past feeling have given themselves over into lasciviousness to work all uncleanness with greediness."

SKETCHES OF COLONIAL BISHOPS. No. 1.

Under this head we shall offer our readers, from time to time, some account of the goodly band who direct the Missionary operations of our Church in Foreign lands. The Colonial Bishops are the great boast of the modern Church of England. That, amid all our divisions and difficulties at home, so many, and such gifted, individuals have been found to go and trace her foundations in other countries, is a subject for the deepest thankfulness. The differences of opinion which may still prevail as to the best method of conducting a Missionary Society at home are made of comparatively little importance by the presence of these authorised leaders in the field abroad. Their faithfulness and zeal are now the great guarantees for the nature of the work which is conducted under their eye, and almost any form of subscription, by which minis ters are maintained in holy orders under the Bishop of the Colony, is deserving of support. We do not mean, of course, that it is of less consequence what sort of men we send out, but that if due precaution be taken on that head at the first, it is of little consequence how our home committees are composed, provided they only give due scope for the exercise of the Bishop's office over all their Missionaries.

No subject, therefore, is now of greater interest than the character and labours of these captains of our Missionary hosts and our hope is to give such sketches as may afford a pleasing insight into the mind and spirit with which they labour. Our first shall be borrowed from the lively pages of one who has himself pressed the veteran hand of the

Right Rev. JOHN STRACHAN, D.D., LORD BISHOP OF TORONTO.

"This venerable Bishop, now in his 71st year, presents a splendid example of what is termed a green old age. In fact, in constitution and capacity for hard work, even at his present time of life, there are few of his clergy who can equal him. On his visitations he will travel the roughest roads, never taking more than two meals a-day,—an early breakfast and a late dinner, pushing from place to place, and taking part in two or more services. The only thing which seems on such occasions to annoy him is, not the roughness of the road, not the

accidents of travel (which he is said not to like his missionary clergy to speak too much of in their journals), but any attempt to save him extra labour by joining two congregations into one, where he might think the settlers of a mere out-of-the-way station might be encouraged by a visit. This he never spares himself in rendering, content to rough it in the commonest log-house of the country in its wildest parts, and winning the confidence more especially of all the youngest children, who are his chosen favourites wherever he goes, and whom he possesses a singular facility of entertaining and attaching to himself. With a singularly firm hand he rules his diocese, combining kindness with strictness, to a degree rarely equalled, and perhaps never exceeded. When it pleases Providence to remove him from the earthly scenes of his labours, and for the benefit of the Church, may that day be far, very far distant,-it will be difficult to find his meet successor. He has had to 'battle the watch' for many an arduous day, piloting the vessel of the Church through every form and mode almost of opposition. And right bravely and firmly has he guided the helm. No epithet could be more deserved or more thoroughly earned than that which Sir Francis Bond Head had so happily bestowed upon him, of "the bold diocesan of the Church of England." Whether in defending her against outward aggression, or in fulfilling the duties of the Christian minister and bishop amongst her generally obedient, though often erring children, boldness and energy, tempered with kindness and gentleness, constitute the prominent elements of his character. When that fearful visitation, the cholera, devastated the country in 1832, and so scared the more timid, or the less armed with those aids which a lively faith alone can impart, that the persons to whom the work properly belonged shrunk even from the duty of burying the dead, the noble-minded prelate, then rector of Toronto, has been known, besides indefatigably visiting the deceased, and performing the usual solemn office over the departed, to have assisted in getting these unfortunates into their coffins, and afterwards in lending a hand to lower them into their graves, when no one stood by him but his curate and the worthy carpenter who made the coffins. And at the time of the Rebellion, the brave bishop was perfectly ready to have gone with the loyalists for their encouragement, and to have exposed himself to the rebel fire, but yielded to the affectionate entreaties of those whose feeling might have been well expressed in those pathetic words, 'Go not forth to the battle, that thou quench not the light of Israel.'

"I believe the bishop was performing the duties of his see gratuitously, being blessed with a competent fortune, the result in part, I believe, of his former exertions in a scholastic capacity, and from the natural in

crease in the value of his property, he having been one of the earliest settlers. A pleasing trait of his kind hearted good nature may be recorded here. His former pupils, having many of them risen to the highest offices of State in Canada, and having taken their place amongst the magnates of the land, determined to present their venerated preceptor with a piece of plate on his elevation to the episcopal dignity. Hereupon the bishop, by way of returning the compliment, invited them all to dinner; and on its being announced, the kind-hearted prelate, assuming for the moment the air of magisterial authority, said with inimitable good humour to the assembled band of judges and senators, Take your seats, boys!' The feelings excited by the expression on such an occasion, may be more easily imagined than described."Churchman in Canada, vol. 1, ch. ix.

This venerable Prelate is now (some two years later in life) arrived in England to appeal to the Church and Christian people of the land against the awful impiety which has swept away from GOD's service and honour the College established in connexion with the National Church by the charter of King George IV. In the last session of the Colonial legislature an act was passed, which came into force on the 1st January 1850, expressly excluding from the College religious instruction according to any form of doctrine whatever; prohibiting any form of prayer or any act of publick worship; and disqualifying any Graduate of the University, who may have taken Holy Orders, from having a voice in the Senate."

Such is the Bishop's own account of the act by which “King's College" has been transformed into the "anti-christian University of

Toronto."

The Bishop's object is now to "establish a University clearly and avowedly in connexion with our Church." More than £25,000 in money and land have been already subscribed in the Colony; and the aged but undaunted Bishop is here to solicit our contributions also. Honour and success to his undertaking!

HINDU LEGENDS, No. 2.

[The deepest compassion is due to the lost and benighted condition of the men who can believe in the tales, of which our kind friend and correspondent now affords us another specimen. We trust that none of our readers will overlook, as they peruse them, the duty devolving on those upon whom "the True Light now shineth," to send over and help the people who entertain such degrading ideas of the Divine Being, and His purposes to man.]

THE INCARNATION OF VISHNUH, AS A MAN-LION.

There are no histories which the Hindûs are so fond of hearing and reciting, as those which relate to the various incarnations of Vishnû: of these a specimen was given in a former number. A very celebrated Avatár, or incarnation, is that in which he is said to have appeared under the form of a man with the head of a lion. There was, in former times, a king whose name was Hiranya-Kásipu, who reigned over heaven, earth, and the abyss. He had obtained from Brahmâ the promise that no created being should have power to destroy him. This Titan, in the pride of power, displaced all the deities, who driven from their heavenly seats, wandered upon the earth in mortal shapes. It must be premised that he had obtained this pre-eminence by the performance of penances, which have power to wrest from the unwilling deity supernatural gifts!

This mighty monarch had a son called Prahlâda, who was taught by his Guru, or spiritual teacher, to adore Vishnû the supreme. It happened one day that this youth was brought into the presence of his father, who questioned him with regard to his studies. He replied that he had learnt to worship the imperishable Lord of the world. The irritated king argued with him in a variety of ways, saying that he himself was the supreme. But the youth only replied that Vishnû pervaded all the regions of the universe, and by his omnipresence influenced the conduct of all beings. Upon hearing this his father ordered him to be slain, but, though hundreds of weapons pierced him, he remained unhurt. The enraged king then ordered the serpents to bite him to death, but the boy, with mind steadfastly fixed upon the deity, remained unhurt by the envenomed fangs of the mighty snake-gods. The elephants who sustained the skies were then summoned to destroy him. But they, though in size like the lofty mountain-peaks, found their tusks blunted against the breast of the heroic youth, who continued to call to mind the many names of Vishnu. The king then ordered a mighty fire to be kindled, and the deity of the wind was summoned to blow it up into an all-consuming flame. But Prahlada declared that the fire was cool and fragrant, and that he was as though reposing on beds of lotus-flowers. The magicians were then called, and they, by their incantations, summoned up a terrific form beneath whose tread the earth was parched, and the heavens grew black at her presence. She smote him with her fiery trident, but the weapon was shivered into a hundred pieces, and the youth was still unhurt. The monarch then, his face darkened with fury, ordered him to be cast down from the top of his palace, which was many leagues in height; but the kindly earth received him gently on her lap. He was