Walter Raleigh: it is, like most posthumous works, incorrect; but contains, with some rubbish, a number of wise aphorisms and pertinent examples; it is rather the common-place book of some statesman, than a well digested treatise; but it has amused me on a second reading, and I hope it will amuse a few of your leisure moments.

CV.

To Dr. Patrick Russel.

Crishnagur, Sept. 8, 1785.

YOUR two kind letters found me overwhelmed with the business of a severe sessions and term, which lasted two months, and fatigued me so much, that I was forced to hasten from Calcutta as fast as winds and oars could carry me. I am now at the ancient university of Nadeya, where I hope to learn the rudiments of that venerable and interesting language, which was once vernacular in all India, and in both the peninsulas with their islands. Your pursuits must be delightful, and I shall be impatient to see the fruit of your learned labours. Our society goes on slowly; and hot-bed fruits are not so good to my taste as those which ripen naturally.

Dr. Koenig's loss will be severely felt; he was a

valuable man, with as much simplicity as nature herself, whose works he studied. Do you know when his books are to be disposed of? I should wish to purchase his Linnæus.

CVI.

To Charles Chapman, Esq.

Crishnagur, Sept. 28, 1785. I AM proceeding slowly, but surely, in this retired place, in the study of Sanscrit; for I can no longer bear to be at the mercy of our pundits, who deal out Hindu law as they please, and make it at reasonable rates, when they cannot find it ready made. I annex the form adopted by us for the oaths of Mussulmans: you will, in your discretion, adopt or reject it; and if you can collect from Mahesa pundit, who seemed a worthy honest man, how Hindu witnesses ought to be examined, and whether the Brahmins can give absolution (I think they call it pryarchitt) for perjury, and in what case, you will greatly oblige me, and contribute to the advancement of justice.

CVII.

To John Macpherson, Esq.

Calcutta.

LADY Jones and myself received much benefit from the dry soil and pure air of Crishnagur: how long my health will continue in this town, with constant attendance in court every morning, and the irksome business of justice of peace in the afternoon, I cannot foresee. If temperance and composure of mind will avail, I shall be well; but I would rather be a valetudinarian all my life, than leave unexplored the Sanscrit mine which I have just opened.

I have brought with me the father of the university of Nadeya, who, though not a Brahmin, has taught grammar and ethics to the most learned Brahmins, and has no priestly pride, with which his pupils, in general, abound.

CVIII.

To Sir John Macpherson, Bart.

MY DEAR SIR,

:

Phoenix Sloop, Feb. 5, 1786.

HAD I known where Captain Light* lived in Calcutta, I would not have troubled you with the annexed letter; but I must request you to forward it to him it is an answer to an excellent letter from him, which I received near a twelvemonth ago. I anxiously hope he has completed (what no other European could begin) a version of the Siamese code.

My voyage to the eastern coast, will, I trust, be very pleasant, and I hope we shall make our part good against the scoundrel Peguers; though, if we descry a fleet of boats, I believe it will be wiser to retreat on the wings of the Phoenix; for I am not poet enough to believe, that another will rise from her ashes.

I lament that our respective engagements have prevented our meeting often, since the end of the rains; but six or seven hours in the morning, and two or three in the evening, spent in unremitted labour, for the last three months, fatigued me so

Captain Light was appointed superintendent of a new settlement at Penang, or Prince of Wales's Island.

much, that I had no leisure for society-scarcely any for natural repose. My last act was to sign our letter to your board on the subject of our salaries; and I would have called upon you, to expostulate amicably on the measure you had pursued, if I had not wished to spare you the pain of defending indefensible steps, and the difficulty of finding reasons to support the most unreasonable conduct. Many passages in the letter were softened by my brethren; for I, who have long been habituated to ancient simplicity, am ever inclined both to write and speak as I think or feel; and I should certainly have asked, if we had conversed on this matter, whether distressing and pinching the judges, and making them contemptible in the eyes of the natives and of their own servants, was, as you expressed yourself last summer, assisting them with heart and hand; or whether forming resolutions, as the sub-treasurer wrote me word three weeks ago concerning them, of which they were the last men in the settlement to hear, was intended as a return for that perfect cordiality, as far as honesty permitted, which I had assured you and Mr. Stables, to be one of the golden rules which I had early resolved to pursue in my judicial character.

In a word, the measure is so totally indefensible, that it would have given me as much pain as yourself, to have discussed it. I have marked the progress of this business from the morning when I received Mr. M.'s note; and I am well persuaded, that the invasion of our property was not an idea conceived or approved by you, but forced on you by some financier, who was himself deluded by a conceit of impartiality; not considering that the