Sir William Jones to William Shipley*, Efq.

Crishna-nagur, Oct. 5, 1786.

I blush, my dear Sir, in reading a

fecond or third time with increafing delight, your excellent letters from Maidstone, when I compare the dates of them with that of my answer. Various, however, are the causes which oblige me to be an indifferent and flow correfpondent.; firft, illness, which had confined me three months to my couch, where first letter found me on the great river; your next, the difcharge of an important duty, which falls peculiarly heavy on the Indian judges, who are forced to act as juftices of the peace in a populous country where the police is deplorably bad; then the difficult

*William Shipley, Esq. brother to the late Bishop of St. Asaph, and now in his 89th year. He suggested the idea of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Commerce, &c. which was established in 1753, and in the following year, a gold medal was voted to him by the society, with an inscription:

I

may

ftudy of Hindu and Mohammedan laws, in two copious languages, Sanfcrit and Arabic, which ftudies are infeparably connected with my public duty, and may tend to establish by degrees, among ten millions of our black fubjects, that fecurity of defcendable property, a want of which, as you justly observe, has prevented the people of Asia from improving their agriculture and mechanical arts; laftly, add (though rather an amusement than a duty) my pursuit of general literature, which I have here an opportunity of doing from the fountain head, an opportunity, which if loft, may never be recovered. When I accept therefore with gratitude the honour offered me by your young Hercules, the MaidRtone Society, of being one of their corref ponding members, I cannot indulge a hope of being a diligent or useful correfpondent, unless any discovery should be made by our Indian Society, which I may think likely to be of use in our common country. Your various papers I have diftributed among thofe, who seemed the likelieft to avail themselves

of the rules and hints which they contain. The rapidity of the Ganges, makes it extremely difficult to rescue the unhappy persons who are overset in boats, especially at the time of the bore*, when fuch accidents most ufually happen; but I am confident that the methods prescribed in the little work which you fent me, will often be falutary even here. Dr. Johnson's tract I have now lent to a medical friend of great ability; and I am particularly interested in the fecurity of our prifons from infection, to which indeed they are lefs liable in this climate, from our practice of fleeping in a draught of air whenever it can be had. Without this habit, to which I am now enured, we fhould never be free from putrid disorders.

*

*

Should your fociety be fo ex

tended as to admit all Kent, you will, I truft,

*The bore, is an expression applied to a peculiar swell in the Hughli river, occasioned by the rapid influx of the tide; it breaks in shallow water along the shore, and no boat can resist its violence. The noise of its approach is heard at a distance of some miles, and the boats to

have an excellent member in one of my oldeft college friends, Doctor Breton, of Broughton, near Ashford, who has left no path of science or literature unexplored. We fhall print our tranfactions with all fpeed confiftent with accuracy; as all our members, including even our printer, are men of business, in commerce, revenue, or judicature, we cannot proceed very rapidly, either in giving the public the tracts we have already collected, or in adding to our collection.

Sir William Jones to Sir J. Macpherfon, Bart. Calcutta, Nov. 1786.

The fociety heard with pleasure, the curious account of the Lama's inaugur ation; and the firft fheet of their tranfactions is printed.

*

Be affured, that I will ever remember the contents of your own letter;

avoid it are rowed into deep water, where the agitation is considerable, but not dangerous. The bores are highest about the equinoxes, and at the middle periods between them cease altogether.

and accept my thanks for the pleasure which I have received from that of Mr. Adam Fer

gufon to you. One fentence of it is so wife, and fo well expreffed, that I read it till I had it by heart." Juftice to the ftranger," &c.

I am correcting proofs of our Tranfactions, which will, I hope, fatisfy Mr. Ferguson as to the theology of the Hindus. By rifing before the fun, I allot an hour every day to Sanferit, and am charmed with knowing fo beautiful a fifter of Latin and Greek.

*

Magnum vectigal eft parfimonia, is an aphorifm which I learned early from Cicero, The public, if they are grateful, must wish that you had attended as vigilantly to your own vectigal, as you have wifely and fuccessfully to theirs.

In September, Lord Cornwallis arrived at Fortwilliam, with the appointment of Governor-General; and the writer of these sheets,

who accompanied him to India, had the hap