not quite recovered from a fevere cold and rheumatism, attended with a fever.

Remember that I am always ready to relieve you at the chambers in the Loll Bazar *, and will cheerfully take the labouring oar next month if you please; especially, as I propose to spend the long vacation in a floating house, and to leave Calcutta as foon as the feffion is over; but I fhall return dead or alive before the 22d of October. I am inexpreffibly amused by a Perfian translation of an old Sanfcrit book, called Siry Bha'gwat, which comprizes almoft the whole of the Hindu religion, and contains the life and achievements of Crifhen; it is by far the moft entertaining book, on account of its novelty and wildness, that I ever read.

Farewell, and believe me, dear Sir,

Ever affectionately yours,

WILLIAM JONES.

* A house in Calcutta, where the puisné judges of the Supreme Court of Judicature attended by rotation in the evening, as justices of the peace.

Sir WILLIAM JONES to Dr. PATRICK

RUSSEL.

Calcutta, March 10, 1784.

You would readily excufe my delay in answering your obliging letter, if you could form an idea of the inceffant hurry and confufion, in which I have been kept ever fince my arrival in Bengal, by neceffary business, or neceffary formalities, and by the difficulty of fettling myself to my mind, in a country fo different from that which I have left. I am indeed at beft, but a bad correfpondent; for I never write by candle-light, and find so much Arabic or Perfian to read, that all my leisure in a morning, is hardly fufficient for a thousandth part of the reading that would be highly agreeable and useful to me; and as I purpose to spend the long vacation up the country, I wish to be a match in converfation with the learned natives, whom I may happen

to meet.

I rejoice that you are fo near, but lament that you are not nearer, and am not without hope, that you may one day be tempted to

די

vifit Bengal, where I flatter myself you will give me as much of your company as poffible.

Many thanks for your kind hints in regard to my health. As to me, I do not expect, as long as I stay in India, to be free from a bad digeftion, the morbus literatorum, for which there is hardly any remedy, but abstinence from too much food, literary and culinary. I rife before the fun, and bathe after a gentle ride; my diet is light and sparing, and I go early to reft; yet the activity of my mind is too ftrong for my conftitution, though naturally not infirm, and I must be fatisfied with a valetudinarian ftate of health. If you should meet with any curiofities on the coaft, either your botanical rambles or in reading, and will communicate them to our fociety, lately inftituted for enquiring into the history, civil and natural, the antiquities, arts, sciences, and literature of Afia, we shall give you our hearty thanks. There is an Abyffinian here, who knew Mr. Bruce at Gwender. I have examined him, and he confirms Bruce's account. Every day fupplies me with fomething new Life-V. II.

in

• D

in Oriental learning, and if I were to stay.

here half a century I fhould be continually amufed.

Sir WILLIAM JONES to

*

*

April 13, 1784.

I am difcouraged from writing to your as copiously as I wish, by the fear that my letter may never reach you. I inclofe however a hymn to the Indian cupid, which is here faid to be the only correct specimen of Hindu mythology that has appeared; it is certainly new and quite original, except the form of the ftanza, which is Milton's. I add the character of Lord Ashburton, which my zeal for his fame prompted me publish *

to

**Lord Ashburton died on the 18th of August 1783. His character, written by Sir William Jones, is published in vol. viii. of his works, page 538. I transcribe from it the last paragraph, as a proof of the gratitude and sensibility of the writer.

"For some months before his death, the nursery had "been his chief delight, and gave him more pleasure "than the cabinet could have afforded: but this parental

our patrons. Our meetings are well attended, and the fociety may really be faid, confidering the recent time of its eftablishment, to flourish.

We have been rather indisposed, the weather being fuch as we had no idea of in England, exceffive heat at noon, and an inceffant high wind from morning to night; at this moment it blows a hurricane, and my study reminds me of my cabin at sea. Our way of life however is quite pastoral in this retired fpot; as my prime favourites, among all our pets, are two large English sheep, which came with us from Spithead, and, having narrowly escaped the knife, are to live as long and as happily with us as they can; they follow us for bread, and are perfectly domeftic. We are literally lulled to fleep by Persian nightingales, and ceafe to wonder, that the Bulbul, with a thousand tales, makes fuch a figure in Oriental poetry. Since I am refolved to fit regularly in court as long as I am well, not knowing how foon I may be forced to remit my atten

to business, I shall not be at liberty to