142 CEYLON BRANCH — ROYAL ASIATIC SOCIETY, 



Holland, independent of the local government — for these 

 letters were sent in sealed, to be forwarded to Holland to- 

 gether with the Government despatches. There are extant 

 in the archives of the consistory here two or three bun- 

 dles of letters from the several Classis above named, being 

 their replies to the annual reports from Ceylon, from whence 

 it appears that the Classis took great concern in their colo- 

 nial churches. Not only did they welcome the periodical 

 intelligence as a pleasing indication of mutual correspond- 

 ence and feeling of brotherhood, but they also urged on the 

 Colombo and Batavia consistories, by an interchange of ac- 

 counts of their respective spheres of labour, to keep up in 

 like manner a mutual uninterrupted communication. The 

 Classis not only attended to the application from Ceylon to 

 urge on the Government to increase the supply of labour- 

 ers, and made such a choice of ministers as to them ap- 

 peared suitable, but also sympathized with the colonial 

 churches in all their difficulties, losses and discouragements, 

 rejoiced in their success, encouraged them by exhortations 

 and advice, and in return for the report received, gave their 

 distant brethren a general oversight of their own operations 

 and of church matters in the Fatherland, accompanied with 

 a copy of their Synodal Acts. The consistory of Colom- 

 bo, on the receipt of these replies and the Synodal Acts, 

 forwarded them to the clergy of Galle and Jaffna for their 

 perusal also. 



From the correspondence between the Colombo and the 

 Batavia consistory, it appears that the latter assumed a sort 

 of authority in church matters in Ceylon, which the former 

 would not acknowledge. This gave rise to occasional mis- 

 understandings, which again called forth lengthy expla- 

 nations, much to the prejudice of brotherly love ; so that in 

 one or two instances the Classis felt it their duty to take 

 notice of these disputes, and after desiring copies of their 

 mutual letters, to direct that an amicable settlement do 

 take place. One sore point with the Colombo consistory 

 for a considerable time was, that while they did not fail to 

 send to Batavia the annual ecclesiastical and educational 

 statements, just as detailed as those to the Directors and 

 the Classis, all they received in return was a short enume- 

 ration of the number and location of the ministers in Java 

 and its dependencies. When they remonstrated against 

 these unsatisfactory communications, the answer at one 

 time was, that to enter into details would be too inconve- 

 nient, as these eonid be sufficiently collected from the print- 



