ROYAL ASIATIC SOCIETY. 



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creed, ten commandments and catechism were already translated 

 into Tamil and Singhalese. They had also for the use of 

 schools a catechism on the doctrines of Keligion, and the history 

 of the New Testament in Tamil, compiled by Baldeus. His 

 Tamil catechism on the Lord's Supper was translated into 

 Singhalese, as also from Dutch " The comfort to the Sick, " to 

 be read publicly in places of worship. 



A letter dated 1681, gives the following minute account : — 

 " During Divine Service, the children repeated out of " The 

 Comfort to the Sick," passages on the doctrine of religion, at 

 the conclusion of which adults were questioned on what they 

 had heard, and received further instruction. At each school 

 a register is kept of the names of all christians of that station, 

 as also of school children and their parents. These registers 

 are carefully inspected once a year, when the children born in 

 the intervals, as also persons who came to reside in the villages, 

 are noted down. Those who were lately admitted to school 

 are likewise marked, and a separate list is kept of all who have 

 left as largeerden. These are re-examined at each visitation to 

 see that they have not forgotten what was learned at school. 

 Against concubinage, a sin very eommon among this people, 

 severe penalties are appointed, whereby the evil is consider- 

 ably checked, and under God's blessing shall be still more 

 checked. They who desire to enter the married state appear 

 with their respective friends first before the schoolmaster and 

 other respectable inhabitants of the place ; the consent of the 

 friends of the betrothed being ascertained, and also the know- 

 ledge of the parties in the christian religion, and other particu- 

 lars according to written instructions given in Singhalese being 

 attended to by the master, the banns are published thrice, and 

 at the next following visitation of the clergyman, the marriage 

 is solemnized. From this brief account of the operation and 



