1838.] 



Asialic Society of Bengal, 



247 



of comparative unworthiness to prevent esteeming a great source of 

 gratification. To you, Mr. President, who have so long added to the 

 duties of your high station in this settlement, a zealous and able ad» 

 ministration of the affairs of this Society,— as well as to your colleague 

 in both these respects, of whom, being now absent, (as I regret to per^ 

 ceive), from illness, I may speak with more freedom,— as one whose 

 distinguished scientific and literary attainments add lustre to his other 

 excellent qualities, — I am well pleased to leave this token of recollec- 

 tion of myself, whose friendship with both was begun in the academic 

 associations of a far different clime from this, in which again I hope 

 we may yet meet. To the other very learned and able Vice-Presi- 

 dents, and to all, whether countrymen or natives of India, who may 

 be led to take interest in the works you have mentioned with such 

 marked approbation, — I am glad to present, when absent, some 

 memento of my endeavours, such as they are, to instruct or to aid 

 them. Once more. Gentlemen, I thank you for your kind sentiments 

 towards me, and bid you most heartily farewell. 



(Signed) W. H. MiLt. 



Resolved, on the motion of Mr. "W. Cracroft, that the address and 

 the reply be entered in the outcoming volume of the Researches. 



The president moved that all farther business be adjourned to the 

 next meeting. 



The Secretary however ere he closed his boxes begged to be allow- 

 ed to mention one subject of their contents, that he could not allow 

 himself to withhold from his friend Dr. Mill, after the warm interest 

 he had just evinced in the progress of the investigations upon which 

 he had lately been engaged. A letter just received from the eminent 

 Pali scholar Mr. Tumour gave confirmation the most unequivocal to 

 the supposition just expressed by the learned Vice-President that the 

 ?a^s were monuments of the classical age of Indian history. Mr. 

 Tumour had proved from an ancient Pali work that Piyadasi was no 

 other than the great Asoka himself, who reigned paramount over 

 India in the third century before the Christian era. 



Neither could he allow himself to sit down on this last opportunity 

 of enjoying Dr. Mill's society without shewing him what would nearly 

 interest him in an equal degree, the fruit of Captain Burnes's re- 

 searches on the Indus, the first Sanskrit monument we had seen from 



