1834.] Account of the Christians on the Malabar Coast, 94 



resorts of ferocious animals only. That when the bridge on the wes- 

 tern branch of the Cuveri shall have been completed, I shall have 

 been the instrument of opening communications vi^hich had long 

 ceased to exist, to the trader and the traveller; that the lives of man 

 and beast will no longer be endangered in the passage of the rapid 

 &nd deep Caver i ; and although I might enumerate many otherpub- 

 lic advantages which have been, and will be derived from my exer- 

 tions, I shall only further allude to the facility which now attends 

 the visits of the curious to the celebrated falls of the Cuveri on each 

 of the branches, by which the sacred island of Sivasamudram is 

 formed. 



Finally, I may claim the merit of disinterestedness. I have 

 sh^n at how great pecuniary sacrifices and personal vexations and 

 trouble the works have been perfomed ; and I have no prospect of 

 future recompense, nor do I ask any. The island of Sivasamudram^ 

 and the tract of jungle granted to me on the original agreement, 

 were rated in the books of the Collector at 4,840 rupees per annum ; 

 whereas, when I took charge of these grants, they did not yield to 

 government a revenue of a hundred rupees a year ; even now, when 

 a great part of the jungle has been cleared, both on the island and 

 the tract above-mentioned, I do not receive from them more than 

 eight hundred rupees per annum, which may be increased, when the 

 jungle IS entirely removed, to one thousand eight hundred rupees. 



My monthly disbursements for charitable purposes,- the expenses 

 of the pagodas, and on various other accounts, are not less tlian six 

 hundred rupees, and the expenditure can never be less, while the se- 

 veral establishments of the island are kept up. 



(Signed) T. Ram AS WAMi, 



Jdghirddr. 



Sivasamudrarrif Oct. 26, 1830. 



III. — An Historical account of the Christians on the Malabar 

 Coast y hy the Venerable Archdeacon Robinson, a. m. 



Part 2d. 



( Continued from the 13th page of our last Number.) 



Before we proceed to the narrative of events which followed the 

 arrival of the Portuguese among the chsistians of St. Thomas, it 

 will be useful to say a few words of their ecclesiastical dependence 

 at that period. I follow with slight variations the narrative of 

 La Croze and Geddes. 



Gouvea, the Portuguese historian, relates in accordance with the 

 ^radition of the country, that on the destruction of Meliapoor, the 



