May 1861.] 



Biographical Memoir of Dr. Bottler. 3 



Tranquebar ; and by him Rottler and bis companion Gerlacb were 

 selected for that work. After a short visit to the Director at 

 Halle, they proceeded to Copenhagen, where they received ordina- 

 tion from Dr. Haubrce, the Bishop of Zealand on the 3rd of 

 November 1775, they sailed for India shortly afterwards, and ar- 

 rived at Tranquebar on the 5th of August 1776. 



Dr. Rottler's Indian Career extends over close upon sixty years, 

 the first half of it having been spent at Tranquebar, and the latter 

 half at Madras. 



Dr. Konig,* who had been a pupil of Linnaeus, and who was 

 already an accomplished Botanist, had preceded Rottler in the 

 mission by nearly ten years : he also found there M. M. Klein and 

 John, two others of the naturalist group, the latter of whom had 

 already been at Tranquebar six years.f The elder Kohlhoff was 

 at the time the patriarch of the mission, having been in India 

 since 1737, but owing to his great age and infirmities, M. Zeylin 

 had succeeded him in the superintendence. Swartz had at this 

 time firmly laid the foundations of his subsequently great influence 

 at Tanjore and Trichinopoly. 



Rottler appears to have given himself earnestly to the acquisi- 

 tion of the Tamil Language from the time of his arrival in the 

 country ; and he is said to have preached his first vernacular ser- 

 mon after less than a year's study. His name is not frequently to 

 be met with during the first few years of his work in India. We 

 find him making missionary tours here and there in company of 

 one or other of his fellow-labourers : and his Journals of these 

 tours are said to abound with the technical names of the plants 

 which he met with, to the study of which he had already become 

 warmly attached. 



From a letter written in 1779, apparently to a friend at Ramnad, 

 it would seem that Rottler had already made some progress in the 

 study of English. It contains the following characteristic passage ; 



* Besides the naturalist, who was for a while the Medical adviser 

 of this Mission, and not ordained, there was at the same time a Mis- 

 sionary of the same name in holy orders at Tranquebar. In the docu- 

 ments that I have consulted the accounts of these two individuals seem 

 to be hopelessly intermingled. The Clergyman died in 1795, after 27 

 years residence in India, 



t Hough, iii. :326, 7. 



