HISTORY OF MADAGASCAR. 
361 
purpose of public worship and instruction. The ordinary 
number of adult hearers was, therefore, much smaller than 
during the previous year. 
The Missionaries, unwilling to confine their efforts to 
the capital, and having received favourable reports of the 
salubrity of Fort Dauphin, on the south-eastern coast of 
the island, communicated to Radama their wishes for the 
establishment of a mission in that part of the island, and 
the sanction of the king was finally obtained. Bombatoc 
was also named some time afterwards as another eligible 
field for Missionary labours; but with regard to that part 
of Madagascar, Radama expressed his fears that the people 
were too superstitious to justify any attempt of the kind at 
that time. 
The Rev. J. Jeffreys had now been in Madagascar three 
years, one of which he had passed at Ambatomanga, super¬ 
intending a school there, and addressing the people in the 
neighbouring villages whenever opportunity offered. In 
the month of January, 1825, Mrs. Jeffreys had been attacked 
with severe and painful indisposition, in consequence of 
which, a voyage to Mauritius was found necessary for the 
recovery of her health; and in the month of June, Mr. 
Jeffreys and his family sailed from Tamatave for Port 
Louis. In this voyage, the inconvenience of their situation 
on board the vessel, with the unaccommodating disposition 
of the captain, were amongst the smallest of the trials they 
were called upon to sustain. On the tenth day after em¬ 
barking, both Mr. Jeffreys and his eldest daughter com¬ 
plained of pain in the head. Other symptoms of an alarm¬ 
ing nature succeeded, and the afflicted mother had to close 
the eyes of her dying child, at a time when its father could 
not with safety be made acquainted with its situation. A 
few days after, its body was committed to the silent deep ; and 
