ADVERTISEMENT

TO THE AMERICAN EDITION.

This Gazetteer has been prepared upon the basis of a volume published in London, in 1828, by Mr. Charles Williams. In his preface, Mr. Williams has the following remarks. "Although this Gazetteer partially resembles one published some time since in America, its plan was laid several years before it was known that any similar work was extant; and a large part of it was prepared before that referred to was seen. The Editor, however, on making the discovery, availed himself of its aid, as well as of the assistance afforded by other missionary records to which he had access; but his principal resources have been found in the reports of the various societies whose stations he has described." The American Gazetteer referred to is the one which was prepared by the late Rev. Walter Chapin of Woodstock, Vermont, and published in 1824. prevent all collision with the respectable work of Mr. Chapin, those passages, which were copied by Mr. Williams from the publication of his predecessor, have been expunged in this edition; with a few exceptions in the first pages of the book— at the time of revising which the Editor was not aware of the use which Mr. Williams had made of the American Gazetteer. The description of all the stations, supported by the American

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Missionary Societies, with the exception of a part of the article upon Rangoon, have been entirely compiled or written by the Editor of this edition. The articles upon these stations constituted the principal part of the matter which Mr. Williams borrowed from Mr. Chapin. It is proper here to say that the British Gazetteer contained between two and three times the amount of matter embodied in Mr. Chapin's work. The latter was distinguished for accuracy, but it was little more than a book of annals. The work of Mr. Williams contains a great variety of anecdote, biography, and other instructive matter. In respect, also, to the efforts of all the European Societies, it is much more full and thorough.

The principal alterations and improvements in this edition are the following.

1. All the matter pertaining to the stations under the care of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, the American Baptist Board, the American Methodist and Episcopal Missionary Societies, with the exception mentioned above, has been entirely recompiled and rewritten.

2. Some of the more important articles respecting the stations of the Foreign Societies, such as Abyssinia, Egypt, Greece, Syria, Sierra Leone, Surinam, St. Thomas, Cape Town, Siam, and others, have also been prepared without aid from any preceding Gazetteer. The greater part of the article upon Liberia, was written by the Editor, several years since, and published in a periodical.

3. All the stations, of any importance, (and it is believed every one where an American or European missionary is employed) which have been established since 1828, are described in this volume.

4. The intelligence respecting all the stations is brought down to the present time, so far as materials were at hand to furnish the information. To give room for this additional matter, the delineation of several missions which have been relinquished, is here omitted, as well as some other matters of little interest or value.

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Several errors in geography and topography have been corrected. The Editor has had access, as he supposes, to all the valuable sources of information on this subject, which are to be found in this country.

The work upon which he has depended more than upon any other, is the London Missionary Register, a publication, which is not equalled in the Christian world for fulness and accuracy on the subject of missions. Much use has also been made of the Missionary Herald, the Reports of all the American and of the principal British Societies, a history of the American Methodist Missions published in New York in 1832, Tyerman and Bennet's Journal, Ellis's Polynesian Researches, Malte Brun's Geography, the American Encyclopædia, and the principal reviews and periodicals of the day.

The Editor is, however, far from supposing that the book is entirely accurate, or that it might not be amended in regard to the selection of matter. Still, he commits it with confidence to the Christian public, hoping, that through the Divine blessing, it may advance the cause of that Redeemer to whom all the nations of the earth are given as an inheritance.

Boston, August, 1832.

B. B. EDWARDS.

MISSIONARY GAZETTEER.

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AASIRVADA POORAM, or the Gondar, in Amhara, enjoying only Blessed village, a place in the district a nominal sovereignty. The country of Tinnevelly, near the southern ex- is mountainous, but in the vales the tremity of the peninsula of Hindoos- soil is fertile. The rainy season contan. In 1828, it was a wilderness, tinues from April to September. This and called by a name which signifies is succeeded, without interval, by a the "Devil's Tank." Now it is a cloudless sky, and a vertical sun; Christian village, consisting of 35 but cold nights constantly follow houses regularly built, with a neat these scorching days. The earth, and large church in front. The notwithstanding these days, is cold church is crowded with attentive hearers, and at the date of the last intelligence, six persons had been baptized, among whom was one of the head men.

ABUROW, OR ABORU, a village in the island of Harooka, which the Rev. Mr. Kam, of the L. M. S. occasionally visits. Here a native schoolmaster, Nicholas Kiriwinno, collected together the inhabitants, and, on the 18th of January, 1822, persuaded them to abandon idolatry, and to demolish their idols. He was equally successful at five different villages in the same island. The very ashes of objects esteemed sacred were cast into the sea. Harooka is one of the Moluccas, or Spice Islands, in the Indian Ocean, about S. Lat. 5°. E. Lon. 128°.

ABYSSINIA, an empire of Africa, 770 m. long, and 550 broad; bounded N. by Sennaar, E. by the Red Sea, W. and S. partly by Sennaar and Kordofan, and partly by barbarous regions, of which the names have scarcely reached us. It is divided into three separate states, Tigré, Amhara, and Efát. The capitol of Tigré is the ancient Axum. The king, or negus as he was formerly called, lives at

to the soles of the feet; partly owing to the six months' rain, when no sun appears, and partly to the perpetual equality of nights and days. No country in the world produces a greater variety of quadrupeds, both wild and tame. Birds are also numerous, and some are of an immense size and of great beauty. There is a remarkable coincidence between the customs in the court of ancient Persia and those of Abyssinia. The religion of the country is a mixture of Judaism and the Christianity of the Greek church; and the language bears a great affinity to the Arabic. The government is legally a despotism, but in an unsettled state; for the power of the emperor, is very weak, and the ras, or prince of the empire, and the chiefs of the provinces, are generally in enmity with one another. The people are of a dark olive complexion; their dress is a light robe, bound with a sash, and the head is covered with a turban. The customs of the Abyssinians are exceedingly savage. A perpetual state of civil war seems the main cause of their peculiar brutality. Dead bodies are seen lying in the streets, and serve as food for dogs and hyenas. Mar