Sta,—Mr. Sidnell asks what is the evidence for the claim
that " Java's Isle " is the original version and not " Ceylon's Isle " ? I was wrong when I said those were the words of the hymn as originally written. I should have said as originally published. He wrote the hymn in 1819 at Wrexham and it was sung the next day in the Church. This version, and possibly that said to have been printed in the Evangelical Magazine for July, 1821, had " o'er Ceylon's Isle," but as published in the edition of his Hymns in 1827 the words were " o'er Java's Isle." But this only strengthens my contention that the vileness that he had in mind was that of the whole human race and not of any particular part of it. The evidence can be found in the Revised Edition of jtdian's Dictionary of Hymnology published in 1825.—Yours, &c., CLEMENT F. ROGERS.
2 Raymond Buildings, Gray's Inn, W.C. z.
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