To the Rev.A.Brandram (ENDORSED:recd.June 21,1837)SALAMANCA,June 7,1837.
REVD.AND DEAR SIR,-I arrived at Salamanca about a fortnight since,in safety and in tolerable good health.I shall defer for a few days communicating the particulars of my journey,though they are not destitute of interest,having at present information to afford which I consider of more importance,and which I hope will afford the same satisfaction to yourself and our friends at home which I myself experience in communicating them.
Some days previous to my departure from Madrid I was very much indisposed.Owing to the state of the weather -for violent and biting winds had long prevailed -I had been attacked with a severe cold which terminated in a shrieking disagreeable cough,which the many remedies which I successively tried were unable to subdue.Ihad made preparation for departing on a particular day,but owing to the state of my health I was apprehensive that I should be compelled to postpone my journey for a time.The last day of my stay in Madrid,finding myself scarcely able to stand,I was fain to submit to a somewhat desperate experiment,and by the advice of the barber-surgeon who visited me,I determined to be bled.Late on the night of that same day he eased me of sixteen ounces of blood,and having received his fee,left me,wishing me a pleasant journey,and assuring me upon his reputation that by noon the next day I should be perfectly recovered.
A few minutes after his departure,whilst I was sitting alone,meditating on the journey which I was about to undertake,and on the rickety state of my health,I heard a loud knock at the street-door of the house,on the third floor of which I was lodged,not very comfortably.In a minute or two Mr.Southern of the British Embassy entered my apartment.After a little conversation he informed me that Mr.Villiers had desired him to wait upon me,to communicate a resolution which he,Mr.Villiers,had come to.
Being apprehensive that alone and unassisted I should experience considerable difficulty in propagating the Gospel of God to any considerable extent in Spain,he was bent upon exerting to the utmost his own credit and influence to further my views,which he himself considered,if carried into proper effect,extremely well calculated to operate beneficially on the political and moral state of the country.To this end it was his intention to purchase a very considerable number of copies of the New Testament,and to despatch them forthwith to the various British consuls established in different parts of Spain,with strict and positive orders to employ all the means,which their official situation should afford them,to circulate the books in question and to assure their being noticed.They were moreover to be charged to afford myself,whenever I should appear in their respective districts,all the protection,encouragement,and assistance I should stand in need of,as a friend of Mr.Villiers,and a person in the success of whose enterprise he himself took the warmest interest.
