hich his discoveries and translations from the
Pali were received by the savans of Europe. Major Forbes, in a private
letter, which I have been permitted to see, speaking of the difficulty
of doing justice to the literary character of Turnour, and the ability,
energy, and perseverance which he exhibited in his historical
investigations, says, "his _Epitome of the History of Ceylon_ was from
the first _correct;_ I saw it seven years before it was published, and
it scarcely required an alteration afterwards." Whilst engaged in his
translation of the _Mahawanso_, TURNOUR, amongst other able papers on
_Buddist History_ and _Indian Chronology_ in the _Journal of the Bengal
Asiatic Society_, v. 521, vi. 299, 790, 1049, contributed a series of
essays _on the Pali-Buddhistical Annals_, which were published in 1836,
1837, 1838.--_Journ. Asiatic Soc. Bengal_, vi. 501, 714, vii. 686, 789,
919. At various times he published in the same journal an account of the
_Tooth Relic of Ceylon, Ib._ vi. 856, and notes on the inscriptions on
the columns of Delhi, Allahabad, and Betiah, &c. &c.; and frequent
notices of Ceylon coins and inscriptions. He had likewise planned
another undertaking of signal importance, the translation into English
of a Pali version of the Buddhist scriptures, an ancient copy of which
he had discovered, unencumbered by the ignorant commentaries of later
writers, and the fables with which they have defaced the plain and
simple doctrines of the early faith. He announced his intention in the
_Introduction to the Mahawanso_ to expedite the publication, as "the
least tardy means of effecting a comparison of the Pali with the
Sanskrit version" (p. cx.). His correspondence with Prinsep, which I
have been permitted by his family to inspect, abounds with the evidence
of inchoate inquiries in which their congenial spirits had a common
interest, but which were abruptly ended by the premature decease of
both. Turnour, with shattered health, returned to Europe in 1842, and
died at Naples on the 10th of April in the following year, The first
volume of his translation of the _Mahawanso_, which contains
thirty-eight chapters out of the hundred which form the original work,
was published at Colombo in 1837; and apprehensive that scepticism might
assail the authenticity of a discovery so important, he accompanied his
English version with a reprint of the original Pali in Roman characters
with diacritical points.

He did not live to c