t out. When the news of
his decease was received (the fourth Bishop to die at his post within
nine years), the appointment began to be looked on as a sentence of
death, and it was declined in succession by several eminent clergymen.
Daniel Wilson had anxiously watched for the answer in each case, and was
suggesting several persons to Mr. Charles Grant, when the thought struck
him, "Here I am, send me." A widower of fifty-four years old, of much
strength, and with no young children, seemed to him the fit person to
volunteer to fill the breach; and he wrote stating, that if no one else
could be found for the post, he was willing to offer himself. The
appointment was accordingly given to him, after an interval of nine
months since the see had become vacant, and an infinity of toil and
arrangements crowded on him. Islington was resigned to his son Daniel,
and he was consecrated by Archbishop Howley on the 29th of April, 1832,
"the day of my espousals to CHRIST my Saviour," as he wrote in his
journal; and on the ensuing 18th of June he sailed with his daughter for
Calcutta. The ship touched at the Cape, which under the government of
Sir Lowry Cole was by no means in the same hopeless state of neglect as
when Martyn had visited it. Bishop Wilson there held an ordination and a
confirmation, the first for himself as well as for South Africa, whose
Episcopate was not founded till twenty-three years later.

He landed at Calcutta on the 5th of November, 1832, and took possession
of the large unfurnished house that had at last been wrung out of
Government. He found only just enough chairs and tables, placed there by
the Archdeacon, to suffice for immediate use; and was answered, when he
asked why his orders that the place should be completely fitted up had
not been attended to, "I thought this would be enough to last for six
months,"--this being the term for which a Bishop of Calcutta was thought
likely to need earthly furniture. But Bishop Wilson was resolved to take
reasonable precaution, and not to be daunted, or to act as if he were
afraid. He furnished the place, and rented a pleasant country-house,
called the Hive, at Tittaghur, where he spent a few days of every week;
and, having been told that much danger was incurred by the exertion of
visitation tours before the constitution had become accustomed to the
climate, he resolved to wait for two years before making any long
journey; and, in the meantime, he was able to