THE PEOPLE.
Lutheran Mission. Nearly all of them are natives. Of those in the plains, more than half are Roman Catholics; in the Agency Lutherans are the most numerous sect.
The oldest Christian mission in the district is the London mission.1[1] Its pioneers, the Revs. G. Cran and A. des Granges, came from Tranquebar as far Lack as 1805 and were the first Protestants to preach in the Telugu country. Government invited them to hold services in the Court House in the fort at Vizagapatam, for the benefit of the soldiers and other British residents, and made them an allowance for so doing. They were assisted by a converted Bráhman from Tranquebar who had originally been a Roman Catholic. Educational work and translations of the Scriptures appear to have occupied more of the attention of the earlier missionaries than direct evangelization, and twenty-seven years elapsed before a single convert was made.
In 1840 a printing press was set up in Vizagapatam from which have issued, besides numerous tracts, two editions of a translation into Telugu of the New Testament and one of a version, in the same language, of the Old Testament. In 1845 the smaller vernacular schools belonging to the mission were closed and one central anglo-vernacular institution was started which eventually developed into the existing high school at Vizagapatam. Two missionaries, one stationed at Vizagapatam and one at Anakápalle, and two lady workers make up the present European staff; and there is a meeting-house in the fort at the former town and three other smaller ones elsewhere. After a century of effort, the number of native adherents of the mission is still less than 250.
It was not until 1845 that the Roman Catholic Church established any regular mission in 'the district.2[2] In that year five missionaries of St. Francis of Sales were sent thither. Their leader was the Very Rev. L. Gailhot, and in 1847 he was succeeded by the Very Rev. S. S. Neyret, who was consecrated Bishop of the diocese about two years afterwards and remained in charge of it until his death in 1862. Father Neyret was followed by the Right Rev. Dr. J. M. Tissot, one of the five original missionaries above mentioned, who held the post for 28 years and is buried at Súrada. During his time, in 1886, the existing diocese of Vizagapatam (which consists of the districts
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