BISHOP COLENSO’S BOX

Greymouth Evening Star, 14 January 1933, Page 12

BISHOP COLENSO’S BOX

ANTS DESTROY SECRET All South Africa was interested lately when the mystery of Bishop Colenso’s locked and sealed wooden box, which had lain tantalisingly in the vestry of St. Mary’s Church, Pietermaritzburg, for nearly fifty years, was to be resolved. Now the box has been opened, and the mystery is deeper than ever, writes Eric Rosenthal in the “San Francisco Chronicle.” Bishop Colenso was a storm centre of the middle years of the last century. He had gained renown in England as a mathematician, years before he was appointed, in 1853, Bishop of Natal; but when he went out to his new field of labour the Zulus absorbed more of his attention than did mathematics. He learned the Zulu language and translated the New Testament. and other parts of the Bible into it; also he compiled a grammar and dictionary. Exchanging ideas with his native flock, he began to modify his own orthodox views and to speak his mind freely and before long he bad stirred up a heated controversy that raged hotely, at Home as well as in Africa. . In 1863 the bishops of South Africa met in conclave and deposed him, but the law did not uphold the deposition. Notwithstanding this, the metropolitan of Cape Town excommunicated him and appointed a rival bishop, and contributions to his missionary societies were withdrawn, although the Courts frustrated an attempt to deprive him of his episcopal income. A handsome testimonial was then raised in England by liberal sympathisers, and Colenso settled again in his diocese, where, until his death in 1883, he continued to work at his translations and his commentaries on the Bible. He also devoted himself to the cause of the natives, defending them against encroachment and exploitation by the colonists, thus adding to the opposition of the conservative clergy the more active enmity of numbers of the laity.

WHAT HE FORGOT And now comes the story of the mystery box. When he died, he left instructions to the wardens of his church at Pietermaritzburg, capital of Natal and seat of his bishopric, that the box be kept unopened until the last members of the family are dead. The bishop had never been a man of capricious whims, so his instructions were treated with faithful respect. The Colensos are a long-lived family Only a few months ago the two daughters of the bishop died at an advanced age, and the time had arrived for the opening of the box. interest in the mystery had grown with the year. The public waited for the church wardens to announce that no other relatives had been found. Rep resentatives of the Government a the Church of England gathered with the parish authorities at St. Mary s Church a few days ago. S 1^ e body knew the contents of the box, the final administration of the bisn op ? s estate Had waited torty-nine years until this moment. Creakingly the lid was lifted and the dust of years brushed away. The air was tense as the first man put in his hand. • He drew forth nothing There was nothing to draw forth. Nothing, that is, but a fragment of red cloth at the very bottom. The great mathematician had reckoned without the African antaAll that had been sealed so carefully away had been devoured, all but the little fragment of red cloth, bishop’s secret is forever safe T public of Natal, is extremely dis annointed and annoyed. Again, altei Saif a century, Bishop Colenso’s name is on every tongue.