One of the most respectable persons employed in the English colonial service, is Sir EMERSON TENNANT, LL. D., K. C. B. &c., who was for many years connected with the administration in Ceylon, and is now, we believe, Governor of St. Helena. He has recently published a volume entitled _Christianity in Ceylon_, in which there are some passages of especial interest to American readers, displaying in a favorable light, the services rendered to civilization by the missionaries of this country. These parts of his work have attracted much consideration. The _Dublin University Magazine_ remarks: "We describe the American Mission, which acts under the direction of one of the oldest and most remarkable of the existing associations for the dissemination of Christianity, "The American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions," whose head-quarters are at Boston, in Massachusetts. The first settlers in Massachusetts, like those of New England generally, were missionary colonists. Their charter, given by Charles I., states that one of the objects of the king and of the planters was the conversion of the natives to the true faith; and the seal of the company thus incorporated bore the device of a North American Indian, with the motto "_Come over and help us_." It may be interesting to add, that the "pilgrim fathers" of the New England States were, indirectly, the cause of the Protestant missions of the Dutch. They were, as our author states, 'the first pioneers of the Protestant world, and the first heralds of the Reformed religion to the heathen of foreign lands. Their mission is more ancient than the Propaganda of Rome, and it preceded by nearly a century any other missionary association in Europe. It was encouraged by Cromwell, and incorporated by Charles II.; and Cotton Mather records that it was the example of the New England fathers, and their success amongst the Indians, that first aroused the energy of the Dutch for the conversion of the natives of Ceylon.'