Mr. and Mrs. Judson, as has already been stated, arrived in Rangoon June 13, 1813. For almost a year and a half since leaving their native land, they had been seeking a home on heathen shores. Having reached Calcutta, they had been forced by the oppressive policy of the East India Company to take refuge upon the Isle of France. They returned again to India and landed at Madras. But they were compelled to flee a second time, and having reluctantly relinquished the strong protection of the British flag, had, at last, settled down in Rangoon, the chief seaport of the Burman Empire. Their own desires and hopes had pointed elsewhere; and it was “with wandering steps and slow” that they had come to this destination. God had drawn around them the relentless toils of His providence, and had hemmed them in to this one opening. But subsequent history has proved that the hand which led them so strangely and sternly, was the hand that never errs. American Christians, in their assault upon Asiatic heathenism, could never have chosen such a strategic position as Rangoon. It is situated near the mouth of the great Irrawaddy River, which is thus described by an English officer: “After draining the great plain of upper Burmah, it enters a narrow valley lying between the spurs of the Arracan and Pegu ranges, and extending below the city of Prome. Thus the mighty stream rolls on through the widening bay, until about ninety miles from the sea, it bifurcates; one branch flows to the westward and forms the Bassein River, while the main channel of the lower part of the Delta subdivides and finally enters the sea by ten mouths. It is navigable for river steamers for 840 miles from the sea, but it is during the rainy season (Monsoon) that it is seen in its full grandeur. The stream then rises forty feet above its summer level, and flooding the banks presents in some places, as far as the eye can reach, a boundless expanse of turbid waters, the main channel of which rushes along with a velocity of five miles an hour.”