We conclude this account of the Ca tholic church with a sketch of the extent of its dominions, by enumerating the countries which profess its doctrines, or which contain considerable commu nities under its obedience. In Europe, Italy, Spain, Portugal, France, Belgium, the Austrian empire, including gary, Bavaria, Poland, and the Rhenish provinces of Prussia, which formerly belonged to the ecclesiastical electorates, profess the Catholic religion as that of the state, or, according to the expression of the French charte, that of the majority of the people. In America, all the coun tries which once formed part of the Spanish dominions, both in the southern and northern portion of the continent, and which are now independent states, profess exclusively the same religion. The empire of Brazil is also Catholic. Lower Canada and all those islands in the West Indies which belong to Spain or France, including the Republic of Haiti, profess the Catholic faith ; and there are also considerable Catholic communities in the United States of North America, especially in Maryland and Louisiana. Many Indian tribes, in the Canadas, in the United States, in California, and in South America, have embraced the same faith. In Asia there is hardly any nation professing Christianity which does not contain large communities of Catholic Christians. Thus in Syria the entire nation or tribe of the Maronites, dispersed over Mount Libanus, are subjects of the Roman see, governed by a patriarch and bishops appointed by it. There are also other Syriac Christians under other bishops, united to the same see, who arn dispersed all over Palestine and Syria. At Constantinople there is a Catholic Armenian patriarch who governs the united Armenians as they are called, large communities of whom also exist in Armenia proper. The Abbd Dubois, in
his examination before a committee of the House of Commons in 1832, stated the number of Catholics in the Indian peninsula at 600,000, including Ceylon, and this number was perhaps rather underrated than otherwise. There are at present an archbishop who is vicar apo stolic of Bengal, bishops who are vicars apostolic of Madras, Bombay, and Ceylon respectively, and they are assisted by co adjutor bishops. [BISHOPRIC.] A new one has been added for Ceylon. We have not the means of ascertaining the number of Catholics in China, but in the province of Su-Chuen alone they were returned, 22nd September, 1824, at 47,487 (Annales de la Propug. de la Foi, No. XI. p. 257) ; and an official report published at Rome in the same year gives those in the pro vinces of Fo-kien and Kiansi at 40,000. There are seven other provinces contain ing a considerab.e number of Catholics, of which we have no return. In the united empire of Tonkin and Cochin China the Catholics of one district were estimated at 200,000 (Ibid, No. X. p. 194), and, till the late persecution, there was a college with 200 students, and con vents containing 700 religious. Another district gave a return, in 1826, of 2955 infants baptized, which would give an estimate of 88,000 adult Christians. A third gave a return of 170,000. M. Du bois estimates the number of native Catholics in the Philippine Islands at 2,000,000. In Africa, the islands of Mauritius and Bourbon are Catholic, and all the Portuguese settlements on the coast, as well as the Azores, Madeira, the Cape Verd, and the Canary Islands.