Storia do Mogor 338.12.4

338.12.4

For in San Thome there was not one man who would give them as much as a glass of water, and all persons there thrust them aside as excommunicated. It was a sorrow to see the poor creatures wandering from door to door among the Hindu Malabāris asking for a mouthful of rice and some water. They received these in the palms of their hands, and out of them they ate. The rice and the water were dropped into them from a height by the Hindus, it not being their habit to come into contact with Christians, or to touch them in any matter of eating or drinking. Then for sleeping the poor things had no other accommodation than the hard stone benches at those Hindus' street-doors, on which they passed the nights. These Hindus still showed some humanity, but the Christians were without compassion. But why wonder at the Christians not succouring them, when the Church (I mean those who governed it there) showed no commiseration for them, although they appealed for it by making themselves out culprits (simply to show their obedience) about a thing wherein they were in nowise guilty.