Storia do Mogor 9.2.3

9.2.3

This celebrated literary man, although he had compiled various notices of that kingdom from other authors, nevertheless renders due justice to the labours of our Manuzzi, and he admits him to be the support and foundation of all his statements, wisely dwelling on the character of that author, who was not a simple traveller or merchant (people who are forced either to hurry hither and thither, or to confine themselves solely to cities near the sea), but in truth a medical man, whose profession had detained him at the court for a period of forty or more years, whereby was thrown open to him access to particular information, concealed from every other European, and the means of transcribing the original chronicles themselves. The said Father observes, furthermore, that in the mode of Manuzzi's narration, in spite of the text being in various and obscure languages, there is found a certain ardour of imagination fitted to sustain the historian who works on such materials; to which may be added that at the same time we discover in all these writings a certain air of unstudied simplicity and honest frankness, which still can be detected even when heightened and embellished by a chastened style [i.e. Catrou's]. This production of Father Catrou, although much honoured by Manuzzi, had not the fortune to please him when it reached him in India;