Travels in India (Tavernier) 35.3.7

35.3.7

They undertook to drive out the inhabitants of the country. But the Viceroy not promising to grant what they asked except on condition that they became Catholics, and they being unwilling to agree, the arrangement which they proposed did not come to pass. A Jesuit Father was sent from Goa to these Christians to work for their conversion, but as he made no progress he preferred to devote his cares to the idolaters, whose language he acquired so perfectly that he spoke it as if he had been born in the country. From time to time he converted some of them, whom he sent to Goa. This he was never able to accomplish with the Christians of St. John, who are thoroughly fixed in their views; and, having passed nearly forty years with the idolaters, who were unwilling that any one should touch either their persons or their houses, it is easy to conclude that he had suffered much during that time, and that no kind of life could be more austere than his. For he had to live like the idolaters, who eat nothing which has had life; and as he travelled from one place to another the food of these countries was insufficient to give him the strength necessary for the fatigues which he had to undergo.