Andrada carried away with him Don Jerome, the king's nephew, and a
brother of his who was made prisoner in a skirmish with the natives, who
was converted, and died at Goa.
All the Jesuits agreed to desist from
the mission of Madagascar, and departed along with Andrada much against
his inclination; and thus ended the attempt to convert the natives of
Madagascar to the Christian religion.
SECTION XIV.
_Continuation of the Transactions of the Portuguese in India, from 1617
to 1640; and the conclusion of the Portuguese Asia of Manuel de Faria._
Towards the end of 1617, Don Juan Coutinno, count of Redondo, came to
Goa, as viceroy, to succeed Azevedo. During this year, three ships and
two fly-boats, going from Portugal for India, were intercepted near the
Cape of Good Hope by six English ships, when the English admiral
declared that he had orders from his sovereign to seize effects of the
Portuguese to the value of 70,000 crowns, in compensation for the injury
done by the late viceroy Azevedo to the four English ships at Surat.
Christopher de Noronha, who commanded the Portuguese ships, immediately
paid the sum demanded by the English admiral, together with 20,000
crowns more to divide among his men. But Noronha, on his arrival at Goa,
was immediately put under an arrest by the viceroy, for this
pusillanimous behaviour, and was sent home prisoner to Lisbon, to answer
for his conduct.
In the year 1618, the Moor who had been seen long before, at the time
when Nunno de Cunna took Diu, and was then upwards of 300 years old,
died at Bengal now 60 years older, yet did not appear more than 60 years
old at his death. In 1619, a large wooden cross, which stood on one of
the hills which overlook Goa, was seen by many of the inhabitants of
that city, on the 23d of February, to have the perfect figure of a
crucified man upon it. The truth of this having been ascertained by the
archbishop, he had it taken down, and got made from it a smaller cross,
only two spans long, on which was fixed a crucified Jesus of ivory, and
the whole surrounded by a golden glory; the rest of the cross being
distributed to the churches and persons of quality. Ten days after this
cross was removed, water gushed from the hole in which it was formerly
fixed, in which cloths being dipped wrought many miraculous cures. A
church was built on the spot to commemorate the miracle. At this time it
was considered, in an assembly of the principal clergy, whether the
threads, worn by the bramins across their shoulders, were a heathenish
superstition or only a mark of their nobility, and, after a long debate,
it was determined to be merely an honourable distinction. The reason of
examining this matter was, that many of the bramins refused to embrace
the Christian faith, because obliged to renounce these threads.
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