1922.] History and Ethnology of N.-E. India. 53 
were estimated at 30,000, and Don Antonio, attached to the 
Church of Noricol in Rajnagar, had joint charge with the 
‘* rector ”’ of 1,000 Cuitit nai 
At the end of the seventeenth century the Portuguese 
churches i in Eastern Bengal and Assam w ere those of ‘‘ Chand- 
pur” in Tipperah, Banja,' Pippli, Balasor, ‘‘' Tambolin’’-(Tam- 
luk, Midnapore], Jessore with 300 Christians, Hughli, Tezgaéon, 
Dacca, and ‘‘ Arrayal de Bencamatis,” or Rangamati in Assam. 
In 1713 Laynez, Bishop of S. Thomé, visited Bengal. He found 
Christian congregations at Hughli, Pippli, Chittagong Dacca, 
Husa —— in Mymensingh, [Nagori? ] and Rangamati, in 
8,000, and that in other parts of Bengal there were 25,000. 
Monsignor Cerri,’ secretary of the congregation De propaganda 
fide, writing about 1680, estimated the number at 22,000 divid- 
ed into eleven parishes, each of which had a vicar and a 
curate. It was, he admits, hard to find any adult converts save 
Portuguese slaves, who had been bought and made Christians. 
In 1840, according to Mr. Taylor,‘ the number belonging to the 

eatables. Anything man’s desire can wish for is to be found there, 
especially in the numerous Bazars or markets (Placas). I would wonder 
there at the sight of the quantity and variety of fowls and wild birds, 
all of them sold alive, and so ap that it was like giving them away 
forn hing ess t a silver real (four annas), in fact, one could 
very often get twenty turtle-doves or fifteen big wild ong sb ean all the 
other things went for the same price, more or less The wealth of 
this city is greatly due to the fact that it has in “its neig raccenend 
the fertile and delightful kingdoms of Bacala (North Bakarganj), Soli- 
esent cca 
District). !n this city (Katrabo) the first Religious built another Church 
and Residen nce, and a litt le after two others in the Bandels of Siripur and 
1 
Both are ancient settlements, post Gupta coins pada. ! been discovered at 
the former, while at Narayandia there is still a e with inscription 
dated 861 A.H. (1457 A.D.: vide J.A.S.B "1910, op: i41- 145). eet 
as Father Niard has already suggested to “Father Hosten, may be Phu 
baria, a mile to the N.W. of Narayandia, near the present railway 
station. Some Feringi Christians still reside there. H.E.S. 
1 [Dr. Wise adds in the text ‘‘ perhaps Banga in Farridpur”’; but 
engal : »?P 
and 20. ) shows that it was dike ‘Pippi ‘en Balasore) not far from Tam- 
lok-—probably on the Haldi River.] 
7. Note 4, p. 
3 “An account of the aoe Catholic ee throughout the world ” 
onyeens by Sir Richard Stee omg 1715 
* Topography of Dacca’’, <r 
